Cesar Senior Wet Trays in Jelly: Poultry, Lamb & Beef Chunks review

Our Average band is where this one settles. Before that reads as a warning, it is worth understanding why. Wet food is the strongest category we score, with the typical adult tin or tray reaching our Excellent band, largely because wet recipes usually declare more of their meat than this label does. Here protein and processing comes out Poor: 4% of a named animal inside a chunk described as meat and animal derivatives gives little to credit. Transparency reads Outstanding on the strength of what the label does declare. Nutritional balance reads Outstanding, and the figures bear that out, with protein converting to 43.6% of dry matter, fat to 28.2% and the estimated carbohydrate to 17.4% against the 15.8% typical of adult wet food. Older dogs have been eating trays like this happily for years, and nothing in the analysis argues with that.

Ingredients, as declared: Meat and Animal Derivatives (in the Chunk* 90%, including Chicken 4%), Cereals (including Rice 1.1%, equivalent to cooked Rice 4%), Derivatives of Vegetable origin, Minerals, 96% natural, Chunk typically 49% of the product, Meat and Animal Derivatives (in the Chunk* 90%, including Beef 4%), Cereals, Vegetables (including a mix of Dried Carrots and Peas 0.8%, equivalent to Carrots and Peas mix 4.5%), Derivatives Vegetable origin, Minerals, 92% natural, Chunk typically 48% of the product, Meat and Animal Derivatives (in the Chunk* 90%, including Lamb 4%), Cereals, Vegetables (including Dried Peas 1.2%, equivalent to 4%), Derivatives of Vegetable origin, Minerals, 92% natural, Chunk typically 48.5% of the product, Meat and Animal Derivatives (in the Chunk* 90%, including Turkey 4%), Cereals (including Rice 1.1%, equivalent to Cooked Rice 4%), Derivatives of Vegetable origin, Minerals, * 93% natural, Chunk typically 49% of the product

The tray is built as a chunk in jelly, with the chunk running from 48% to 49% of the product. Inside it, meat and animal derivatives are declared at 90% on all four recipes, and one animal is named at 4%: chicken on one sleeve, beef on another, then lamb and turkey.

That 4% is the whole of what the pack pins down. Any part of any warm-blooded land animal can sit under meat and animal derivatives. The mix behind it may be reformulated from batch to batch and the printed list will read the same. A great deal of big-brand wet food is written like this, so it is not a red flag by itself. It does turn the tray into an act of trust, not a recipe you can read.

Rice is named at 1.1% dried, equivalent to 4% cooked, inside a cereals entry that goes no further than that. Rice is easily digested and a fair choice for an old dog. The estimated carbohydrate works out at 17.4% of dry matter, a touch above the wet-food norm but nothing unusual for a recipe set in jelly.

Cassia gum at 1661 mg per kilo does the setting. It is drawn from senna seed and used right across the wet category. Of everything on this label, this is the entry a careful owner will want flagged.

Where the tray does well is energy for the volume. At 93 kcal per 100g with fat converting to 28.2% of dry matter, this is one of the richer wet foods by weight. That is exactly what helps when an old dog is picking at meals. The nutritional additives are printed with doses across vitamin D3, vitamin E, copper, iodine, iron, manganese and zinc.

£5.47 a kilo, in 150g trays sold in packs of 8.

As a guide, a 15kg adult dog in moderate condition works out at about £4.94 a day, or roughly 903 grams. The assumption is 840 kcal a day (110 × bodyweight^0.75, the standard maintenance estimate). The label's own guide for a dog of that weight is lighter, at 637.5 to 675 grams a day.