Ci Foods Ci Peptide Plus: Skin & Coat review

Our Good band takes three versions of Peptide Plus, the same band as the typical adult dry food, while Weight Control settles a band below in Average. Gastro Care posts the strongest overall reading of the four and Weight Control the most modest. Transparency reads Outstanding across the entire range, fitting for recipes whose whole pitch is knowing what your dog is eating.

Ingredients, as declared: Freshly Prepared Hydrolysed Salmon (35%), Potato, Sweet Potato, Hydrolysed Dried White Fish (14%), Salmon Oil (4%), Beet Pulp, Soya Oil (3%), Hydrolysed Salmon Gravy (2.5%), Minerals, Dried Algae (Schizochytrium sp.) (0.2%), Borage Oil (0.2%), Marigold (Source of Lutein)

Hydrolysis is the range's signature: the turkey, salmon and white fish here are broken down into smaller protein fragments before they reach the recipe. Smaller fragments are less recognisable to an over-alert immune system, which is the thinking, and the species stay named on every label, so you always know which animal you are feeding.

Grain appears nowhere across the four recipes. Starch comes from potato and from sweet potato in all four versions, and estimated carbohydrate runs from 41.9% to 46.8% of dry matter across the range, straddling the 46.2% typical of adult dry food.

Each version carries its own toolkit. Dental Care fields a Plaque Defence blend at 2% with sodium hexametaphosphate at 6,150 mg/kg, a recognised tartar softener, plus seaweed, peppermint, cranberry and green tea. Skin & Coat stacks salmon oil at 4%, borage oil, dried algae and L-Carnitine at 1,442 mg. Weight Control drops energy to 315 kcal/100g with fibre at 8.5% and a pinch of green lipped mussel, while Gastro Care keeps its list shortest and adds dried yeast.

The fibre strategy deserves a plain word: cellulose in Dental Care and lignocellulose in Gastro Care and Weight Control are purified plant fibres that bulk and sweep without feeding the dog. In a dental or weight recipe that inertness is the point, but it is fibre chosen for function rather than nourishment.

On the single-protein question the four differ. Gastro Care is the clean one, with turkey as the only animal ingredient in any form. Dental Care pairs its turkey with hydrolysed dried salmon, Skin & Coat mixes salmon and white fish with soya oil, and Weight Control couples white fish with salmon oil and that trace of mussel. Read the version, not the range.

Salmon-led at 35% with hydrolysed dried white fish at 14%, then a deliberate stack of fats: salmon oil at 4%, soya oil at 3%, borage oil and dried algae, with L-Carnitine dosed at 1,442 mg. The soya oil is the entry for sensitive owners to note.

All four versions sit at £7.50 a kilo, sold as a 1.5kg trial bag, sets of four 1.5kg bags and a 10kg sack.

Daily amounts for a 15kg adult dog in moderate condition range from 220 grams on Skin & Coat to 267 grams on the lighter Weight Control. That puts the day rate between £1.65 and £2.00 on the usual 840 kcal maintenance basis (110 × bodyweight^0.75).