Darf Complete Adult Dry Wild review

This recipe reaches our Excellent band. The middle of the cold-pressed field sits a step below it, in our Good band. Protein and processing and transparency each read Excellent, with nutritional balance further back at Average. What keeps it from going higher is the plant fraction and the balance of the analysis, not the animals, which are as interesting as anything in the category. For a dog who needs a protein they have never met, the band word is beside the point.

Ingredients, as declared: 60% meat (30% deer meat, 15% roe meat, 9% goose bone, 6% deer organ), 2% eggs, 14% raw dried carrot, 13% raw apple, 5% millet 2% krill, 2% coconut oil, 1% nettle

Cold pressing is the reason this lives in the cupboard and not the freezer. The ingredients are pressed together under gentle heat, not cooked at extrusion temperatures. That keeps things like raw dried carrot recognisable as themselves. The finished pellet crumbles in liquid and does not swell.

The animal share is the reason to be here. Deer meat at 30% and roe at 15% are the muscle, deer organs at 6% carry the vitamin dense material, and goose bone at 9% is the calcium source, landing at 1.25% of dry matter. Naming the bone rather than adding a mineral is the more informative way round, and it also explains the modest ash figure of 5.9% of dry matter.

Game meats are leaner than farmed ones as a rule, and eggs at 2% are the small top-up that brings the fat and the amino acid balance back into line. Egg is one of the most complete proteins a recipe can borrow, and at this level it is doing a job rather than padding a list.

The plant side runs raw dried carrot at 14% and raw apple at 13%, giving fibre and a little natural sweetness, with millet at 5% as the grain, gluten free and easy on most digestions. Krill at 2% supplies the marine omega fats that venison alone cannot, coconut oil at 2% adds readily used energy, and nettle at 1% closes the label.

The analysis reads as a steady adult food. Protein converts to 26.0% of dry matter and fat to 10.9%, with 399 kcal in every 100g, comfortably above the 351 kcal typical for cold-pressed food. Carbohydrate estimates at 54.7% of dry matter against a 43.2% typical, the consequence of dried fruit and vegetables taking well over a quarter of the recipe. The micronutrients are declared as a vitamin and mineral supplement at 0.5% without printed doses.

£6.18 a kilo, sold in 4kg and 14kg bags.

A 15kg adult dog in moderate condition needs around 840 kcal a day on the standard maintenance estimate (110 × bodyweight^0.75), which on this recipe is roughly 210 grams, or £1.30 a day.