Essential Foods Essential Balance review

This one comes out in our Good band, the same band most adult dry food occupies, which makes it a solidly conventional bowl rather than a striking one. Transparency lands on Excellent, protein and processing and value both on Good, and nutritional balance on Average. The turkey first ingredient and the properly dosed prebiotics pull upwards, while the undeclared meat share, protein at 24.0% of dry matter and a starch level above the category norm pull back the other way. It is a food built to be easy on a dog rather than to impress a label reader, and it succeeds at the thing it set out to do.

Ingredients, as declared: Freshly prepared and dried turkey, white rice, brown rice, oats, whole linseed, turkey gravy, turkey fat, beet pulp, alfalfa, minerals, vitamins, ESSENTIAL the OMEGA 3 OIL, natural seaweed, Fructooligosaccharides (FOS, 960 mg/kg), Chicory Extract (0.05%), Yucca Extract (190 mg/kg), Dandelion.

Turkey opens the list in both forms at once, freshly prepared and dried combined into a single entry, which means the meat starts ahead of the cereal. Turkey is leaner than chicken, easy on most dogs and reliably palatable. The label puts no number on it. That is the figure a careful reader most wants, because a combined fresh and dried entry can be weighted either way.

White rice, brown rice and oats sit next, and the pairing looks deliberate. White rice is quick to digest and kind to an unsettled stomach, and brown rice keeps its bran and the fibre that comes with it. Oats add more fibre still, along with a spread of minerals. Fibre converts to 4.4% of dry matter and estimated carbohydrate to 56.3%, a starchier build than the 46.2% typical of an adult dry food.

Turkey gravy and turkey fat keep the animal side of the recipe on one bird all the way down. That is unusual, since most makers reach for a generic animal fat at this point. The omega 3 oil is the single exception, carrying the maker's own name with no declared source, so the one-bird story cannot be checked to the last line.

Alfalfa, natural seaweed and dandelion make up the herbal end. Seaweed is a broad mineral source and the usual reason a maker includes an iodine-bearing plant. Dandelion has a long history as a gentle digestive herb, and whole linseed ahead of them supplies omega 3 in its plant form. All of it sits at small inclusion levels, doing seasoning work only.

The prebiotics are dosed properly, with fructooligosaccharides at 960 mg/kg, chicory extract at 0.05% and yucca extract at 190 mg/kg. Chicory in particular is a reliable source of the inulin that gut bacteria thrive on. Trace minerals come in sulphate form, printed at 50 mg of zinc, 50 mg of iron, 35 mg of manganese, 12 mg of copper and 1 mg of iodine per kilo. Rosemary extract handles the preserving, and that is the natural way to do it.

£4.70 a kilo. Bags come in 2.5kg and 10kg, with a four-bag case of the 2.5kg and a two-bag case of the 10kg.

As a guide, a 15kg adult in moderate condition would eat about 255 grams a day, assuming around 840 kcal a day (110 × bodyweight^0.75, the standard maintenance estimate). That works out at £1.20 a day. The maker's own chart is more conservative, putting a 15kg dog at 204 grams, so start where the pack says and let the waistline adjust it.