Essential Foods

Essential Foods Essential Highland Living review

Name: Essential Foods Essential Highland Living
Brand: Essential Foods

72.6/100Excellent

DryAdult

A Scottish larder emptied into one bag: turkey, salmon, Aberdeen Angus beef and a wild bird mix of quail, pigeon, pheasant and guinea fowl. It sits in our Excellent band. This is a food for a dog with a broad palate, and the label is open about nearly all of it.

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Our view

Likely to suit

Dogs with a wide appetite
Fussy eaters. Turkey liver stock at 2% gives the kibble a flavour worth coming back to
Country and working dogs, with fat at 18.5% of dry matter
Coat condition: fresh salmon at 12% and linseed both in the recipe
An older dog's joints, with glucosamine, MSM and chondroitin named

Worth watching

Seven animals plus egg, the wrong tool for narrowing down a reaction
Not fish free, with salmon at 12%
An omega oil at 6% under the brand's own name, source never stated

Written by our editorial team. Independent guidance, not veterinary advice.

How this scores

How we score

72.6/100Excellent

Protein and processingGood

Nutritional balanceGood

TransparencyOutstanding

ValueExcellent

The details

Dog fit

Listed for adult dogs of every size. It is a dense recipe, so weigh the daily amount and adjust by condition.

Food type

Dry

Life stage

Adult

Breed size

Toy, Small, Medium, Large, Giant

Main protein

Turkey

The score, in context

Essential Highland Living 72.6

All one Excellent. Typical dry food: Good.

A run of named animals and a candid label carry it a step above the typical adult kibble.

What's in it

Dried and fresh free-range turkey44%Declared together, so you cannot tell how much survives the oven. Easy to digest, a little leaner than chicken.
Sweet potato
Fresh Scottish salmon12%Long-chain marine omega 3.
Chickpeas, peasBinding. Chickpeas release slowly, which suits a dog that works in bursts.
Fresh Aberdeen Angus beef6%
Wild birds: quail, pigeon, pheasant, guinea fowl6%A genuinely unusual thing to find on a British label.
Linseed, Essential the Omega 3 Oil6% (oil)The oil is doing real work at that level, and the list never says what it is pressed from.
Whole eggs, turkey liver stock5%, 2%The stock is the palatability trick.
Alfalfa sprouts, MOS, FOS
Glucosamine, MSM, chondroitin, then a fruit, vegetable and herb tailThe joint trio is named, not dosed.

Printed in full: taurine at 1,500mg, trace minerals as amino acid chelates for readier uptake, and rosemary extract to preserve.

Calcium comes out at 1.74% of dry matter, a fair helping for an adult food and the result of this much dried meat.

Named ingredients

Dried & fresh free-range turkey (44%), sweet potato, fresh Scottish salmon (12%), chickpeas, peas, fresh aberdeen angus beef (6%), wild birds (quail, pigeon, pheasant & guinea fowl)(6%), linseed, ESSENTIAL the OMEGA 3 OIL (6%), whole eggs (5%), turkey liver stock (2%), alfalfa sprouts, vitamins, minerals, MOS (mannan oligosaccharides), FOS (fructooligosaccharides), glucosamine, MSM (methylsulfonylmethane), chondroitin, cranberry, acai, bilberry, mulberry, apple, tomato, orange, pear, carrot, spinach, cauliflower, seaweed, marigold, ginseng, decaffeinated green tea, ginger.

Against the range

Turkey leads at 44%, declared dried and fresh together, with salmon, Angus beef, four wild birds and egg behind it. Chickpeas, peas and sweet potato do the binding with no cereal, and carbohydrate is estimated at 37.0% of dry matter against a typical 46.2%.

Nutritional analysis

Declared analysis

Energy

362 kcal/100g

Protein

29%

Fat

17%

Fibre

3.5%

Ash

8.5%

Moisture

Dry weight

Protein

31.5%

Fat

18.5%

Fibre

3.8%

Ash

9.2%

Carbs

37%

As-fed composition

Estimated breakdown of the finished product by ingredient category, from the declared ingredient list and ingoing weights. These are estimates, not measurements.

Meat

75%

Carbs

15.9%

Veg

0.8%

Oils

Other

2.3%

Pricing & size