Lovejoys Original Wet Adult: Chicken & Tripe review

Five of the six recipes finish in our Excellent band, with the Chicken and Tripe just below in our Good band. The choice here is about which animal suits your dog, not about which tin is better made. The middle of the adult wet market sits in that same band, which puts this shelf in strong company rather than behind it. Chicken with Rice and Vegetables and Turkey with Rice and Vegetables read strongest, helped by a single named meat at 60% and a full printed additive panel. The plant load is what keeps the whole shelf from climbing higher. Brown rice, peas and carrots push estimated carbohydrate to between 18.9% and 31.5% of dry matter, where adult wet food usually sits at 15.8%.

Ingredients, as declared: Chicken (41%), Tripe (19%), Brown Rice (5%), Dried Carrots (1%, equivalent to 10% Carrot), Dried Peas (1.25%, equivalent to 4% Peas), Minerals, Salmon Oil (2.8%), Dried Herbs (0.5% - Parsley, Oregano, Thyme, Rosemary), Dried Seaweed, Omega 3 (0.09%), Omega 6 (0.58%), Glucosamine (0.004%), Chondroitin (0.002%), Yucca Extract (0.002%), Cranberry Extract (0.002%), Yeast Extract (0.001%)

The meat comes first on every label and it is named. The three single meat tins run chicken at 60%, lamb at 60% and turkey at 60%. Then come chicken at 41% with tripe at 19%, duck at 30% with chicken at 30%, and the Ocean Fish with salmon at 50% and white fish at 10%. Only that white fish stops short of a species, which is a good record for a wet shelf at this end of the market.

Tripe deserves a word, because it looks odd on a label and is not. Tripe is the stomach of a ruminant. It is rich in protein and famously appealing to dogs that pick at their food, and at 19% it is a proper inclusion.

Brown rice at 5% is the constant behind the meat, with dried carrot and dried pea reconstituting to larger fresh weights that two of the labels helpfully spell out as 10% carrot and 4% peas. Most dogs take rice easily and it makes a sensible carrier, though its presence rules the shelf out for a grain free household.

Salmon oil is the fat of choice, printed at 2.8% on two of the labels, with the omega figures declared beside it. Iodine and trace minerals come from the seaweed. Yucca extract is in there for stool odour, and the cranberry and yeast extracts come right at the list's end, where the amounts are small.

Glucosamine and chondroitin appear on all six labels and both are given figures, either as a percentage or as milligrams per kilo, at 38 mg/kg and 22 mg/kg where the numbers are printed that way. Those are modest amounts and honest extras, not a treatment. If your dog has a diagnosed joint problem, keep them on whatever the vet has dosed.

Every tin prints its added vitamin and mineral panel in full, from vitamins A, D3 and E through a line of trace elements. A lot of wet labels offer less. The figures are not identical across the range, so it is worth reading the tin you actually put in the trolley.

Chicken at 41% with tripe at 19%, and the tin to reach for when a dog is turning its nose up at dinner. At 26.2% of dry matter its estimated carbohydrate is on the higher side.

£4.53 a kilo on the Chicken and Tripe, Chicken with Rice and Vegetables, Ocean Fish and Turkey recipes, and £4.67 a kilo on Chicken and Duck and on Lamb. All six come in 395g tins, sold in packs of 10.

As a guide, a 15kg adult dog in moderate condition eats roughly 587 to 832 grams a day, which comes to between £2.74 and £3.77 depending on the recipe. That works from about 840 kcal a day, or 110 × bodyweight^0.75, the standard maintenance estimate.