Markus Muhle Markus Muehle Red Deer review

This lands in our Good band, and so does the typical cold-pressed food, which makes it a solid middle-of-the-field result in a category we rate well. Named game meats and a fish inclusion open the case for it, backed by a mineral and vitamin panel printed with doses and a joint ingredient at a size you can actually see. Pulling the other way is a base of rice, potato and millet. Carbohydrate converts to 46.1% of dry matter against the 43.2% typical for the category, and protein to 28.4%, respectable without being remarkable. Protein and processing reads Good. Transparency comes back Excellent, with nutritional balance at Average.

Ingredients, as declared: Dried and ground Barbary duck meat 18%, ground wholegrain rice, dried and ground deer meat 9.4%, potato, flakes, dried and ground white fish 6.3%, ground millet, dried rice germ, gelatine, dried and ground beta, vulgaris, dried and ground venison bone, seaweed blend, fresh green herbs, cold-pressed vegetable oil, mixture, linseed, dried moor 2%, forest berries (consisting of: red currents, raspberries, berries, blueberries, rosehips, cranberries) 2%, fennel seeds, dried and ground Yucca schidigera, egg yolk powder, silica 1.5%, green-lipped mussel (Perna canaliculus) extract 1.5%, green mineral soil

Like the rest of the Markus Muehle range, this is pressed at low temperature. An extruded biscuit is cooked and puffed, and this one is not. The pellet crumbles in water where an extruded one expands. Fed like a dry food and stored like one, it asks nothing extra of your kitchen, which is most of the appeal of the format.

Barbary duck at 18% is the biggest single entry, with deer meat at 9.4% behind it. That order is worth knowing if you came here for a venison diet, because the deer is genuine and named but the duck is doing more of the work. Dried and ground venison bone appears further down and is where most of the calcium comes from, converting to 1.51% of dry matter.

White fish at 6.3% adds marine protein and oils, and the carbohydrate base is wholegrain rice, potato flakes and millet, with dried rice germ behind them. Millet is gluten free and gentle, and rice germ carries a large share of the grain's B vitamins in a very small ingredient. Crude fibre reads high for the category at 6.2% of dry matter, which the beetroot, the dried moor at 2% and the seed and berry tail all feed into.

That tail is unusually long and unusually specific. Forest berries at 2% cover redcurrants, raspberries, blueberries, rosehips and cranberries, a properly mixed set of antioxidants. Fennel seeds and Yucca schidigera follow, then a seaweed blend. Green lipped mussel extract is declared at 1.5%, a real inclusion and not a name-check for the front of the bag. Silica at 1.5% and a green mineral soil close the list out.

Two entries do not say where they came from. Gelatine could be sourced from any animal, and the cold-pressed vegetable oil mixture is the one place where a label this precise steps back into generality. Against that, the vitamin and trace element declaration is printed in full, line by line, with a dose against each.

It comes in 5kg and 15kg bags.

For a 15kg adult dog in moderate condition the standard maintenance estimate is roughly 840 kcal a day (110 × bodyweight^0.75). Against this food's estimated 319 kcal per 100g, that is about 263 grams a day.