Natural & Delicious N&D Prime Adult Medium & Maxi Dry Food: Lamb & Blueberry review

The two recipes land together in our Excellent band, a step up on the Good band where the typical adult dry food settles. The gap between them is narrow. They declare the same protein and fat, and carbohydrate converts to 30.8% of dry matter on the lamb against 31.3% on the chicken, both a long way under the 46.2% typical of adult dry food. Choose on which of the two animals suits your dog.

Ingredients, as declared: Fresh boneless lamb (26%), dehydrated lamb meat (25%), sweet potatoes, dried whole eggs, fresh herrings, dehydrated herrings, chicken fat, fish oil(from herring), fiber vegetable of peas, dried carrots, dried alfalfa, inulin, fructooligosaccharides, yeast extract (source of mannan-oligosaccharides), dried blueberry (0.5%), dried apple, dried pomegranate, dried sweet orange, dried spinach, psyllium (0.3%), sodium chloride, dried brewer's yeast, turmeric root (0.2%), glucosamine, chondroitin sulfate.

The opening pair of entries is what makes this range worth reading. Fresh boneless meat at 26% brings the quality and the palatability. Dehydrated meat of the same animal at 25% brings the concentration, and that matters because the oven takes most of the fresh share away as water. With both declared, you can see that the meat is genuinely there in the finished kibble rather than only in the fresh figure. Protein converts to 37.4% of dry matter and fat to 19.8%.

Herring appears twice over, once fresh and once dehydrated, with herring oil a little further down. Marine omega 3 comes in ready for a dog to use, and the amino acid profile broadens beyond the headline animal. Dried whole eggs do similar work. Egg is roughly the most complete protein a recipe can put in.

The only substantial carbohydrate is sweet potato, and the pea fibre behind it is there for bulk. Carbohydrate is estimated at 30.8% of dry matter on the lamb and 31.3% on the chicken. For a dry food that is genuinely low, and the clearest sign that the meat is carrying the recipe. There is no grain and no white potato anywhere.

The support cast is thoughtful. Inulin and FOS look after the gut flora with the yeast-derived MOS, psyllium at 0.3% adds soluble fibre, and dried carrot, alfalfa and spinach fill in the plant nutrients. The named fruit is a small share: blueberry or pomegranate at 0.5%, with apple, sweet orange and turmeric at 0.2% behind it. Read the front of the bag as a flavour signature.

The additive panel runs long and prints its numbers. Chelates carry the trace minerals, the form generally absorbed more readily, and selenium arrives as the yeast form. The amino acid entries include DL-methionine at 4000 mg, taurine at 1000 mg and L-carnitine at 300 mg per kilo. Aloe vera extract at 1000 mg and green tea extract at 100 mg round it off. Glucosamine and chondroitin appear on the ingredients list itself with no dose attached, so treat them as a helping hand for older joints.

Lamb takes the same two opening positions at 26% fresh boneless and 25% dehydrated, and dried whole eggs move up ahead of the chicken fat, which shifts more of the recipe onto the animal itself. Dried blueberry at 0.5% gives it the name. Ash sits a little higher at 8.3%, calcium at 1.21% of dry matter and energy at 398 kcal per 100g. Reach for this one if poultry meat is what your dog does not get on with.

£7.50 a kilo on both recipes. The chicken and pomegranate comes in 2,5kg and 12kg bags as the label writes them, the lamb and blueberry in 2,5kg.

Take 840 kcal a day as the assumption for a 15kg adult dog in moderate condition (110 × bodyweight^0.75, the standard maintenance estimate). That is about 210 grams a day for the chicken bag and 211 for the lamb, or £1.58 a day on either recipe. Portion size is the waistline's call in the end.