Nourish Grain Free Adult Large Breed: Salmon With Trout, Sweet Potato & Asparagus review

Both bags come out in our Good band, level with the typical adult dry food. Half of each recipe declared as a named animal, a joint package with real figures next to it and a fully dosed mineral panel are what carry them there. The starch behind the meat is what stops them going further. Carbohydrate reads 42.4% of dry matter in the turkey recipe and 47.3% in the salmon, against the 46.2% typical for a dry food. For a big adult with joints to look after, the dog these bags are drawn for, that balance is a sensible one.

Ingredients, as declared: Salmon and Trout 50% (including Freshly Prepared Salmon & Freshly Prepared Trout 33%, Dried Salmon 15%, Salmon Stock 2%) Sweet Potato (24%), Peas (9%), Potato, Beet Pulp, Linseed, Omega 3 Supplement, Minerals, Vitamins, Vegetable Stock, Asparagus (0.3%), Glucosamine (170 mg/kg), Methylsulfonylmethane (170 mg/kg), Chondroitin Sulphate (125 mg/kg), FOS (96 mg/kg), MOS (24 mg/kg)

Both labels declare 50% of the recipe as a named animal and then break that share down into a freshly prepared part and a dried one. Freshly prepared meat sheds its water during baking, and the dried entry ends up doing more of the finished work than its smaller percentage suggests. Protein lands at 26.1% of dry matter in the salmon recipe and 31.5% in the turkey.

Sweet potato at 24% is the leading plant entry in both. Potato follows, with peas at 7% to 9%. Neither label carries a cereal, and dried beet pulp supplies the fibre.

This range exists as a separate thing because of the joint package, and that package is dosed in print: glucosamine and methylsulfonylmethane at 170 mg/kg each, chondroitin sulphate at 125 mg/kg. Those are figures you can hold a manufacturer to, which is more than a bullet point on the front of a bag ever gives you.

Linseed appears on both lists as a plant omega 3 source, and the turkey recipe also names turkey fat at 2%, which is the one animal fat in the range pinned to a species. Both labels then carry an entry called omega 3 supplement with no source attached. On an exclusion diet, that stops either recipe from counting as strictly fish free.

Fructooligosaccharides at 96 mg/kg and mannanoligosaccharides at 24 mg/kg feed the gut bacteria in both bags. The vitamin panel runs down to 95 IU of vitamin E, and the trace minerals give zinc and iron 50 mg each, manganese 35 mg and iodine 1 mg per kilo. The turkey label adds copper at 15 mg and selenium at 0.3 mg, while the salmon panel stops short of both. That is a difference in the labelling and not anything to worry about in the bowl.

Salmon and trout at 50%. Their freshly prepared share comes to 33%. Dried salmon adds 15%, salmon stock 2%, and asparagus sits at 0.3% down at the bottom. It is the leaner declaration of the two on protein at 26.1% of dry matter, and the one that leans harder on its plant side with carbohydrate at 47.3%. Every meat entry here is a fish, so a big dog kept away from land meats has its answer, and the starch leaves nutritional balance reading Average.

£4.07 a kilo for either recipe, sold as a 200g sample, a 1.5kg bag, a 6kg bag and a 13.5kg sack.

As a guide, a 15kg adult dog in moderate condition eats about 232 grams a day of the salmon and 229 of the turkey. The figure behind it is around 840 kcal a day (110 × bodyweight^0.75, the standard maintenance estimate). That comes to £0.94 and £0.93 a day. A big dog gets through considerably more, and the label asks 415 grams for a 40kg dog and 620 grams at 70kg.