Nulo Baked & Coated Adult: Chicken, Duck & Turkey review

The poultry recipe lands in our Excellent band and the red meat one a rung below it in our Good band, which is where the typical adult dry food settles too. The reason is plain enough: a named fresh meat paired with a dried version of the same animal. Protein converts to 33.2% of dry matter in the red meat recipe and 32.6% in the poultry one, with estimated carbohydrate at 35.9% and 36.4% against the 46.2% of a typical adult dry food. The poultry one edges ahead, though not by enough to outweigh a preference for one animal over the other.

Ingredients, as declared: Fresh chicken (23%), dehydrated chicken proteins (18%), sweet potato, chickpeas, lentils, linseed (4.2%), fresh turkey (4%), fresh duck (4%), hydrolysed chicken protein, chicken fat, chicken broth (1%), pea fibre (0.5%), dried apples, salmon oil (0.5%), dried carrots, autolysed inactivated yeasts, minerals, chicory inulin, coconut oil (0.1%), dehydrated pumpkin (0.01%), dried cranberries, products from the processing of herbs (Curcuma longa).

Both labels lead with a fresh named meat and then back it with a dried version of the same animal, which is the order you want to see on a kibble. Fresh meat carries a lot of water, and nearly all of it disappears in the oven. The dried entries therefore put more finished protein into the bowl than their position suggests. Because neither label declares a moisture figure, the dry matter conversions above rest on the standard 8% assumption for a dry food.

The binding falls to lentils, chickpeas and sweet potato, and pea fibre at 0.5% adds a little bulk behind them. Legumes of this sort bring their own protein and fibre along with the starch. Neither recipe holds a cereal.

Chicken threads through both bags in ways the front of the pack does not advertise. Each bag uses chicken fat as its added fat. Hydrolysed chicken protein sits mid list as a palatant, and chicken broth is declared at 1%. Both get their marine omega from salmon oil at 0.5%. None of that is a fault. It does decide whether either bag suits a dog kept away from birds or from fish.

The small print is where this range does its quiet work. Taurine is dosed at 1,290 mg per kilo in the red meat recipe and 1,285 mg in the poultry one. It is an amino acid, and the heart is the usual reason for adding it. DL-methionine and choline chloride are both declared. Every trace mineral appears twice over in two different forms, zinc at 98 mg and 42 mg per kilo being the largest of them. The gut flora stabiliser is a live Enterococcus faecium culture, with chicory inulin to feed it.

The fruit and vegetable tail is garnish rather than groundwork. Dried apples, dried carrots, a berry, coconut oil at 0.1% and dehydrated pumpkin at 0.01% will not change a dog's week. The turmeric at the very end is there for the label as much as the bowl. The weight here sits on the meat and the short starch list, exactly where it belongs.

Chicken carries this version at 23% fresh and 18% dried. Fresh duck and fresh turkey at 4% each add company without displacing it. Linseed is stepped up to 4.2%, which gives the recipe a little more plant omega 3 than its stablemate, and the fruit tail finishes on dried cranberries. It is the leaner panel of the two on protein and the richer one on fat.

Both recipes come in 2kg and 10kg bags.

As a guide, a 15kg adult dog in moderate condition eats between 224 and 228 grams a day, assuming about 840 kcal a day (110 × bodyweight^0.75, the standard maintenance estimate). The label's own table asks 164 to 284 grams for a dog between 10kg and 20kg. Let your dog's waistline pick the figure.