ROR Senior & Light review

This recipe earns our Outstanding band, and that band is where the middle of the raw field already lives, so it is holding its place in the strongest category we cover. What lifts it above that midpoint is the naming: two animals with percentages, five plant ingredients spelled out, and a printed vitamin and mineral panel behind them. Protein and processing and transparency both read Outstanding with nutritional balance just behind at Excellent, and those readings are the clearest sign that the light positioning has not been bought by thinning the recipe out.

Ingredients, as declared: Free Range Deboned Turkey 51%, Deboned White Fish 25%, Sweet Potato 10%, Carrots 5%, Green Beans 3%, Cranberry, Redcurrants, Salmon Oil, Seaweed, Yucca, Green Tea, Dandelion, Hawthorn Leaf, Beet.

Turkey at 51% and white fish at 25% put named animal ingredients at 76% of the pack, both deboned. Turkey is a natural fit for a recipe like this, being highly digestible, lighter in fat than chicken and reliably palatable for a dog whose appetite has become choosier with age.

On an otherwise exact label, the fish is the loose entry. White fish names the family, not the species, so it is one to keep in mind when you are managing a dog around a specific fish. In every other respect the animal side is precise, which is what makes the category entry stand out at all.

The plant list is the fullest thing about this recipe. Sweet potato at 10% brings slow starch and bulk, carrot at 5% brings vitamin A, plus soluble fibre and antioxidants, and green beans at 3% add fibre with very little energy behind it. Cranberry, redcurrant, dandelion, hawthorn leaf, green tea, yucca and beet sit at the tail as trace additions, with seaweed the one carrying real mineral value as a source of iodine.

The analysis is where the light claim earns itself. Protein converts to 31.6% of dry matter and fat to 33.5%. Those sit close enough together to read as a balanced bowl, and energy comes out at 155 kcal per 100g, level with the middle of the raw field. Carbohydrate is estimated at 27.3% of dry matter against a 5.0% category typical, which follows both the generous vegetable fraction and the by-difference method used to reach it.

Behind the food sits a printed vitamin and mineral pack: vitamin A, vitamin D, vitamin E, zinc, iron, copper, iodine and selenium. The selenium is given as inactivated selenised yeast. No calcium ingredient is named, which follows from deboned meat rather than a bone in grind, and the calcium reading converts to 0.89% of dry matter.

Sold in 1kg packs. There is no checked per kilo figure on file for this recipe, so there are no cost figures below.

A 15kg adult dog in moderate condition, working from the standard maintenance estimate of 110 × bodyweight^0.75 and so about 840 kcal a day, gets through roughly 541 grams of this one. The label's own table asks 315 to 625 grams for dogs between 10kg and 25kg, so the two guides sit close together.