Royal Canin Mini Adult review

We have this one in our Average band. The typical adult dry food scores a tier above it, in our Good band. The main reason is order. Wheat flour opens the list, so the cereal side is the single biggest block in the recipe, and maize gluten further down adds plant protein. There is credit on the other side of the ledger. Moisture is declared at 8% instead of assumed, and pork is named outright where most of this brand's meat entries are not. Estimated carbohydrate comes out at 44.4% of dry matter, marginally under the 46.2% typical of adult dry food.

Ingredients, as declared: Wheat flour, dehydrated poultry proteins, maize flour, animal fats, hydrolysed animal proteins, dehydrated pork proteins, maize, barley, maize gluten, wheat, minerals, beet pulp, soya oil, yeasts products, fructo-oligosaccharides, fish oil, algal oil Schizochytrium sp

Wheat flour in first place is the headline fact about this recipe. It binds a kibble together well and most dogs digest it without complaint. Wheat is also the grain named most often when a dog proves intolerant of one. Keep it in mind if your small dog has ever had an itchy spell nobody could explain.

The two animal entries are dehydrated poultry proteins and dehydrated pork proteins, with the pork the one to look at. It is still rarely used in dog food, which makes it new to a great many dogs, and it is a good, highly palatable meat in its own right. Between them the recipe reaches 27% protein, or 29.3% of dry matter.

Behind the flour comes more cereal: maize flour, maize, barley and whole wheat, with maize gluten raising the protein figure without bringing any meat with it. Barley is the pick of that group, cooking down into an easily digested grain that carries useful fibre and micronutrients along with it. Estimated carbohydrate lands at 40.8% as fed.

Fat runs at 16% and energy at 391 kcal per 100g, so the kibble is dense for the size of dog eating it, and portions want measuring. Beet pulp and fructo-oligosaccharides handle the fibre and prebiotic side, with crude fibre modest at 1.4%.

The oils at the bottom of the list are worth a look. Soya oil sits alongside fish oil and an algal oil from Schizochytrium. A plant oil on its own cannot provide long chain omega 3s, and those last two can. Each trace mineral has its dose in print, zinc at 128 mg and manganese at 49 mg per kilo among them.

£5.62 a kilo, in 2kg, 4kg and 8kg bags.

As a guide, a 15kg adult dog in moderate condition would get through about 215 grams a day, assuming about 840 kcal a day (110 × bodyweight^0.75, the standard maintenance estimate). That is £1.21 a day. A small dog eats a good deal less. On the label's low activity rows, 69 grams covers a 4kg dog and 137 grams a 10kg one.