Symply Adult: Fresh Lamb review

All four of these finish in our Good band, level with the middle of the adult dry category, and the lamb comes in just below its siblings without leaving that band. Transparency reads Outstanding across the range, which is where these recipes are strongest: the meat is named, the split behind the number is printed, and the plant side is recognisable food rather than fractions. Nutritional balance reads Average on three of the four and Poor on the lamb, because carbohydrate is still carrying a fair share. It runs from 47.4% of dry matter in the salmon up to 50.6% in the chicken, against 46.2% for the typical adult dry food. Let the animal decide it for you, since the gap between these recipes is smaller than their finishing positions suggest.

Ingredients, as declared: 45.7% Lamb (Fresh Lamb 26%, Dried Lamb 15%, Lamb Fat 3.1%, Lamb Gravy 1.6%), Sweet Potato (15%), Whole Oats (12.9%), Potato (11.9%), Pea Starch, Peas, Alfalfa, Salmon Oil (0.8%), Whole Egg, Carrot, Apple, Broccoli, Marigold Flower, Cranberry, Bilberry, Spinach, Prebiotic - Fructooligosaccharides (0.04%), Peppermint.

Each recipe puts one named animal at the top and then shows its working. The chicken variety declares 45.8% chicken: 26% fresh, 15.7% dried, 2.5% chicken fat and 1.6% chicken gravy. The other three follow the same pattern with their own species. That matters because a fresh meat figure is largely water weight, and the oven removes it. The dried share is what really lands in the finished kibble, and printing both halves means you are not left guessing which is which.

Sweet potato, whole oats and potato carry the starch, in that order in the chicken recipe and shuffled slightly in the others, with pea starch and whole peas filling in behind. Whole oats are a gentle, easily digested grain that brings soluble fibre along with them, and sweet potato adds fibre and vitamin A that ordinary potato does not. Carbohydrate still converts to between 47.4% and 50.6% of dry matter across the range, so the plant side is doing genuine work rather than sitting decoratively at the back.

Whole egg turns up in every recipe, a small entry with an unusually complete amino acid profile behind it, and alfalfa sits above it as a green source of fibre and minerals. The fruit and vegetable tail of cranberry, carrot, apple, broccoli, marigold flower, bilberry and spinach is real but modest. Treat it as seasoning on a recipe that already stands up without any of it.

In the chicken, lamb and turkey recipes the omega 3 source is salmon oil. In the salmon variety the fish is the meat itself, with sunflower oil alongside. Marine omega 3s are the form a dog's body puts to work most directly, on skin and coat and on the joints. That is a real advantage. The flip side is simply that nothing here is free of fish.

Fructooligosaccharides are declared at 0.04%, a prebiotic fibre that the large intestine's helpful bacteria live on. Peppermint closes the list. The trace element panel is short and specific. Zinc appears twice: 90 mg as the oxide, and another 45 mg as an amino acid chelate. That second form is the one a dog absorbs most readily. Copper comes at 10 mg, iodine at 2 mg and selenium at 0.2 mg per kilo. Iron and manganese are not declared, which is worth noticing on an otherwise open label.

Lamb at 45.7%, split into 26% fresh, 15% dried, 3.1% fat and 1.6% gravy. This one carries the most fibre at 4.5% and the most ash at 9.0%, with calcium working out at 2.28% of dry matter. Protein is the lowest in the range at 21.0%, which is what leaves it a shade behind its siblings. Lamb remains one of the kindest red meats for a dog that finds poultry hard going.

Per kilo, the chicken and the turkey are £5.67, the salmon £6.08 and the lamb £6.33. All four are sold in 2kg, 6kg and 12kg bags.

As a guide, feeding a 15kg adult dog in moderate condition works out at between £1.36 and £1.56 a day depending on the flavour. That assumes about 840 kcal a day (110 × bodyweight^0.75, the standard maintenance estimate) and the estimated energy figures on these labels. The maker's own table asks 150 grams a day for a 15kg dog, a little under that estimate, so let your dog's condition settle the difference.