Wainwright's Mature Trays: Turkey with Brown Rice review

Our reading places this tray in the Excellent band, and the typical adult wet food lives in Excellent too. An older dog fed from here keeps pace with the general wet shelf. Turkey at 68% is the main reason, along with a short list on which every food ingredient is named. The nutritional balance and transparency readings are both Outstanding, with protein and processing Good and value Excellent.

One caveat belongs alongside that. The label declines to declare moisture, so the dry matter figures rest on an assumed 78%, the figure applied when a wet label withholds its own. Read against that assumption, protein converts to 50.0% of dry matter and fat to 45.5%, both of which look high, and a declared moisture figure could move them a fair way in either direction. No carbohydrate estimate can be produced at all without the real number.

Ingredients, as declared: Turkey (68%), Brown Rice (4%), Dried Peas (2.5%, equivalent to 8% peas), Dried Carrots (1%, equivalent to 8% carrots), Sweet Potato (1%), Minerals, Dried Alfalfa, Pear, Dried Seaweed, Dried Herbs (Parsley, Rosemary, Fennel, Marigold Flowers), Flaxseed Oil (0.08%), Chicory Root Powder (as a source of Prebiotic Fructo-oligosaccharide) (0.05%), Glucosamine (0.005%), Chondroitin (0.005%), Yucca Extract (0.005%)

The animal content is turkey at 68%, all of it, printed with its share and the only meat on the list. Turkey is lean and easy to digest, and that is why senior recipes turn to it so often. At this share it is doing nearly all the work in the tray.

The plant side is brown rice at 4%, dried peas at 2.5% standing for 8% peas, dried carrots at 1% standing for 8% carrots, and sweet potato at 1%. Dried alfalfa and pear sit behind them without amounts. The list is small and unremarkable, in the very best sense, with everything on it named.

Glucosamine and chondroitin are each declared at 0.005%. Meat and cartilage hold both of them naturally, and printing a figure beside them shows they have been added deliberately. The amounts are small. If a joint condition has been diagnosed, the vet's own plan stays in charge and the tray simply feeds the dog well underneath it.

At the tail come dried seaweed and a herb mix of marigold flowers, fennel, rosemary and parsley. Flaxseed oil at 0.08% follows, then chicory root powder at 0.05% as a prebiotic fibre, with yucca extract at 0.005% last.

The additive declaration is the one the brand uses across its trays, with 2,500IU of vitamin A, 200IU of vitamin D3 and 30mg of vitamin E. Alongside them run zinc at 50mg, iron at 10mg, copper at 5mg and iodine at 0.5mg.

The missing moisture figure is the one real gap on this label. Most wet labels print it and this one does not, so the dry matter conversions on this page rest on an assumed 78% rather than on a measurement. The analysis as fed is unaffected: protein is 11.0%, fat 10.0%, crude fibre 0.7% and crude ash 4.5% in the tray as it comes.

£3.58 a kilo buying the 12 tray case, or £4.28 a kilo buying single 395g trays.

The daily energy need of a 15kg adult dog in moderate condition is about 840 kcal (110 × bodyweight^0.75, the standard maintenance estimate). This tray covers that in roughly 680 grams, or about £2.43 a day at the case figure. The tray's own feeding table is written around puppy age brackets rather than adult maintenance, so the energy based figure is the more useful one here.