- Joined
- Jun 15, 2019
- Messages
- 65
- Purraise
- 242
Assuming the cat is ‘normal’/healthy with no special needs and price isn’t an issue, how does one go about choosing the right food for them? Do certain breeds do better with specific foods?
-
Too many ads? Join our community of cat lovers now to reduce ads by 90%! Click here to join for free!
How To Choose
- Thread starter jisaacson214
- Start Date
If you have a normal healthy cat. Look for a high meat food, canned only if you can afford it. That is ideal for a normal cat. High moisture, high meat, organ, and bones. Raw would be the MOST ideal, then canned, then a kibble canned mixture, etc. kibbles are just too high carb. The only ones who aren’t are dr elseys, tiki, and young again from my knowledge.
- Joined
- Sep 7, 2018
- Messages
- 12,679
- Purraise
- 25,197
The best food for a cat is live prey. That's also not practical and sometimes not safe. The next best thing is a diet that mimics live prey. That's basically going to be meat, moisture, organs, and meaty bones. Assuming you won't be starting with raw feeding, your next best thing would be a canned wet food. Canned wet food is cooked and bones cannot be included in cooked foods because they can splinter when cooked causing all kinds of internal damage to the cat. Additionally, because certain parts of animals are not allowed in the food supply or impractical to include such as brains, eyes, skin, feathers, and hair, the nutrients that those supply need to be supplemented. Processing, storage, transportation these all cause some nutrients to degrade so extra supplements are added for that reason too. Our revised formula for the ideal canned (wet) cat food will be meat, moisture, organs, and supplements. Preferably in that order.
Can you see what's missing from that recipe? Fruits, vegetables, starches, grains, and legumes. If it isn't part of a mouse, it's not needed in a cat's diet. In fact, these ingredients can cause problems because they make food coming out of the stomach the wrong pH for effective digestion. They also promote the overgrowth of the wrong kinds of gut bacteria. You may hear that cats live their entire lives on kibble without any issue. They are the lucky ones. Even if the inappropriate ingredients never cause a GI disorder or disturbance, the moisture content in dry food is too low. Dry food sets the stage for future kidney problems. Cats also aren't designed to get their energy from carbs so dry food can lead to obesity and diabetes. Your worst wet food will be better than the best dry food simply because of the moisture alone but also because most of them will be meat heavy rather than starch/grain heavy.
There are very few perfect foods out there. Most of them use an ingredient or three you will bristle at. I would try to stick to the "meat, moisture, organs, and supplements" formula as close as you can. Additionally, I'd try to avoid extra add-ins like prebiotics (peas, chicory, inulin, etc) as these don't select good from bad bacteria in the colonies they promote. Many people try to avoid gums and thickeners as well. This will leave you very few foods. At a minimum, I avoid carageeenan because I've heard nothing good about it. I also avoid agar agar and xanthan gum because I know my IBD kitty has particular sensitivities to these. Guar gum is okay with her.
Alright, so those are the guidelines and the caveats. Now you probably want specific brands.
Fancy Feast Classic pates (Yes really!) The "meat byproducts" in this formula are unnamed organs. Cats eat it all so there really aren't byproducts. But when you sell the meat and you sell the named organs, whatever is left that can still be allowable in cat food are the unnamed organs. So byproducts are okay. The only flags I see with Fancy Feast Classic is that they aren't single protein and their turkey flavor has chicken bits (poultry giblets and natural flavor) which don't agree with my IBD kitty. They also contain guar gum but my IBD kitty says guar gum's not the worst. Only the Classic pates are species-appropriate (good food for cats without the starchy/grainy/veggie junk that's added to a lot of foods.)
Other species-appropriate foods that follow the meat, moisture, organs, and supplements recipe well:
Tiki Cat - Most of their foods are also gum-free.
Rawz - This is what my IBD kitty thrives on and about all she can eat because of various IBD sensitivities now. These are also gum free.
Pure Vita - similar to Rawz but they include a prebiotic (some root) and agar-agar which causes my Krista to crouch in pain after eating it.
Canidae - I don't know if these are still available but they had some pretty clean recipes too (except for the agar agar, but my Krista's sensitive gut shouldn't set the rules for your cats.)
Hound And Gatos
First Mate / Kasicks
Commerical raw like Stella and Chewy's and Northwest Naturals are also excellent options.
I'd recommend finding a food they like, they do well on, and their poops are well-formed. Odor can be fixed with probiotics. Once you have one, try out others as guest star meals. If they don't work out, you still have your lead actor to carry the show until you find a guest star worthy of making the regular cast. Always do food transitions slowly. Mix new food with old about 1/4 portion at a time and watching for the next poop to see if the food will work out before adjusting the new-to-old ratio by another 1/4 portion. I have also done what I call naked transitions which is offer 1 tablespoon new food (without the old food) apart from any other meal. Wait until the next poop to decide whether to hold (soft poop, see if it firms with another day), proceed (good poop), or abort (liquid poops rarely firm up if you give it another day.) Then you add another tablespoon to that guest star meal and wait another poop as before. As long as you are only doing this for a guest star meal, you can abort without leaving your cats without food to eat. It's similar to the new-to-old transition in that it's slow and you're judging progress from the poops, but I only pretend the old food is still there by restricting the amount of new food I offer.
Can you see what's missing from that recipe? Fruits, vegetables, starches, grains, and legumes. If it isn't part of a mouse, it's not needed in a cat's diet. In fact, these ingredients can cause problems because they make food coming out of the stomach the wrong pH for effective digestion. They also promote the overgrowth of the wrong kinds of gut bacteria. You may hear that cats live their entire lives on kibble without any issue. They are the lucky ones. Even if the inappropriate ingredients never cause a GI disorder or disturbance, the moisture content in dry food is too low. Dry food sets the stage for future kidney problems. Cats also aren't designed to get their energy from carbs so dry food can lead to obesity and diabetes. Your worst wet food will be better than the best dry food simply because of the moisture alone but also because most of them will be meat heavy rather than starch/grain heavy.
There are very few perfect foods out there. Most of them use an ingredient or three you will bristle at. I would try to stick to the "meat, moisture, organs, and supplements" formula as close as you can. Additionally, I'd try to avoid extra add-ins like prebiotics (peas, chicory, inulin, etc) as these don't select good from bad bacteria in the colonies they promote. Many people try to avoid gums and thickeners as well. This will leave you very few foods. At a minimum, I avoid carageeenan because I've heard nothing good about it. I also avoid agar agar and xanthan gum because I know my IBD kitty has particular sensitivities to these. Guar gum is okay with her.
Alright, so those are the guidelines and the caveats. Now you probably want specific brands.
Fancy Feast Classic pates (Yes really!) The "meat byproducts" in this formula are unnamed organs. Cats eat it all so there really aren't byproducts. But when you sell the meat and you sell the named organs, whatever is left that can still be allowable in cat food are the unnamed organs. So byproducts are okay. The only flags I see with Fancy Feast Classic is that they aren't single protein and their turkey flavor has chicken bits (poultry giblets and natural flavor) which don't agree with my IBD kitty. They also contain guar gum but my IBD kitty says guar gum's not the worst. Only the Classic pates are species-appropriate (good food for cats without the starchy/grainy/veggie junk that's added to a lot of foods.)
Other species-appropriate foods that follow the meat, moisture, organs, and supplements recipe well:
Tiki Cat - Most of their foods are also gum-free.
Rawz - This is what my IBD kitty thrives on and about all she can eat because of various IBD sensitivities now. These are also gum free.
Pure Vita - similar to Rawz but they include a prebiotic (some root) and agar-agar which causes my Krista to crouch in pain after eating it.
Canidae - I don't know if these are still available but they had some pretty clean recipes too (except for the agar agar, but my Krista's sensitive gut shouldn't set the rules for your cats.)
Hound And Gatos
First Mate / Kasicks
Commerical raw like Stella and Chewy's and Northwest Naturals are also excellent options.
I'd recommend finding a food they like, they do well on, and their poops are well-formed. Odor can be fixed with probiotics. Once you have one, try out others as guest star meals. If they don't work out, you still have your lead actor to carry the show until you find a guest star worthy of making the regular cast. Always do food transitions slowly. Mix new food with old about 1/4 portion at a time and watching for the next poop to see if the food will work out before adjusting the new-to-old ratio by another 1/4 portion. I have also done what I call naked transitions which is offer 1 tablespoon new food (without the old food) apart from any other meal. Wait until the next poop to decide whether to hold (soft poop, see if it firms with another day), proceed (good poop), or abort (liquid poops rarely firm up if you give it another day.) Then you add another tablespoon to that guest star meal and wait another poop as before. As long as you are only doing this for a guest star meal, you can abort without leaving your cats without food to eat. It's similar to the new-to-old transition in that it's slow and you're judging progress from the poops, but I only pretend the old food is still there by restricting the amount of new food I offer.
Last edited:
Short answer: Whatever your cat will eat and what you can afford. Daftcat gave some great examples of foods and what cats physiologically do and don't need.
Wet food is always preferred over dry- yes, it is more expensive (usually), but they need the moisture and will help prevent urinary issues in the future, especially if you have a male cat.
Some foods that I feed:
Fancy Feast Classic pates
Tiny Tiger and American Journey (from chewy-dot-com)
Redbarn lamb
Abound/4Health Chicken and Whitefish
Wet food is always preferred over dry- yes, it is more expensive (usually), but they need the moisture and will help prevent urinary issues in the future, especially if you have a male cat.
Some foods that I feed:
Fancy Feast Classic pates
Tiny Tiger and American Journey (from chewy-dot-com)
Redbarn lamb
Abound/4Health Chicken and Whitefish
I agree about the Fancy Feast pates: they're very decent food at a very decent price. Fancy Feast now also makes a more natural version, known as Gourmet Naturals, which don't have byproducts or artificial colors and the like. Stick to the pates, though, since the gravy foods (at least some) have wheat gluten.
A couple other options: Sheba pates are also good supermarket food. The "cuts" in gravy are iffier because they're carbier (it's the tapioca) but when I bought some of those by mistakes, the cats really lapped it up. They're by far not the worst food out there so may become an "every now and then treat." The cats also like Weruva's BFF Play pates, which have simple ingredients.
cheesycats mentioned other "modes" of feeding so I'll mention that it's fine -- and even good for many cats! -- to feed a variety of different kinds of food. We feed freeze-dried raw, frozen raw, homemade cooked, and canned foods. Our cats really like the variety, which helps keep them from being bored with their food. Other than that, the main thing I go for is all meat protein, with no potato, peas, or other carby vegetables. I also try to keep tapioca and other carby thickeners at low levels, other than an occasional treat food. (To borrow daftcat's metaphor, they're like occasional cameo appearances, not even guest stars.) I also avoid carrageenan and agar-agar. Our cats are Siamese mixes with tricky stomachs so there are multiple ingredients that I either know they don't do well on or that seem obvious to avoid.
A couple other options: Sheba pates are also good supermarket food. The "cuts" in gravy are iffier because they're carbier (it's the tapioca) but when I bought some of those by mistakes, the cats really lapped it up. They're by far not the worst food out there so may become an "every now and then treat." The cats also like Weruva's BFF Play pates, which have simple ingredients.
cheesycats mentioned other "modes" of feeding so I'll mention that it's fine -- and even good for many cats! -- to feed a variety of different kinds of food. We feed freeze-dried raw, frozen raw, homemade cooked, and canned foods. Our cats really like the variety, which helps keep them from being bored with their food. Other than that, the main thing I go for is all meat protein, with no potato, peas, or other carby vegetables. I also try to keep tapioca and other carby thickeners at low levels, other than an occasional treat food. (To borrow daftcat's metaphor, they're like occasional cameo appearances, not even guest stars.) I also avoid carrageenan and agar-agar. Our cats are Siamese mixes with tricky stomachs so there are multiple ingredients that I either know they don't do well on or that seem obvious to avoid.
Food for thought 
How To Choose The Right Food For Your Cat
Choosing The Right Food For Your Cat - Part 2
What Makes The Best Canned Cat Food?
How To Choose The Best Dry Cat Food?
What Do I Need To Know About Feeding My Cat?
Catinfo.org goes into more detail about proper cat nutrition.
The "best" food out there is no good if the cat won't eat it and / or it makes you go broke and / or is not available in local stores if you're not willing to buy online.
How To Choose The Right Food For Your Cat
Choosing The Right Food For Your Cat - Part 2
What Makes The Best Canned Cat Food?
How To Choose The Best Dry Cat Food?
What Do I Need To Know About Feeding My Cat?
Catinfo.org goes into more detail about proper cat nutrition.
The "best" food out there is no good if the cat won't eat it and / or it makes you go broke and / or is not available in local stores if you're not willing to buy online.
