Nature's Recipe Rotisserie Recipe with Real Chicken & Touch of Garden Vegetables Dry Cat Food, 2 lb

Comes in many variations

Availability: Usually ships within 24 hours
Click on the image to order.

(You can print this review in landscape mode, if you want a hardcopy)

Reviewer: Mark Lamendola

One of the drawbacks of getting a great cat food is if the cat really, really likes it then suddenly the food the cat was eating and very happy with is no longer good enough. That happened here. This kind of thing is normal for those of us who are owned by a cat instead of a dog. When this happens, I just take the other food to the local ASPCA and donate it.

Before buying the queen a new food, I first make sure it doesn't contain anything toxic, such as wheat, corn, soy, or the new "poison your pet" darling, the potato. I don't eat these toxins myself, and certainly would not serve them to a trusting animal. If you don't know why these are toxic, you would do well to research that. The gist of it for wheat, for example, is it's been bred to have a giant endosperm (making it an endocrine modifier) plus it's been contaminated with RoundUp (giving it neuorotoxicity). Monsanto keeps lying about the alleged lack of persistence of RoundUp in the grain, but three highly respected labs in three different European countries have proven the persistence and those papers are published.

Before actually giving her the food, if ordered online, I read the label on the package even though I read the ingredients online. Then if it's kibble, which is nearly all I ever feed her, I taste it myself. In this particular case, the package has a blurb "Every ingredient counts" and you can tell the folks at Nature's Recipe really mean this.

Another reviewer panned the food for too many carbs. This is a common misconception, as is the classifying of protein-rich beans and peas as carbs. I eat beans daily, and my body fat is currently below 5% though I turn 56 next month. Yes, I am leaner than the guys on the cover of GQ (not skinny, lean--there is a difference). I also eat pea protein, so I don't think peas are fattening either. It's not any different for cats, this one has been eating cat food high in beans and peas for years now yet you can see her muscles ripple when she walks.

Most kibble has a distinctly fishy taste, even if it's fish-free. I'm not sure why that is. Most of it tastes about the same to me. This kibble had a distinctly different taste from those that have come before. I wasn't sure if she'd like it, but as soon as I opened the package she wanted some. I gave her a little, she ate it, and then she asked for more.

As with all the high-end cat foods I have examined thus far, the packaging exactly matched the product. With the low-end foods, the packaging is deceptive. I just want to note something about high-end cat foods. They save you money versus buying the cheap stuff. If you understand nutrition, you understand why. Basically, the cat eats less food in total so it lasts longer and your cat doesn't have the typical illnesses that drive up vet bills. Dental caries is now an epidemic among pet cats and dogs, a problem that totally goes away with the right food.

The key to the caries problem is to stick with good kibble. The corn-based stuff will not only wreak havoc on your cat's endocrine system, it will leave a film on their teeth. This problem also exists for humans, so start checking what you eat if you want a zero cavities household and zero obesity household.

I feed this cat dry kibble, though she does get moist treats on occasion. She's an indoor cat who likes to go outside. So she does hunt and eat rabbits, chipmunks, birds, and other little critters. I avoid giving her salmon, since that is a heavily contaminated fish that now has a very high correlation to prostate cancer; if you eat this fish yourself, stop doing so.

At 7.8 lbs, she's not a big cat but she is a lean, muscular athlete. This is because of her diet; "Great bodies are made in the kitchen" and "You are what you eat." She's seven years old, but has the energy of a cat teenager. She whoops all contenders in the territory fights, even those big males that are more than twice her size. And I've seen her make a six-foot vertical leap. One time, she even took a bird that was in mid-flight.