Caturday: What is the Most Affordable Raw Cat Food?

I've been crunching some numbers to determine whether commercial premade raw cat food is cheaper than canned food. It seems plausible, cans are heavy and bulky, and feeding an all-canned diet becomes alarmingly expensive very quickly. I love collecting data, and I wanted to share my findings with you. Please keep in mind that this is not a complete list, it represents what is readily available either online or in my local stores.

Methodology

The foods included on this table are those for which I could find price, serving size, and servings per package. If I was unable to find the answer to those between the manufacturer's website, and various retail sites, I didn't add it. Serving sizes were determined using Solstice, a 13-pound cat that needs to lose some weight, and the feeding charts provided on the food packaging or manufacturer website. If they had a feeding amount calculator, I used it. Food prices were the lowest price I could find for the largest package available.

Freeze-Dried or Frozen?

My experience with raw dog food has led me to believe that freeze-dried pet food is super expensive, and that frozen raw food is much more reasonable. I was therefore quite surprised to see freeze-dried food as the three least expensive options. It's very interesting how the food prices cluster, first there's three freeze-dried foods at a similar price point, then five frozen foods followed by four freeze-dried foods. I'm sure these are coincidental though, since the price points for each cluster range quite a bit.

Conclusion

Is premade commercial raw cat food cheaper than canned cat food? Nope. Not even close. I am currently feeding primarily 4Health grain-free canned cat food at a cost of $0.79 per can, with some other brands mixed in when I can pick them up on uber-clearance for $0.30-.60 per can. Each cat eats one 5oz can per day, so their monthly feed bill is $23.70. It costs me $47.40 to fed The Hellions each month.

On Sojo's Complete, the most affordable raw cat food I could find, it would cost $0.98 per day to feed one of my cats. That's a monthly feed bill of $29.40 per cat, or $58.80 for both. Though the price difference between the various foods is just a few cents, it adds up really fast. Feeding Grandma Lucy's exclusively to two cats would cost me $67.80.

On the other end of the spectrum, I am truly amazed at how expensive raw cat food can be. Rad Cat is available at my local pet stores. It would cost me $4.25 per day to feed one cat. That's $127.50 to feed one cat for a month, or $255 to feed both. Yikes!

While crazy-expensive raw cat food is not going to be a staple of James and Solstice's diets anytime soon, I do like to vary their diets quite a bit. They aren't allowed to have frozen raw food because they can't eat it without making the entire house smell like a slaughterhouse, but I'd like to introduce them to the concept of freeze dried cat food.

Treat Tuesday: Grandma Lucy's Oven Baked Dog Treats

Grandma Lucy's Oven-Baked Dog Treats are little bear-shaped cookies that, to be honest, taste delicious. No seriously, they were handing out the blueberry ones at SuperZoo and many attendees were happily snacking. That's because these are made with human-grade ingredients, in a bakery. The ingredients include wheat flour, cane juice, brown sugar, canola oil, rice starch, and pumpkin powder. No meat, no eggs, and nothing super yucky. They're even safe for some dogs with allergies!

Good For: Handing to dogs on my way out the door without making my hands smell all gross. Families with toddlers that like dog food. Dogs with egg, corn, or meat allergies.

Not Good For: High-value training treats. Looking normal when you eat one in public.

How Much We Like Them: I had purchased a huge bag of their blueberry cookies ages ago, and could never remember who made them until I saw these at SuperZoo.

Food Friday: Grandma Lucy's Artisan Chicken Freeze-Dried Dog Food

I got this media packet from the Grandma Lucy's booth at SuperZoo, but the sample of food inside was actually Artisan Chicken and not their Pureformance blend. This company specializes in grain-free freeze-dried pet foods with short ingredient lists. I've seen it a couple of times in independent pet stores, and I'm pleased to finally try it.

The Company

Grandma Lucy's makes all their food in their own facility in southern California, where I currently live. Yay for local food! They have a whole history of the company on their website, with pictures of their dog Lucy, who inspired the company. They even shared how the massive pet food recalls of 2007 resulted in them adding complete diets to their product line. Yay for real people behind the business! They develop a direct relationship with all of their ingredient suppliers to ensure quality. Yay for reliable sourcing! My only scruple is that they proudly state that their food is GMO-free. Boo for anti-science.

The Food

Ok, the first thing I want to point out about this food is that it is freeze-dried, but in powder form. That's unique so far here on The Dog Geek. The powder-form dog foods we've tried, Honest Kitchen, Spot Farms, and WellyChef, are all dehydrated. The freeze-dried foods we've tried, Stella&Chewy's, Nutrisca, and Wysong Archetype, all come in chunks. Grandma Lucy's comes with a few big chunks just to show off the lovely meat, but most of it is sort of flakey powder.

The second thing I want to share is that I have a digestive disorder that makes eating interesting, and one of the few foods I don't have issues with is mashed potatoes. While I greatly prefer, you know, actual potatoes, I'm willing to settle for instant potato flakes. The reason I'm telling you this is because Grandma Lucy's Artisan Chicken dog food set off the "Woohoo! Mashed potatoes!" part of my primitive lizard brain as soon as I poured water on it. Yes, it's a potato-based food, I just didn't realize quite how potatoey until that moment. Clearly Grandma Lucy's has done a smashing job of maintaining the fresh tasty goodness of their ingredients.

Dog Food Advisor awards this particular recipe four out of five stars, it's a plant-based food with a good ratio of protein and fat to carbs. The entire Artisan line of foods rates 4.5 stars on average, while Grandma Lucy's Pureformance foods rate five out of five across the board. The Artisan product line is more affordable, and plenty of dogs do well on potato-based foods. Pureformance uses Chickpeas as the primary carbohydrate source, and the new Valor food line uses quinoa, which is surprisingly not a grain.

The Verdict

Sisci Godzilla ate the Artisan Chicken food immediately. Zip also enjoyed it. Ru wouldn't touch it. He's not a big fan of chicken though, so I'd like to try some other Grandma Lucy foods with him. They have some great alternative protein sources, like goat, venison, and rabbit. I need to find someone that sells the smaller bags though, I've only ever seen huge expensive bags in stores, and I'm just not ready for that kind of commitment.

Have you tried Grandma Lucy's food yet? How about their treats?