What's the deal with meal?

(Sorry... I just can't help myself with those punny titles...!!)

I'm looking into grain-free dry for the kittens when my current bag of Blue Buffalo kitten formula gets low. I was looking at Blue Buffalo Wilderness kitten formula, and found that chicken meal and turkey meal are both high on the ingredient list (although deboned chicken is first).

I've read contradictory things about what "meal" means - that it can be any part of the animal just ground up, etc. and is not desirable, or that it's drier/tougher cuts of meat ground up and is fine.

Here's what Blue's website states:

Definition of chicken meal:
Chicken meal is a highly digestible protein source produced by cooking chicken at high temperatures, extracting the fat and drying the meat residue. It is a meat protein, providing essential amino acids and fatty acids, vitamins, and minerals for muscle development and energy. It is naturally stabilized with mixed tocopherols and rosemary to preserve freshness.

Definition of turkey meal:
Dry, rendered or cooked ground clean whole turkey that is a high-quality protein source.

And then there's the "True Blue Promise" which states:
All BLUE healthy cat foods contain NO chicken or poultry by-product meals, artificial preservatives, corn, wheat or soy.

So, how do you feel about meal? ( sorry!) And do you think Blue Wilderness kitten formula is a good quality dry food for my fuzzballs?

There is a difference in "chicken meal" and "chicken BY-PRODUCT meal". Both are dehydrated versions of either "chicken" or "chicken by-product". So basically "meal" just means that it's dehydrated before cooking whereas if it just says "chicken" (or deboned chicken in the case of BB) then once the chicken is cooked and therefore the water is removed, it will actually fall on the ingredients list even if it's listed first because the chicken was weighted before the (60%) water was removed. However, chicken or chicken meal is the muscle meat of a chicken. By-Products are the "extras", things like organs, feet, beaks, ect. MANY people don't like these but a high quality source of them is actually healthy. As nasty as it may sound to *US*, things like livers, hearts, kidneys, necks, feet, ect are HEALTHY and would naturally be consumed by cats in a natural raw state. I actually like to buy fresh sources from the grocery store and feed them raw (as do I like to add fresh muscle meat!) for a less processed version of it along with kibble.

Chicken = chicken muscle, lots of waterweight (so while listed first may actually be fourth or fifth on a dry matter basis), but quality meat like breast or thigh and the like.

Chicken Meal = prepared dehydrated ground chicken, may include some bone and cartilage, but isn't necessarily worse quality protein and won't have heads and beaks and feet and other poorly nutritious parts of the chicken ground up in the mix.

Meal ain't a bit Deal, IMO. Bigger difference is saying "meat meal" (which means various mystery meat and may include 4D animals) or "by-product meal" which is cheaper than muscle meat and are the remaining scraps from the carcass.

Originally Posted by Ke$ha

MANY people don't like these but a high quality source of them is actually healthy. As nasty as it may sound to *US*, things like livers, hearts, kidneys, necks, feet, ect are HEALTHY and would naturally be consumed by cats in a natural raw state.

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Sorry, didn't refresh to see this. I agree on liver and the like, but I don't think necks and feet are nutritious. Too much skin, cartilage, and bone w/ very little meat protein. Liver is healthy but is usually listed as a separate ingredient in quality recipes, making mystery "by product" unnecessary.

Sounds like it's not something that needs to be avoided - which makes sense because I was under the impression Blue Buffalo was a fairly high-quality food. Thanks for the info!

Originally Posted by Ducman69

Sorry, didn't refresh to see this. I agree on liver and the like, but I don't think necks and feet are nutritious. Too much skin, cartilage, and bone w/ very little meat protein. Liver is healthy but is usually listed as a separate ingredient in quality recipes, making mystery "by product" unnecessary.

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Necks are actually a good source of RMB. (And great for cleaning teeth! ) Feet on the other hand I'd consider more of a dental treatment or a treat rather than "nutritious" but if it's mixed with plenty of MM there is no real harm in feeding it. Of course, those are in raw/whole form. But I wouldn't mind them being in a by-product mix if it involves other things as well. Hearts are considered a by-product but also a MM for instance, therefore if you have hearts, livers and necks in a by-product mix, it's actually not a big deal. Depending on the percentage of each it could actually be a full meal on it's own. That doesn't even include what other muscle meats (ie. "chicken meal") are added to the rest of the kibble/canned mix. As long as you balance out the calc-phos levels, a little extra bone is no problem. On the other hand, large amounts of liver can cause diarrhea and is high in vitamin A so I prefer not to feed foods where just "liver" is listed in the first 5 ingredients. When I feed it raw, even my 50lb GSD/Kelpie gets just a tiny bite.

Originally Posted by Ke$ha

By-Products are the "extras", things like organs, feet, beaks, ect. MANY people don't like these but a high quality source of them is actually healthy. As nasty as it may sound to *US*, things like livers, hearts, kidneys, necks, feet, ect are HEALTHY and would naturally be consumed by cats in a natural raw state.

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I eat this stuff too...if it's good enough for me, it should be good enough for my cats.

If the above is indeed the correct definition of by-product meal, then I'm not going to be too bothered by it. Thank you for the definition.

Originally Posted by tdonline

I eat this stuff too...if it's good enough for me, it should be good enough for my cats.

If the above is indeed the correct definition of by-product meal, then I'm not going to be too bothered by it. Thank you for the definition.

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You SHOULD be bothered by it because even though it Can include good things like hearts and livers, it can also be either comprised entirely of those extra parts and therefor not nutritionally complete or made of dead, diseased or chemically PTS animals.

Chicken feet are sold to China. There they are popular (human) food and American chickens have bigger feet.

My father-in-law, long gone, used to enjoy chicken feet - poached, rolled in bread crumbs, lightly fried and served with mustard.

I use chicken feet when making soup - high in gelatin and help to make a rich, strong stock. Asian markets are about the only place I can purchase them. Stripped chicken backs and chicken necks also go into my soup stock. It's delicious soup. Maybe at an Amish market I can find a stewing hen / fowl. Cannot make good chicken soup from a roaster or broiler. Their meat is too bland.

Personally, I find the muscles more used by the animal have better flavor, but require more attention to cooking. Chuck makes a better pot roast than top round but needs to be braised low temperature and slowly.

Beef is slaughtered young. Most commercial chickens are Cornish cross and they reach slaughter weight at 6 to 8 weeks - that's a 4 pound dressed weight roasting chicken. Turkeys have been bred to the point where they have such massive breasts that the toms cannot mount the hens to mate - every Beltsville White turkey that we eat is produced by artificial insemination.

If this is what we're eating - think about what you're feeding your cats.

Can I just point out something about the "4D" thing...I hope the animals are dead before they're put into kibble! Otherwise I think we have a much bigger problem on our hands than the parts of the animals being used.

And unless you're going with a super crappy product, you're going to have plenty of meat to add to that by-product meal.

Technically speaking, a RAW diet should be made of at least 20% of "by-products". (organ meat, bones, tripe...) And since RAW is suppose to be the "best" food, why is it wrong to be in kibble/canned? The only problem with tripe in a can/kibble is that it looses the enzyme benefits when it's cooked. But organs and bones are still good.

I'm not saying go out and buy the cheapest pet food you can find but if you go with a midgrade food, don't feel bad feeding by-products.

Have you ever noticed what part of a bird remains after a cats has finished eating it?

Now THAT's a MEAL!

I'm not sure if a pun was intended or not?

Originally Posted by Ke$ha

Can I just point out something about the "4D" thing...I hope the animals are dead before they're put into kibble! Otherwise I think we have a much bigger problem on our hands than the parts of the animals being used.

And unless you're going with a super crappy product, you're going to have plenty of meat to add to that by-product meal.

Technically speaking, a RAW diet should be made of at least 20% of "by-products". (organ meat, bones, tripe...) And since RAW is suppose to be the "best" food, why is it wrong to be in kibble/canned? The only problem with tripe in a can/kibble is that it looses the enzyme benefits when it's cooked. But organs and bones are still good.

I'm not saying go out and buy the cheapest pet food you can find but if you go with a midgrade food, don't feel bad feeding by-products.

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Yeah, but 4-D animals are dead before they get to the slaughterhouse. . .it's not a good thing, because they don't do autopsies so you don't know what they died of. Could have been mad cow disease, could have been rabies, could have been some icky bacterial infection. And the meat may be rotted if the animal was dead for too long. Of course they have to be dead before food is made out of them but they shouldn't be dead before they get through the kill line.

If by-products were mainly organs and stuff like you'd use in a raw diet, nothing would wrong with that. But the industry is poorly regulated and pretty much anything can be thrown in there. Best to avoid it if possible.