Bottom line on supermarket canned foods?

I am in the process of changing the diet of my cat Vivian, on prednisolone for 4 months to treat large intestine inflammation, and became pred induced diabetic. She's on a tiny dose of insulin and I am transitioning her to a low carb diet in the hope of getting her into remission from the diabetes (also tapering pred). So far I am just completing a transition to EVO dry food (yes it is still necessary to feed her some dry food) and I think she is very close to remission. I'm ready to tackle the wet food. She has been eating prescription dry and wet food, both of which are way too high in carbohydrates, even the "low carb" varieties.

She has phases of low appetite because of her intestinal disease and the meds she takes for it (chlorambucil), so I have tried Fancy Feast Classic Tuna to whet her appetite. She liked it, but it gave her diarrhea. I don't know  how non-fish varieties of FF would work with her. My quest is to give her a low carb high quality canned food that she likes and can tolerate. That's a tall order. I have heard so much about grocery store brands like Fancy Feast and Friskies, both good and bad. I'm hoping to get a bottom line answer to the question: are these foods junk food? Some say it's like feeding your cat the McDonalds of cat food, others swear by it. Looking for direction on this and which would be some great foods to try with her. We're not headed in the direction of raw or homemade, but am willing to spend a little $ for a top notch food that fits the bill.

thank you!

Cat Pal said:

 
I am in the process of changing the diet of my cat Vivian, on prednisolone for 4 months to treat large intestine inflammation, and became pred induced diabetic. She's on a tiny dose of insulin and I am transitioning her to a low carb diet in the hope of getting her into remission from the diabetes (also tapering pred). So far I am just completing a transition to EVO dry food (yes it is still necessary to feed her some dry food) and I think she is very close to remission. I'm ready to tackle the wet food. She has been eating prescription dry and wet food, both of which are way too high in carbohydrates, even the "low carb" varieties.

She has phases of low appetite because of her intestinal disease and the meds she takes for it (chlorambucil), so I have tried Fancy Feast Classic Tuna to whet her appetite. She liked it, but it gave her diarrhea. I don't know  how non-fish varieties of FF would work with her. My quest is to give her a low carb high quality canned food that she likes and can tolerate. That's a tall order. I have heard so much about grocery store brands like Fancy Feast and Friskies, both good and bad. I'm hoping to get a bottom line answer to the question: are these foods junk food? Some say it's like feeding your cat the McDonalds of cat food, others swear by it. Looking for direction on this and which would be some great foods to try with her. We're not headed in the direction of raw or homemade, but am willing to spend a little $ for a top notch food that fits the bill.

thank you!

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There are better quality foods out there but the pate versions of both FF and Friskies are perfectly fine. Many of us have both in our rotations and a lot of cats like them very much. It really depends on what your cat is willing to eat. If you're looking to build a rotation, both of these can have a place in it. I'd also consider: 

Nature's variety Instinct (high quality pates)

Pride by Instinct (made by NV- not pates- they are sliced or minced bits in gravy. The Rockstar's Rabbit is a HUGE hit with my very picky eaters. 

Red Barn Tricky Chicky (minced bits in gravy)

Nutro Natural Choice- they have all types- pates, chunky pates, minced and sliced. 

Soulistic or Weruva (shredded meats in broth like gravy- made by the same people. Soulistic is Petco's house brand)

Grreat Choice (Petsmart's house brand- this one is very affordable and a lot like FF and Friskies)

Merrick pates- mine like the duck, chicken and turkey

Nature's Variety Prairie Homestyle- this one is like a stew. 

Sheba pates

Most of the above are not available in grocery stores with the exception of Sheba. You can get Pride by Instinct at Petco. I don't think Petsmart carries it in store anymore (mine doesn't). Maybe a specialty pet store. If you try some of these and they go over well, you can save $ by buying them by the case from Chewy.com, Wag.com, Amazon.com or Petco/Petsmart. Most of these have auto ship options that save money as well. Good luck 

A great resource for information on carbs is the food chart on catinfo.org. That's what I used for putting together a list of low-carb foods for our cats. Not everything is up-to-date but it's a fantastic start. It's a little overwhelming, so I usually just focus on one column at a time.

For what it's worth, if carbs are your primary criterion, Fancy Feast Classics would be very good, though I believe most of the Friskies pates have a small amount of rice that increases the carbs slightly. (Many, if not most, of the non-pate Fancy Feast and Friskies foods have wheat gluten and the like. You can see the higher carb numbers on the chart.)

Our cats get about 60% raw food and 40% canned. Here are the canned brands we settled on, at least for now:

-Nutro Natural Choice (minced chicken, sliced turkey, chunky chicken)

-Tiki Cat (mostly Gourmet Carnivore but also some of the "luau" theme chicken foods, too)

-Weruva's Cats in the Kitchen canned foods with chicken and no fish

-Occasional cans of Hounds & Gatos lamb, Wellness CORE kitten food (a treat; it has carrageenan), and perhaps of Merrick LID duck (they liked a first can... we'll see how that goes)

-Occasional pouches of Weruva or Soulistic chicken and pumpkin, most of the gravy drained because it's pretty carby

Our cats are young and pretty healthy but they do have sensitive digestive systems--they're Siamese mixes and prone to it--so my goal is to feed them high-protein, totally grain-free, low-carb foods without carrageenan, which is thought to be an irritant. I also avoid potato, peas, carrots, sweet potato, and most other vegetables in all forms, which knocks out a lot of foods but keeps the carbs down. The only vegetable exception in their canned foods is the occasional pumpkin. Tapioca can also raise carbs a lot; I'm noticing it more and more. The cats only get occasional fish, other than the small amount of salmon in their Primal raw foods. (Their Primal foods do have some fruits and vegetables but most aren't starchy, plus the proportions seem very different from canned foods so the carbs remain very low.)

Good luck finding suitable foods for Vivian!

So the message I'm getting is that Fancy Feast is not complete junk food, and would make a satisfactory low carb canned food for my cat Vivian.

Interesting you mention lists and rotations of foods. Both my cats, but especially Vivian now with her intestinal problems, are very sensitive to food changes and it takes me a long time just to gradually transition them from one food to another. Not sure how I would work a variety into that equation.

Also noticed nobody mentioned Evo canned as a good option. I only ask because it's one of the only brand names I remember from the only place in town that sells higher end pet foods -

thank you

Cat Pal said:

 
So the message I'm getting is that Fancy Feast is not complete junk food, and would make a satisfactory low carb canned food for my cat Vivian.

Interesting you mention lists and rotations of foods. Both my cats, but especially Vivian now with her intestinal problems, are very sensitive to food changes and it takes me a long time just to gradually transition them from one food to another. Not sure how I would work a variety into that equation.

Also noticed nobody mentioned Evo canned as a good option. I only ask because it's one of the only brand names I remember from the only place in town that sells higher end pet foods -

thank you

Click to expand...

Fancy Feast is not complete junk food. It's somehow gotten a bad reputation that I don't think it deserves. Maybe because it's so readily available and made by Purina and isn't a high end brand? I'd stick with the classics (pates) as they are grain free. The cuts, shreds etc are not and have more carbs from the gravy. 

Cat Pal said:

 
So the message I'm getting is that Fancy Feast is not complete junk food, and would make a satisfactory low carb canned food for my cat Vivian.

Interesting you mention lists and rotations of foods. Both my cats, but especially Vivian now with her intestinal problems, are very sensitive to food changes and it takes me a long time just to gradually transition them from one food to another. Not sure how I would work a variety into that equation.

Also noticed nobody mentioned Evo canned as a good option. I only ask because it's one of the only brand names I remember from the only place in town that sells higher end pet foods -

thank you

Click to expand...

If you're in the US, you can request a free sample of FF's new food Purely Thoughtful. It's part of their higher end line. Click the link below and then try it now over on the right

https://www.fancyfeast.com/purelythoughtful/

Our cats are very picky about not being fed the same canned foods two meals in a row so we have to rotate them a lot or they go on strike. They cats didn't like Evo at all so it got knocked off the list early; it's very decent food, despite the carrageenan. You might want to ask at your local store about supply with Evo: a couple years ago they had a recall on cat treats and never brought them back and it looks like they sell fewer kinds of canned food than before. (Our previous cat loved those treats!)

As for Fancy Feast, I agree with @Kat0121: I'd only feed the Fancy Feast Classics since they don't have all the wheat gluten. I do think the other foods (the Elegant Medleys, Mornings, etc.) are junky because of the wheat gluten. Our previous cat loved Fancy Feast and I'm sure she'd recommend the Chopped Grill Classics food for Vivian. I don't feed our new cats Fancy Feast, both because of the menadione, which I'm not sure I feel comfortable with, and because I'd rather not feed them byproducts... but if they were pickier and that was what they liked best, I'd be very glad they chose those instead of something high-carb. Put it this way: there are lots of far more expensive foods that I'd try much harder to never have to feed!

If you have concerns about Vivian eating Fancy Feast, though, after the diarrhea, you might want to check with your vet to see if s/he thinks there's anything that might have irritated Vivian's digestive tract.

Good luck with Vivian's diet!

I picked up a can to FF Classic Turkey and giblets (they didn't have straight up chicken) and Vivian had a little bit last night and a little this morning. She doesn't love it but ate a little bit. And wow! Either that or the increase in EVO dry (which both cats really like) has given her really stinky farts!! No diarrhea so far, so that's good, but she sure is smelly. I remember when I first got her 10 years ago and was feeding her Purina One or something like that b/c that's what she was eating at the shelter, she used to fart up a storm. She and my other cat Willis have been on Hills prescription food since shortly after that and in all these years she hasn't had gas like this. whew!  Her blood glucose looks good but that smell!

Interesting conversation.

We're giving our cat Akodo Friskies Pates and he likes them very much (when they do not contain liver) and we have no issues with smell

As everyone said here, the pates are not that bad. Though every time we buy we check the ingredients just to be sure nothing has changed in the ingredients. I wish they had more variety, Akodo looks a bit bored of the same 3/4 flavors from time to time

I wonder if the gas is related to Vivian's intestinal disease? One of our cats had very smelly gas before we took the cats off dry food and, eventually, potato, which seemed to make Edwina vomit and make nasty clouds of toxic gas. As I mentioned, they also have sensitive digestive systems!

EVO is high in fat which some cats may not be able to tolerate very well.

I have heard before that EVO is high in fat at 22-24%, but the Hills DD they/ve been eating is 21% and the iD is 20.5% Doesn't seem like a huge difference to me. What is normal fat content for a dry cat food?