Food Friday: Weruva Marbella Paella Dog Food

Weruva's Marbella Paella dog food is one of the many canned foods I have tried to convince Ru to eat after his dental cleaning and tooth extraction. Ru was not impressed. I was though, this company and their foods are rather unique, and will definitely be making into our regular rotation. I may even start feeding their foods to my cats.

The full name of this food is Marbella Paella with Mackerel and Pumpkin in Aspic. That's a pretty fancy name. For those less culinarily educated, aspic is the savory gelatin you get from boiling bones to make broth. It's meat Jello.

This stuff is mostly made out of mackerel, and it's really obvious. I can see big chunks of fish in there. One of the unique things about Weruva is their take on ingredients.

I learned from Dog Food Logic that "chicken" in the pet food industry is defined as "flesh and skin, with or without bones". So the meat that goes into my dogs' food could be something that looks just like what I'd find on my plate in a restaurant, or it could be a pile of skin and bones. Pet food companies are not allowed to explain what "chicken" means to them on their product packaging, but they can on their websites. That's where I learned that Weruva uses people food for their pet food. Their dog food is made out of boneless, skinless cuts of meat intended for human consumption. Amazing.

The only thing that originally made me hesitate for a moment was the fact that Weruva's foods are made in Thailand. I'm hesitant to use products imported from Asia due to the rampant recalls, but most of those have been tied to products from China where quality control is severely lacking. I hold products of Thailand in higher esteem. What really made me feel at ease was the fact that Weruva's pet foods are manufactured in a human food plant that makes human food the rest of the time. They have to pass human food standards to get their foods made and imported, and they still test the heck out of everything.

It's no surprise that Weruva's Human Style canned foods rate five out of five stars on Dog Food Advisor. I think the main reason they weren't particularly on my radar before is that ten of their 15 foods are chicken-based. Happily, they don't insist on cramming eggs into the other five flavors. Three of those five are fish-based though, and that's a lot of fish. I don't think I'd choose to feed my dogs Weruva exclusively, but it's definitely a welcome addition to our food rotation. For everyone but Ru, who won't touch it.