Merrick Grain Free Beef & Sweet Potato Puppy Food: our recipe review

Merrick · Grain Free Beef & Sweet Potato Puppy Food · Dry food · All life stages

On the facts printed on its own label, Merrick Grain Free Beef & Sweet Potato Puppy Food scores 82 out of 100 on our rubric: a strong label by the standards of this database. The panel opens with Deboned beef, and the first ingredient signal earns 20 of its 20 points. At 28% crude protein it ranks 26 of the 82 Merrick recipes we scored for protein. Crude fat reads 15%.

At 454 kcal a cup it is calorie dense: small measuring errors become extra meals over a month, so this is a food to weigh rather than eyeball. Its adequacy claim rests on formulation: balanced on paper against the AAFCO nutrient profiles rather than fed to dogs in a trial. The brand carries 4 FDA posted recall events in our check, set out below with their dates; weigh their age as well as their count.

The panel runs to 24 ingredient lines. 5 of them are animal source lines and 8 are plant lines. The first added fat appears at line 8, so 7 lines sit ahead of it in the recipe by weight. Salt appears at line 15 of 24: ingredients listed after salt are present in small amounts, a standard reading aid for long panels. The vitamin and mineral pack begins around line 17; the 8 lines from there on are mostly supplements, preservatives and functional extras rather than staple foods.

The label facts

How the score breaks down

Ingredient notes: the first ten, one by one

Definitions below are written from AAFCO's ingredient definitions in our own words. They describe what an ingredient is, never what a brand claims about it. Names that appear in our ingredient dictionary link to it; the dictionary counts how many scored recipes carry each ingredient.

• Deboned beef. Deboned beef is the named meat in fresh form. Panel order is set by weight before cooking, and fresh meat is mostly water, so its share of the finished food is smaller than its place at the top suggests.
• chicken meal. chicken meal is the named animal rendered and ground, with water and most fat cooked off before it is weighed. Per kilo it carries far more protein than the fresh meat does.
• sweet potatoes. sweet potatoes is a starchy root used to bind kibble and add energy, with useful fibre and beta carotene.
• potatoes. potatoes is a starch binder. In grain free recipes it is usually what holds the kibble together in place of grain.
• peas. peas is a legume bringing starch, fibre and plant protein together. Legumes help a panel reach its protein figure without meat, which is worth knowing when you read the protein line.
• natural flavor. natural flavor is a flavouring: a spray or powder added so the food tastes stronger to the dog. It is not a protein source and our rubric does not count it as one.
• turkey meal. turkey meal is the named animal rendered and ground, with water and most fat cooked off before it is weighed. Per kilo it carries far more protein than the fresh meat does.
• chicken fat. chicken fat is rendered fat from the named source. Fat is the densest energy in the recipe and carries much of its flavour.
• pea protein. pea protein is one fraction of the pea, split out and listed on its own. Each fraction is a small share of the whole pea, so several pea lines on one panel add up to more pea than any single line suggests.
• miscanthus grass. miscanthus grass sits on the panel as a functional ingredient: a binder, supplement or processing aid rather than a nutrient base.

The brand's recall record

2010: Merrick treats were recalled across July and August 2010 in one expanding FDA posted chain: Beef Filet Squares first, then Texas Hold'ems, then all lots of both, over possible Salmonella contamination. The FDA's first word on these treats was a health alert on January 14, 2010, the first notice of this same event, counted once.

2011: Merrick Jr. Texas Taffy pet treats were recalled in January 2011 over possible Salmonella contamination.

2011: Merrick Doggie Wishbone pet treats were recalled in August 2011 over possible Salmonella contamination.

2018: FDA posted a recall of limited Merrick and Castor and Pollux beef dog treats over potentially elevated levels of naturally occurring beef thyroid hormone. The event covered treats, not foods.

All four events covered treats rather than complete foods, and three of them date from 2010 and 2011. We count them, labelled as treats, because they speak to the maker's quality systems across its history.

See the full dog food recall tracker for recent events across all brands.

Other Merrick recipes we scored

Those are the twelve highest scoring of the 81 other Merrick recipes we scored. The full comparison, flagship review included, is on the Merrick brand review.

Feeding it

Switch foods gradually over about a week, mixing more of the new food into the old each day. Portion by calories, not by the look of the bowl: our feeding calculator works out a daily amount from your dog's weight, and this recipe's calorie line above is the number it needs.

What that means at the bowl, for a typical neutered adult (resting energy 70 times body weight to the power 0.75, times 1.6; treats come out of the same budget):

Puppies, pregnant dogs and very active dogs need more; older and weight watching dogs need less. The calculator linked above adjusts for those cases.