Meal completers for your cat’s homemade diet

Preparing a balanced homemade diet can be overwhelming: it requires some nutritional knowledge, and time for prepping and shopping for all the different ingredients. In this article, we are going to talk about meal completers which can greatly simplify the process and guesswork in a homemade diet.
We are going to see what are the advantages, the drawbacks and a comparison between different meal completers.

What's a meal completer?

A meal completer is an all-in-one supplement made to balance a meat-only diet. As we have seen in a previous article, a diet made of only meat has several deficiencies. That’s why when we feed a raw diet, in addition to the meat we add many ingredients such as organs, raw meaty bones, fish, and a few supplements. So, a meal completer is a single supplement replacing the organs, raw meaty bones, fish, and individual supplements.
However, depending on how the meal completer is formulated, sometimes it will require adding liver or eggs. There are many different types and brands of meal completers with different formulations so it’s important to check the manufacturer's instructions and recipes.
Generally, they can be used with either raw meat or cooked meat. 

Advantages of meal completers

The main advantage of meal completers is that they are easy to use. You don’t need to find and shop for multiple ingredients. The preparation process is also easier as you have fewer ingredients.

This can be an alternative to a fully homemade diet when you cannot source a variety of ingredients like organs and raw meaty bones.

As the goal of a meal completer is to “complete” the diet, one of its advantages is that you are sure to feed a complete and balanced diet. While there is some uncertainty as not all meal completers are well formulated, a diet with a meal completer is much more likely to be balanced than a ratio diet like a PMR or a BARF raw diet.

Drawbacks of meal completers

A recipe using a meal completer may not be as precise as a recipe specifically formulated and taking into account the nutritional values of the meat used. In fact, a meal completer is formulated to work with many different types of meat that have different nutritional values, so they need to still fulfill the recommended amount of nutrients for the meat with the lowest nutritional values. This is why when you use a meal completer the diet can end up being too rich in some nutrients depending on the meat used.
Similarly, as they are formulated to fit the majority of cats, they may not fit your cat if they have some specific needs. As the meal completer contains most of the nutrients, you can’t finely tailor each specific nutrient to your cat’s needs.

Depending on the cost of the meal completer used, it may end up being more expensive than a fully homemade diet. In fact, in a raw diet, the organs and raw meaty bones are generally the cheap part compared to the muscle meat. So, if you replace the cheap part with a costly supplement, you end up with an overall more expensive recipe.

Finally, it could be argued that a diet with a meal completer is not as “natural” as a fully homemade diet. In fact, most of the micronutrients, vitamins, and minerals, are brought by the meal completer and not by whole food in the diet.
However, it’s important to keep in mind that a diet with a meal completer would still be a fresh, minimally processed, and homemade diet as most of the calories would come from fresh food. So this drawback shouldn’t discourage you to feed a diet with a meal completer if a full homemade diet is too complicated for you.

Warning

It’s important to respect the instructions of a meal completer, as otherwise the diet may not be balanced. A common mistake is to underestimate the quantity of meal completer. 
Finally, another mistake is to use a meal completer along with organs, raw meaty bones, fish, or other kinds of supplements as it can create an overdose in minerals and some vitamins.
Similarly, do not use a meal completer if you are feeding a balanced commercial diet like kibbles or wet food.

Comments on meal completers

As we have seen in the article about iodine, the current recommendations for iodine in the nutritional standards are higher than what I would recommend. As the meal completers are generally formulated to follow the industrial guidelines for pet food (the AAFCO or the FEDIAF) they also generally have higher levels of iodine than what I would prefer to feed.

To mitigate the issues of high levels of minerals depending on the meat that you feed with the meal completer, I would recommend regularly varying the meat.

I recommend feeding between 30% to 45% of the calories as fat, which means you should use meats containing around 4.5% to 10% fat as fed. If you use meats that are too lean like chicken breast, the diet will contain only 19% of the energy as fat. If you use fatty meats like ground beef 80/20, 67% of the energy will come as fat. 

With a few exceptions, the meal completers don’t provide omega-3. Both to get a balanced omega-6:omega-3 ratio and to add EPA and DHA to the diet, I would suggest adding fish oil. However, because meal completers already contain vitamin D, I wouldn’t recommend adding oily fish to the diet.

The meal completers don’t provide fiber, so I would also suggest adding a source of fiber to the diet.

My experience with formulating with the different meal completers is subjective and another nutritionist may have another opinion.

Comparison of different meal completers

Vit’i5 Orange

The Vit’i5 is a French meal completer, it is formulated by Dr. Geraldine Blanchard, a Board Certified Veterinary Nutritionist. It is recommended for kittens, adult cats below 8 years old, and gestating and lactating queens. For cats older than 8 years old or with some urinary or kidney disease, another version with less phosphorus and reduced minerals exists: it’s called Vit’i5 Bleu.
It doesn't contain animal proteins (for pets with allergies), starch, sugar, colorant, or aroma.

The manufacturer's suggested dose is 5 ml per 100-150 g of meat or fish. It’s recommended to use it with meat, vegetables or a source of fiber, and canola oil. However, no free recipes are provided.

My experience formulating with it: It works well, and it’s well-balanced. The label instructions are accurate. I find it a bit low on iron when you use chicken as meat.

Felini Complete

The Felini Complete is a German meal completer, there is no information on who formulated it. It’s mentioned that it is hypoallergenic, likely because it doesn’t contain any animal proteins. It can be used for kittens. For cats with kidney issues, another version exists with less phosphorus: it’s called Felini Renal. I would recommend using it also for older cats.

The manufacturer's suggested dose is 1.9 g of supplement per 150g of meat, and two tablespoons of water. They also recommend using meat containing 10% fat, and that you can use up to 15% of the meat as heart, and up to 5% as kidney.
If you prepare large quantities of food, the recommendation is 1 kg of meat plus 12.5 g Felini Complete and some water.

My experience formulating with it: The label instructions are accurate. I like that the iodine is on the low end. It’s on the lower side on vitamin E in my opinion, and it often doesn’t reach the recommended allowance in zinc, especially when using chicken meat. The taurine is very generous which isn’t necessarily needed.

TCfeline 

The TCfeline is a Canadian meal completer, it’s manufactured in the USA, and developed by the founder of the company, Natashia Willie. It’s based on mimicking the nutritional value of mice. The supplier in the USA mentions that it meets AAFCO guidelines for all life stages. There are 4 different versions: the original one that requires adding liver, a version including beef liver, a version including chicken liver, and a low-phosphorus “special formula”.

It doesn’t contain any artificial colors or flavors.

I looked more into detail at the "plus beef" version for a fair comparison with other meal completers. The feeding guidelines are to use 40 g of TCfeline per 900 g of meat. It’s recommended to also add a cup of water and optionally two egg yolks. 

The full nutritional analysis of the product isn’t available. Based on the ingredient list of the TCfeline Beef Liver, I’m concerned that it doesn’t contain zinc, iron, iodine, manganese, thiamine, and folates. It contains dried krill, so it may not be needed to add a source of omega-3.

Note that this product is different from the TCfeline premix manufactured in Germany.

Balance IT

Balance IT is based in the USA and was founded by Dr. Sean Delaney, a Board Certified Veterinary Nutritionist. Their meal completer is formulated to comply with the AAFCO nutritional standards. To prevent allergies it doesn’t contain any animal products.

There are 3 different products targeted at cats: the Balance IT Feline, the Balance IT Feline K and the Balance IT Carnivore Blend. The Feline is the classical version for cats: it’s made to work with meat, a source of carbs, oils, and vegetables or fiber. The Feline K is a low phosphorus version for cats with kidney issues. Finally, the Carnivore Blend is formulated for both cats and dogs and it’s made to be used with low carbohydrates recipes.

There are no label instructions or feeding guidelines but there is a calculator available on the website to formulate recipes with the supplements. Sadly, you can’t select raw meat in this calculator, so if you want to use this meal completer in your homemade raw diet you will need to formulate it yourself (or with the help of a nutritionist).

My experience formulating with it: It’s indeed complicated to formulate with the Balance IT Feline with a low carbohydrate diet: I find it too low in folates. The Balance IT Carnivore blend works well with fatty meat, but with lean meat it can lead to high levels of minerals.

Alnutrin

Alnutrin was founded by Marta Kaspar and is based in the USA. Their meal completer is formulated to meet the AAFCO nutrient profile. There are several products to be used with meat and liver: Alnutrin with Calcium (the calcium is provided by calcium carbonate), Alnutrin with eggshell calcium (the calcium is provided by eggshells), and egg-free Alnutrin with calcium (it doesn’t contain egg yolk contrary to the two other versions). They all have very similar nutritional values.
The latest version, Alnutrin for Meat & Bone, is to be used for diets containing already meat, bones, and liver.
They don’t contain any sugar, yeast, starch, artificial flavors, or colors.

There are recipes available freely on their website, as well as feeding instructions on the packaging. There is also a calculator on their website so you can compare your recipe to AAFCO nutrient profile.

My experience formulating with it: Alnutrin doesn’t contain folates, so if you want to reach the requirement in folate you need to add quite some liver which some cats may not tolerate. It doesn’t quite reach the requirement in iron and zinc when some fatty meats are used. I like that Alnutrin is low in iodine.

EZ complete

EZ complete is manufactured in the USA, it’s sold by the company Food Fur Life, founded by Carolina Lima and Laurie Goldstein. It is formulated to meet the AAFCO nutrient profile with raw meat or cooked meat.
It doesn’t contain any colorants, thickeners, or flow agents. There is a nutritional analysis of the meal completer with examples of raw meats. However, the nutritional data of the product in itself isn’t available, so I couldn’t try formulating with it. 
Based on the ingredient list it seems to be indeed balanced. It contains green-lipped mussels, so it may not be needed to add a source of omega-3.

The manufacturer's recommended dose is 53.3 g of EZ Complete for 900 g of boneless meat.

Purrform Complete Supplement

Purrform is a UK company but there isn’t any information on where the Purrform Complete Supplement is produced. They mention that it’s formulated to provide a complete diet: as they are in the UK, I would assume that they follow the FEDIAF nutritional standards. The minerals are in a chelated form which is great for absorption.
The manufacturer's recommended dose is 1 g of Purrform Complete Supplement per 100 g or meat. They also recommend not using exclusively lean meat.

Note: The purrform complete has the same vitamin, iodine, taurine, sodium, phosphorus, and calcium quantities as the felini complete. For these reasons, I would guess that they may be produced by the same manufacturer.

My experience formulating with it: I find the recommended dose slightly underestimated. The vitamin E is on the lower side, and the taurine level is quite generous. I find it overall quite balanced and easy to formulate with.

Raw Meow Mix

Raw Meow is an Australian company created by Laura Di Ciano, and their products are manufactured in Australia. It’s formulated to meet the AAFCO nutrient levels. It doesn’t contain any thickeners or flow agents. 
Raw Meow has a broad line of meal completers, they have a line for adult cats (with either freeze-dried chicken liver or lamb liver), a line for kittens (and gestating or lactating queens), a low phosphorus version, and a hypoallergenic version containing only kangaroo as freeze-dried liver.
The manufacturer's recommended dose for the Raw Meow Mix Adult - Chicken liver is 67 g for 1 kg of raw meat.
They don’t provide any nutritional information. Based on the ingredient list, it seems to be indeed balanced. It contains green-lipped mussels, so it may not be needed to add a source of omega-3.

To conclude, there are a lot of meal completers available on the market. I would privilege using a meal completer that provides nutritional information on their composition. Be sure to respect the instructions on the label, but it would be even better if you can get a specific recipe for your own cat and take into account the meat you use.

Summary

Meal Completer	Country	Do you need to add EPA and DHA?	Do you need to add liver?	Is it low phosphorus?	Easy to formulate
Vit’i5 Orange	France	Yes	No	No	++
Vit’i5 Bleu	France	Yes	No	Yes	/
Felini Complete	Germany	Yes	No	No	++
Felini Renal	Germany	Yes	No	Yes	/
TCfeline Original	USA/Canada	No	Yes	No	/
TCfeline plus Beef Liver	USA/Canada	No	No	No	/
TCfeline Special Formula	USA/Canada	No	No	Yes	/
Balance IT Carnivore Blend	USA	Yes	No	No	++
Balance IT Feline	USA	Yes	No	No	+
Balance IT Feline K	USA	Yes	No	Yes	/
Alnutrin with calcium	USA	Yes	Yes	No	+
Alnutrin with Eggshell calcium	USA	Yes	Yes	No	+
Egg-Free Alnutrin with Calcium	USA	Yes	Yes	No	/
EZ Complete Fur Cats	USA	No	No	Yes	/
Purrform Complete Supplement	UK	Yes	No	No	++
Raw Meow Mix Adult - Chicken Liver	Australia	No	No	No	/
Raw Meow Mix Adult - Lamb Liver	Australia	No	No	No	/
Raw Meow Mix KITTEN- Chicken Liver	Australia	No	No	No	/
Raw Meow Mix KITTEN- Lamb Liver	Australia	No	No	No	/
Raw Meow Mix Adult - Low	Australia	No	No	Yes	/
Raw Meow Mix Hypoallergenic All Life Stages - Roo Liver	Australia	No	No	No	/

If marked with “/“, I have not tried formulating with the meal completer or the nutritional data is not available.