In this article, I'm going to present you with an example of 3 daily meals for my cats and I will explain why each ingredient is present in their diet.
It's been a while that I didn't give an example of what my cats eat in a day: the last time I did such a thing was two years ago and it was the first article on this website! You will notice that since then I learned a lot and changed my mind about some things. For example, I used to not feed any supplement which I now add.

On the menu

Breakfast

The breakfast is fed between 8 am to 9 am.
Turkey thigh meat, lamb liver, beef kidney, sprat, mussel, sprinkled with kelp and vitamin E.

First dinner

The first dinner is fed around 6 pm to 7 pm.
Beef and turkey thigh meat

Second dinner

The second dinner is fed between 11 pm to 12 am.
Quail half upper body sprinkled with nutritional yeast and psyllium. Two mini homemade beef grinds: one with zinc supplement and the other with iron supplement.

The repartition of the food in the 3 meals doesn't really matter. I give the organs and fish in the morning because it used to be what Néline liked the least when I started feeding raw more than 3 years ago. As she was more hungry in the morning, she was more likely to eat them if they were served at breakfast. I kept this habit but I could swap the meals around, as for most cats it doesn’t really matter.

This day of food is an example of a balanced diet for a day. It’s balanced because all the nutrient requirements, as defined by the NRC, are covered.
I did the nutritional analysis using the formulation spreadsheet developed by Raw Fed and Nerdy. If you want to know more about it, Raw Fed and Nerdy provides a nutrition course and a video on how to use it.
I hesitated to share the quantity I used for each food, but I decided not to as the recipe is tailored for the specific nutritional requirements of Néline and Praline, and I don’t want it to be incorrectly used for other cats.

Nutritional analysis

Total calories: 240 kcal.
Total weight: 163 g.
Calorie distribution:

Proteins 53%
Fat 45%
Carbs 2%

This recipe is on the high side in terms of fat content: this isn’t an issue in my case because I don’t feed only this recipe. I alternate the quail with leaner raw meaty bones.
The ratio of calcium to phosphorus of this recipe is 1.1 but this value is an approximation, as the amount of calcium and phosphorus in raw meaty bones is estimated. In fact, it’s difficult to find the amount of those minerals in raw meaty bones as we don’t eat these parts as humans. As such, this data is non-existent in most nutritional databases.

What does each ingredient provide in the diet?

Overall, the animal-based ingredients bring the amino-acids in the diet, and in particular taurine, which is essential for cats.
The quail is fed as a raw meaty bone and provides calcium and phosphorus. It provides 40% of the calories in the diet. As the quail is fed with the skin it’s high in fat and it provides half of the fat in the diet. It also provides two essential fatty acids: linoleic acid and arachidonic acid, which are both omega-6. The quail is also quite rich in iron.
The beef provides 30% of the calories in the form of protein and fat, and it’s also rich in zinc.
The turkey provides 15% of the calories, it’s leaner than the beef and the quail and so it slightly lowers the total percentage of fat in the diet. I also use it to add variety to the meal.
The lamb’s liver provides vitamin A, copper, folates, vitamin B12.
The beef’s kidney provides vitamins and is also used to add variety.
The sprat provides vitamin D and omega-3 (in particular EPA and DHA).
Blue mussels provide manganese and omega-3 (in particular EPA and DHA).
The nutritional yeast provides B-vitamins, and in particular folates and thiamin.
The kelp provides iodine.
The psyllium husk provides fiber.
Vitamin E unsurprisingly provides vitamin E. It’s almost impossible to cover the vitamin E requirement without using a supplement. Additionally, the more the diet contains omega-3 and omega-6, the more vitamin E is needed.
The iron supplement isn’t absolutely needed as the diet doesn’t contain anything that prevents its absorption and the diet is very close to the recommended allowance (98%). However, I still added a supplement as the amount of iron was still low in comparison to the other minerals in the diet.
Similarly, without the zinc supplement, the recommended allowance in zinc is reached (122%). However, in this case, I added the supplement in order to have an acceptable ratio between the zinc and the copper (Zn:Cu of 11).

This was an example of what my cats eat in a day: keep in mind that I vary their food and they don’t only eat this recipe.

What my cats eat in a day: a balanced homemade raw diet