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Nutro Adult Salmon & Lentils Recipe
A salmon-first dry food that's cheaper per calorie than 25% of the dry foods we've priced and denser than 91% (you feed fewer cups) — $2.50 a day for your 40-lb adult dog.
THE FACTS, ONE SENTENCE — data as JSON · reference dog 40 lb · updated 2026-10-18
The evidence
The Verified Label
Every food on this site gets this exact panel — same fields, same order, sourced from the official label — so brands finally become comparable. Dots show where this food sits among all 494 dry foods we've verified.
verified 2026-10-18
Composition — dry-matter basis
why dry matter
Calories & cost — for your 40-lb adult dog
Cost per 1,000 kcal: $2.54 — cheaper than 25% of the 360 dry foods we've priced (median $1.93). Serving math uses standard veterinary energy formulas — see the formula.
Standards & ingredients
what this means
why unknown
Safety
Source: official label source (official)· price: Amazon, 2026-10-18 · anchors: 494 verified dry dog foods (360 priced) · how to read this label
The fit
For your dog, specifically
Checked for a 40-lb adult with a sensitive stomach — the same published criteria our finder uses. Change your dog above and these update.
The source material
The full ingredient list
Every flag above is computed from this list. Why order is by pre-cooking weight, and how splitting bends it →
Salmon, Lentils, Dried Potatoes, Fish Meal, Chickpeas, Sweet Potatoes, Potato Starch, Sunflower Oil (preserved with Mixed Tocopherols), Potato Protein, Canola Oil (preserved with Mixed Tocopherols), Dried Plain Beet Pulp, Potassium Chloride, Natural Flavors, Salt, Choline Chloride, DL-Methionine, Whole Flaxseed, Citric Acid (preservative), Mixed Tocopherols (preservative), Ferrous Sulfate, Zinc Oxide, Sodium Selenite, Vitamin E Supplement, L-ascorbyl-2-polyphosphate (source of Vitamin C), Manganese Sulfate, Copper Sulfate, D-Calcium Pantothenate, Biotin, Thiamine Mononitrate, Vitamin B12 Supplement, Vitamin A Supplement, Niacin Supplement, Potassium Iodide, Riboflavin Supplement (Vitamin B2), Manganous Oxide, Pyridoxine Hydrochloride (Vitamin B6), Vitamin D3 Supplement, Folic Acid, Rosemary Extract
9 ingredients in this list are ones we hold sourced evidence on , and 3 of them are genuinely contested rather than merely unpopular online.
- Lentils · ingredient 2ContestedA pulse (legume) common in grain-free formulas as a protein and carbohydrate source. Lentils are named alongside peas in the FDA's open 2018 investigation into diet-associated canine DCM; the agency grouped 'peas and/or lentils,' which appeared in 93% of reported products.
- Potato · ingredient 3ContestedA starchy tuber used as the carbohydrate base in many grain-free foods (it is a vegetable, not a cereal grain). The FDA's open 2018 investigation into diet-associated canine DCM listed potatoes 'in various forms' as main ingredients of interest alongside pulses such as peas and lentils.
- Chickpeas (garbanzo beans) · ingredient 5ContestedA pulse (legume), also called garbanzo bean, used in grain-free foods for plant protein and carbohydrate. Chickpeas are among the pulses (with peas and lentils) cited in the FDA's open 2018 investigation into diet-associated canine DCM.
- Named Meat/Poultry Meal (e.g., Chicken Meal, Lamb Meal) · ingredient 4Well supportedA rendered, water- and fat-reduced concentrate from a named species (AAFCO, e.g., 'chicken meal'). Because most moisture is removed it is a dense protein source (poultry meals commonly around 57-69% crude protein) and it names the species for allergy avoidance.
- Mixed tocopherols (natural vitamin E) · ingredient 8Well supportedA blend of vitamin E forms (alpha-, beta-, gamma-, delta-tocopherol) used as a natural-source antioxidant to slow fat rancidity, commonly chosen as an alternative to synthetic preservatives. EFSA concluded that tocopherol-rich extracts are safe for all animal species and the consumer and are efficacious antioxidants in feed.
- Beet Pulp · ingredient 11Well supportedThe fibrous material left after sugar is extracted from sugar beets, included as a moderately fermentable fiber source (commonly around 5 to 7.5% of the diet). Controlled feeding studies show it supports firm, good-quality stools and short-chain fatty acid production without impairing overall nutrient digestibility, so the 'cheap filler' characterization is not supported by the evidence.
Wet ingredients like fresh salmon shrink once cooked — which is why named meals appearing high on the list matter: they keep meaningful animal protein after moisture is removed.
Nutritional twins
Cheaper close matches
Verified foods with a closely matching label at a meaningfully lower cost per 1,000 kcal.
Label-composition matches only: same species, form, and growth stage; same primary protein where both are known; grain-free preserved; protein within 4 points and fat within 4 points, and estimated carbs within 8 points, on a dry-matter basis. Not a medical or quality recommendation.
The maker
Who makes this — and how they back it up
The five questions the WSAVA nutrition guidelines tell you to ask a pet-food company. Every answer is sourced or marked as an undisclosed gap — never guessed. This is the "is it made competently?" axis that star-rating sites skip.
Nutro FAQ (nutro.com/faqs) adds: 'We have two dry pet food manufacturing facilities for NUTRO products located in Henderson, North Carolina, and Victorville, California.' Some products are co-packed abroad (SO SIMPLE trays made in Thailand per the FAQ), so it is not exclusively self-owned, but dry food is made in Mars-owned US plants — primary answer 'owns' with minor co-pack exception.
source →We could not confirm this from a public source.
source →No feeding-trial AAFCO statement found on the 84 labels we’ve verified for this brand, and no company-wide claim was found either. Most pet foods are only "formulated to meet" AAFCO profiles (a paper calculation) rather than fed to real animals in trials — this is common, not necessarily a red flag.
covers: testing of the food (general; no detail on what is tested). Nutro FAQ.
source →666 PubMed papers (animal/pet filtered) list Waltham Petcare Science Institute (Mars Petcare) in an author address; we checked 200 and 200 really name the company. A floor, not a total.
source →Full company scorecard, sources, and every SKU we've verified for this brand: Nutro brand page →