Nature's Recipe® Frequently Asked Questions

Nature's Recipe^® dog dry and wet dog food is available nationally almost anywhere you find pet food. We've made the hard decision to discontinue our cat recipes, you can find more information below. For more information, please visit our where to buy page.

For 35 years, we've been passionate about making it easy for all pets to enjoy high-quality food. That's why we've decided to make Nature's Recipe^® dog food available at even more stores, at an affordable price. We want to assure you that we're still offering the same high-quality, healthy and delicious recipes you and your pets love.

We constantly work with retailers to refine and improve our product offering. As a result the products we carry at a specific store may change or select items may be discontinued. If you can't find what you're looking for on our website, we're happy to help point you in the right direction – Give us a call at 800-237-3856 (weekdays only, from 8am – 6pm EST).

Your dog food requirements vary depending upon breed, size, age, level of activity and environment. Please reference the feeding guidelines chart printed on your Nature's Recipe^® product packaging.

Puppies have specific dietary needs so you need to ensure that your food is formulated for Puppies specifically, or for all life stages. Nature's Recipe® has several puppy specific recipes, listed here.

We're happy to help! Give us a call at 800-237-3856 (weekdays only).

DCM stands for dilated cardiomyopathy and is a type of heart disease some dogs can develop. This disease is characterized by the heart and its chambers becoming dilated making it harder for the heart to pump which can lead to a buildup of fluids in the chest. The cause of DCM has been investigated by the FDA and If you have questions about DCM, we recommend speaking to your pet’s veterinarian.

In their most recent update, the FDA indicated they have not reached a conclusion on the role diet plays in these cases, or DCM in general, and is not recommending pet owners change their dogs’ diet. They have noted that they were investigating DCM in breeds of dogs that are not typically disposed to DCM. The FDA stated that these dogs were largely eating foods containing legumes like peas or lentils, other legume seeds, or potatoes as main ingredients.

While any amount of cases are too many, the American Veterinary Medical Association estimates there are 77 million pet dogs in the United States. From January 1, 2014 to April 30, 2019, the FDA has received reports of 524 dogs diagnosed with DCM as part of their ongoing research. Tens of millions of dogs have been eating food without developing DCM and Nature’s Recipe® was named in less than 1% of these 524 noted cases.

As pet owners ourselves, we want to make sure all dogs are happy and healthy. Like many in the pet community, we continue to review available research on this topic and work closely with industry partners and the FDA to identify a root cause. It is not clear what role diet plays in these cases, but the industry and the FDA are actively researching. We understand you may have concerns about the FDAs ongoing research into the cause of an increase in heart disease among dogs. At this time, no conclusion has been reached by the FDA, and based on the information we have reviewed with vets having expertise in animal nutrition, it is not clear what role diet plays. Our in-house team is working with industry partners and the FDA and we're hopeful this collaboration will identify a conclusive root cause. 

The FDA has not provided any guidance to pet owners to avoid specific food or treats and at this time is not advising dietary changes based solely on the information gathered so far. We are working alongside the FDA to further research this increase in heart disease occurences. As always, any decisions we make with our food will be to ensure all dogs being fed our products are happy and healthy. 

We have been making high quality recipes for our pet friends for over 35 years, but delivering recipes for our pets is a great responsibility. With the help of our retail partners, we decided to focus on continuing with our heritage, making purposeful ingredients to help our dog friends fuel the wag and live a happy, BIG life.

We do not intend to bring back our cat recipes at this time.

With high quality sister brands like Rachael Ray’s Nutrish, and Dick Van Patten’s Natural Balance, we have something to recommend for every cat. Make the Switch to Nutrish by checking out their Product Selector or use Natural Balance’s Help Me Choose tool!

As cat lovers, discontinuing our cat recipe line was a difficult decision, but we believe that our friends at Rachael Ray’s Nutrish, and Dick Van Patten’s Natural Balance are good substitutes for Nature’s Recipe® cat food.