Primal Freeze Dried Raw Cat Food Nuggets Chicken & Salmon, Complete & Balance...

I've been buying this for a while now mostly in store. This option seems a bit stiffer than what's available in store. It still breaks into crumbles but it makes me think this formula is slightly different from what local vendors is selling. Food is quality. There isn't any mystery ingridents. Most importantly there isn't a single gum included in this. It is a bit smelly when rehydrated. I usually cook this using very hot water or putting it into the microwave for 30 seconds. It's the herring oil that makes the rabbit smell unappealing. Scent really doesn't matter to me as I'm not the one consuming it. My cat loves it. As soon as it's out she's on it. This is also good to be used as a kibble topper. I usually put out half a nugget when being served dry. My girl will eat this before any kibble in her bowl. It also makes for a good treat between full meals or as positive reinforcement of good behavior. Price is high but all freeze dried options is expensive. It makes sense given the process used to pull all the moisture out. Because of the cost I can't make this and other freeze dried options the main part of my girl's diet. It would be entirely too expensive. The way I serve these the bag usually last about a week which is mostly dry and half a nugget as again used as a kibble topper. Overall this an excellent buy.

Possibly literally. A little back story. In Feb of 2020 I adopted a feral "barn cat" from a local humane society. He was a large, orange, 6 year old Maine Coon mix that I was told the shelter had had since he was a kitten. They hadn't advertised him until before I went in for him b/c he didn't take to his foster as a kitten. I was told he hated people & wouldn't tolerate life as an indoor cat. Well, he's too pretty to go outside & hate is a strong word... more like not fond of. He's had no issue being indoors, but he still isn't big on people. About a month after I got him my boyfriend was cooking up some ground venison for our dogs. Abraham, Abe, the cat, was sitting in the middle of the kitchen watching him. My boyfriend thought he'd offer Abe some venison as a peace offering. Abe smelled it a bit & then instead of taking it out of my boyfriend's hand, he grabbed his hand & tried to run off w/ it. He let go of my boyfriend's hand, devoured the venison & more after that & a venison addict was born. This car went from eating the cheapest of cheap food at the shelter to not eating anything if he didn't have venison in a month. Luckily we have a lot of friends that hunt, so we can keep him pretty well stocked, but he does run out. He would not eat any other cat food, even venison food. If you mixed it w/ people venison he would, but don't try to feed him anything w/o venison. Last year wasn't a great year for my hunting friends & we didn't get as much as usual. Since I already tried what I'm pretty sure is every other venison cat food on the market, I was actually contemplating spending $32.00/lb to have a local grocery store special order it. Before doing that I gave 1 last ditch effort search on Google & was shown these for the 1st time. I bought a bag figuring he wouldn't like them. My boyfriend asked what they F were they as I was cutting them into bite size pieces, they look like little bread loaves. I gave Abe a few pieces & held my breath. He actually devoured them! 4 bags later & he hasn't tired of them. We now chop up the little loaves & soak them in water overnight. He'll eat them & other food either way, as long as there's some venison loaf, but my boyfriend likes to use the left over water on the dogs' food. Side note, 1 of my dogs is the pickiest pitbull ever & she also loves these. We have recommended this brand to quote a few people that have super finiky cats. They've all tried different flavors, we've only tried the venison, but they've all had the same result we have. It might be a more expensive food & I might only really be buying it for 1 cat (we have 4), but I would gladly pay more b/c my Abradude eats it & happily! I'm not sure how he was going to survive if I couldn't find something he would eat. It's worth every penny & then some!

Orange in color, hard as a rock, horrible odor and my cat won't eat them. He used to love them! So far all batches with Best Buy date in May, 2026, are bad. I have bad batches # W10167066, W10169126, and W10169128. I sent email to Primal and they will take no responsibility. Only have a couple good bags left so looking for a replacement to transition him to... UPDATE 9/26/25: Primal has admitted, a new safety step did affect texture in some freeze dried nuggets batches for a short while. They claim they adjusted the process and are starting to see improvements come through in the market. I have yet to see them in the market. I have noted that all Primal freeze-dried nuggets I tried with best buy date of May - July 2026 are hard as a rock with a foul order. Unfortunately, that's all stores have on the shelf because customers are not buying them. Hopefully, Primal will recall or stores will return all of the bad batches and get the new corrected batch to the market. Until then, I will avoid Primal at all costs and hope that Primal will implement some quality control in the future!

Don't write too many reviews on products, but felt obligated to do so for this one. I have a male cat about 9 years old named Cooper that was showing all the telltale signs of feline hyperesthesia. He had chewed the tip of his tail raw, to the point where he had to wear an Elizabethan collar, which he hated, and it broke my heart to watch him with it. He also had extreme twitching and rolling of the skin on his back, like he was trying to shoo off flies. My vet said that unless a change of diet changes his condition, he'd probably have to go on medication or have his tail amputated, which are two pretty terrible options, in my opinion. Started reading all I could find about cat diets, which led me find the benefits of a raw diet. Cats have only been eating this corporate-made kibble for about 100 years, which isn't enough time for their bodies to evolve to handle it. Some can and do, but many have issues. But most raw diets are extremely tedious, and as much as I wish I did, I just didn't have the time to design and fix a raw diet for him everyday. Enter Primal Nuggets. I saw these online and decided that I had nothing to lose by trying them. Cooper was a little skeptical when he first sniffed them, but soon started eating them. My other cat won't touch them, but she doesn't have any hyperesthesia symptoms, so it doesn't matter. When I first started feeding the nuggets to Cooper, I would put a small amount of spring water into a coffee cup, drop 1 nugget into the cup, and microwave for about 15 seconds, then put it on a saucer for him. He ate them for a few months that way, but then he slowly started losing interest. I also feed him grain-free Wellness Core, and he pretty much decided to switch back to just that. I hated to see that, because--I wasn't sure if it was my imagination at first--it seemed his fur was getting softer, and it looked like his tail was finally starting to heal a little. Here's what REALLY worked for me. I still fill the coffee cup up about 1/3 of the way with spring water and microwave for 15 seconds. But then, I break up the nugget while it's still in the warm/hot water, then I put it on his saucer. The only thing I'm doing differently is breaking the nugget into about 10-15 really soaking wet pieces for him. Now, he can't wait to eat it, and I've been doing this for a few months. He now prefers the nuggets to any other type of food. Here's what it has done for him. Cooper now has full fur coverage on the tip of his tail, and that was after a full year of him biting all the fur off the tip of his tail. My vets couldn't believe it, they say that it's pretty rare for a cat that has that much of an issue with tail-biting to stop without medication. His fur--at 9 years old--is waaaaaaay softer than it's ever been before! He's almost completely stopped rolling the skin on his back, which has to be extremely relieving to him because it had to be very irritating for him. It sure was heart-breaking to watch him constantly twitching. His stools have gotten much more solid, to the point of being completely normal. He used to have diarrhea constantly, and he used to throw up a lot, too. All of that has now stopped. His nose is dry now, for the first time in years, and his eyes no longer have any seepage coming out, which he also battled for years. Cooper--at 9 years old--seems far healthier and happier than he ever has. I just wish I would've found these nuggets a long time ago. So if your cat has feline hyperesthesia symptoms, there is a great chance that it's having dietary issues/allergies. Going to a raw diet is very likely to help all your cat's symptoms, without going on medication. These Primal Nuggets are the easiest, most effective way to get your cat on a raw diet and relieve any food allergies he or she may be having. Good luck, and I hope this helps someone who is as desperate as I was to help their little guy/gal.

First, I'll start by saying I would give this product 5 stars, were it not for some of the Primal recommendations. But I'll get to that. (Also please note I have no veterinary training whatsoever - what's posted below is based off of research I've done and it's important for you to do research on your own to find what's best for your cats!) My husband and I adopted two kittens last June 2014. At the time, they were being fed Sheba canned pate and had dry kibble left out in a bowl during the day, so we kept up with this initially as to not change their diet too quickly (which can make cats very sick). When we brought them home, we noticed that they had fairly frequent diarrhea, but they were eating, sleeping, and playing normally and had no signs of lethargy. They had no accidents outside the litter box, save for one, which we think happened because they were fed quite a bit of tuna fish at the vet's office and hadn't eaten that before. We brought them to the vet and they recommended a deworming medication. Still, the diarrhea continued, so we brought in a stool sample to their vet as recommended. The stool sample came back negative for parasites, but the vet prescribed a broader spectrum deworming medication just in case. That didn't help, either. At the time, my father-in-law and brother-in-law both had their cats on a raw diet, so we decided to do some research on this. Our vet had us check out catinfo.org when we asked about raw diets, and we did a lot of research on that website, as well as some other sites as well. In the end, we opted to go for Primal Freeze-Dried Feline Turkey Formula, as nearby pet stores didn't have viable options and we don't have a lot of freezer space for raw foods. (Note: From what we read, beef can be an allergen for cats, and fish can have too much mercury, so we opted for poultry only). Our cats LOVE this food. We did a slow transition, but even just feeding them 25% raw food with 75% of their normal diet, we noticed a vast improvement. The diarrhea IMMEDIATELY stopped, and their urine output was much better because of the increased moisture (NOTE: you must must must must rehydrate this product if you want to give it to your cats). Their coats were shinier, they had more energy, and they were only pooping about once every two days, which is what's supposed to be happening. We had no idea what a difference this would make and couldn't be happier to have them on a safe, healthy diet! Less vet calls, bills, and unnecessary medicine? I'm all for that. For rehydrating this food, we use two to four parts water to one nugget. So, one nugget = 2-3 tablespoons of water, minimum. The Primal packaging says it should be one tablespoon per nugget, but cats need water! Dry kibble and even a lot of canned foods don't have anywhere near the amount of water cats are supposed to get from a diet, especially considering 80% of domesticated cats are bred from wild cats, and wild cats naturally consume prey with about 75% moisture (think: mice). Also, while your cats should always have access to fresh drinking water, they're supposed to get their hydration primarily from the foods they eat (and, adding water to dry kibble can cause bacteria to grow and just is not recommended whatsoever). So, we upped the water we gave them per nugget versus what Primal recommended. Within a day of this, we noticed our cats just ceased drinking from their water dish. Completely stopped. We still leave a clean bowl of fresh water out, but I haven't seen them touch it once since we transitioned to the raw food diet. And, like I said before, their urine output is so much higher, so I know they're getting plenty of water. (Today, in fact, my husband brought one of them to the vet, who felt the cat's muscles and said he looked super healthy and wasn't dehydrated in the least bit). So, I'd like to see Primal maybe up their recommendations for water on that front. Also, please please please do NOT rely on Primal's pet food calculator. We were religious about checking their weight and activity levels and working within the Primal guidelines, but we noticed that our cats became completely food-obsessed after we made the switch to raw food. At first, we thought it may have had to do with the fact that they had previously been accustomed to having dry kibble out all day, and now their mealtimes were broken down into 4 times during the day, so maybe they were a little anxious about that. One of them started getting really nuts and jumping on the counters, stealing sandwiches out of our hands, etc. We increased their food by a nugget here and there (along with what was recommended as they were gaining weight) to be sure they were eating enough. We regularly fed them an amount over Primal's recommended limit. They weren't losing weight, looked completely happy and normal, and were growing, so we thought they were being fed enough and just absolutely loved this raw food and wanted it all the time. HOWEVER, when my husband took one of them to the vet today (the food-crazy one) with the bag of Primal nuggets, the vet pulled out his calculator, and found that we were feeding them each FOUR LESS NUGGETS PER DAY than what they needed. We were astonished, because we thought we were giving them more than what was recommended! I'll never forgive myself for having hungry little kitties, but now we know and are adjusting accordingly. The point is, if you're going to start your cats on this diet, bring a bag of food with you to a vet's office and ask them how many nuggets per day your cat should get. Absolutely better to take an hour out of your day to do this than let your kitty go hungry. I know the primal calculator says this is just a guideline, but be aware that their recommendations could be more off than you think. All in all, we (or, I should say, my cats) do love this food, and we are so grateful to have found a product that keeps our kitties happy and healthy! This is all they eat (plus treats) as it's a complete diet (once you add water). It is expensive - for two cats, we were going through about 6-7 bags a month, and that was when we were underfeeding them, so now it's going to be quite a bit more, at least until they become adults cats and we can lower their nugget intake. But, when thinking about how sick your cats can get off dry kibble or other such foods, I'd rather invest in high-quality raw food now than deal with any number of ailments and diseases later that could have been prevented!

I highly recommend using a BARF diet for pets whenever possible. Prime Nuggets are a great way to do that. I used to order directly from Prime back in say 2009-2011 when they used to ship direct frozen food. We've recently moved and we're having trouble obtaining the product without ordering from Amazon. We usually got the frozen (less expensive) but the small town local pet food store has a limited supply and I'm going to see if they will order the Pork and Venison in the frozen state. We prepare the freeze dried nuggets, four for each jar, breaking or cutting them up, adding water and refrigerating them for the next day feeding schedule. Don't expect a cat to tear apart a big nugget - needs to be hydrated appropriately. I've made cat food for the BARF diet from Cat Nutrition.org. I had the Tasin grinder and sourced the chicken, including the organ meats and any supplements. My cats didn't like it much but I was a novice and gave it to friends for their cats and finally gave the grinder away in 2019. I always thought premium cat food was good as we've been advised it's better than dried up kibble - and I do think that is correct but premium cat food, if too rich and not varied (fish only, chicken only...) we can, over time harm our cat's physiology. For 5 years my remaining cat would only eat cat food tuna and occasional salmon. He developed pancreatitis which required Denosyl, an anti-nausea pill, a cream on his ear to wake up his appetite and 4-5 laser treatments for his pain. After he was eating again, we switched over the raw frozen Primal foods - and surprisingly he ate it up and thrived for a year as much as a 16 year old can on Pork, Venison and Rabbit. We made a mistake recently and tried some Lamb in another brand which put him right back were he was a year prior - in a pancreas episode - because the Lamb raw food main ingredient was heart - too rich. He is on year two with Primal Raw foods only with a weekly serving of fresh boiled asparagus for the fiber and we're introducing a small amount of psyllium husk powder in his food twice per day to keep everything moving in an older cat on a raw diet and two fresh bowls of water daily. He is still on the Denosyl and and a thyroid pill. If I could advise my younger self - I would say learn more about a pet's diet and not from the billion dollar industry that could very easily shorten your pet's life. You wouldn't feed a lion dried up kibble - and a cat's physiology is the same as a lion's.

I have 3 cats, all have been on homemade raw food since very young (good resource: Dr Becker's Real Food For Healthy Dogs and Cats: Simple Homemade Food - latest edition). Since I moved them to homemade raw food, their health has improved a lot. One of them had IBD and since I moved him to raw food, the IBD went away. NOTE about raw food: I buy organic chicken from a super reliable and clean source. The last thing one needs is to bring parasites into the cats' food. I cook twice a month and put the preparation in glass containers that go into the freezer. I wanted to have something good in case I did not have time to prepare their food or emergencies. I decided to go with Primal Freeze because it look good, good ingredients, etc. The results: my cats were not too keen on the flavor (all 3); the cat who had IBD started with diarrhea. This told me that my homemade food is delicious :o) but something more important: this food may not be appropriate for a cat that has sensitive GI (in this case, good raw food is the best option). On a less important stage: you need more water to hydrate the dehydrated pieces. I think it is double the recommended amount. You may also cut them into 4 pieces to get them hydrate well. And you may need less pieces x day than the recommended amount. But this depends on the cat you have. The one that used to have IBD eats a lot, he is super active too, while his sister eats much less. Finally, cost wise: if you can prepare their food, even though it looks expensive, it is the same or slightly less than Primal. And the quality of good homemade food is much superior than Primal. And what you save in vet's bills more than covers for buying a good meat grinder :o)

My kitten LOVES this stuff! She had been eating Purina kitten chow at her foster home, so when I was starting to transition her to this new food, I put a small bowl of each down on the floor. She was immediately drawn to the Primal and licked her bowl clean. I was hoping to do a little bit of each food type everyday to fully transition her without making her sick, but now she won't even touch the Purina and will only eat Primal! She's only had the turkey formula, but she loves it so much that I doubt we'll be trying the others. As you can guess from the photo, she starts enthusiastically devouring it as soon as the bowl gets on her level. I've heard some folks say that kittens should only eat food specifically made for kittens, but my tiny 8-week-old baby is doing great on it and seems to be getting what she needs. No vomit, no bad litter box episodes, just a happy little kitty with a full belly. In terms of feeding, she seems to be pretty content with about four meals per day. I'm not sure how many nuggets that boils down to, because I broke all the nuggets into little pieces (they're easy to smash up with a mortar and pestle) and put them into a bag to cut down on prep time for individual meals. This also allows me to give her as much or little at a time as I think she'll need, whether it's a big meal after a lot of play time or a little snack. I'd recommend doing this if you are okay with portioning out the food on your own. I also like to add a bit more water to smash up with the food than the package instructs. My kitten gets a little more hydration that way, and she doesn't mind because she likes the taste of it.