What exactly is the attractant in dog food and cat food?

A bait is an additive that is used in feed to increase a pet's appetite.

The additives used in cat food and dog food are flavors, not food attractants. Flavors are extracted from fresh meat, just like salt, monosodium glutamate, sugar, and vinegar that we humans use, and have no adverse effects on pets.

Flavoring agents are added to pet food to ensure the uniformity and palatability of the food, to ensure the quality of the pet's eating, and to ensure that the pet has sufficient nutrition.

In fact, pets' taste needs for food are not as varied as ours. On the contrary, they need the unity of food taste, because for pets, and even most members of the animal kingdom, taste is more functional than sensibility. . Taste, like smell, is a chemical scan designed to distinguish between potentially dangerous (bitter, sour) substances and nutrients the body needs (salty, sweet). Therefore, in order for pets to eat with peace of mind, we need an additive to maintain the consistency of their food taste. Because various ingredients are produced in different places, different seasons, and different processing techniques, there will be slight taste changes when they are finally made into pet food, and this change is for pets whose senses of smell and taste are far more developed than those of humans. It's a sign of extreme danger that will cause them to refuse to eat.

Therefore, after the pet food is dehydrated and puffed during the processing, the taste of the food itself will be removed, and a stable and safe taste will be given to it through the flavoring agent, thereby promoting the pet to eat. This means that a cat food with more fish may taste the same as a cat food with more poultry, depending on the flavor.

Food attractants, also known as flavoring agents, flavoring agents, and appetite enhancers, are additives added to feed to improve the palatability of feed, enhance animal appetite, increase animal feed intake, and promote feed digestion, absorption and utilization.

There are many types of food attractants, mainly including flavors (meat, frankincense, fruity, fishy, garlic, grass, bean and other flavors), sweeteners (single or compound sweeteners), sour Agents (inorganic or organic edible acids), umami agents (sodium glutamate, sodium inosinate, sodium guanylate, etc.), spicy agents (garlic powder, chili powder), salty agents (salt, carbonic acid) sodium hydrogen) etc.

The bait-attractant often used in the manufacture of pet food is oil, which is not only an important nutritional component in pets, but also can change the appearance of pet food and improve palatability. In the process of pet food processing, oil is often sprayed after granulation to meet nutritional standards and improve the palatability of the food. Fats play an important role in the smell of food. Different types and contents of fats have different volatilized smells.

Another common food attractant is what we often call the smell of meat. Studies have shown that the production of meat flavor is a volatile component with meat flavor that is jointly generated by the Maillard reaction and the degradation of lipids during the heating process. Maillard reaction is the main source of meat flavor, and has a greater impact on food flavor. The so-called Maillard reaction is the reaction between carbonyl compounds (that is, sugars) and amino compounds such as amines, amino acids, peptides, proteins, etc. The flavor substances produced mainly include oxygen-containing compounds, nitrogen-containing compounds, and sulfur-containing heterocycles. The compounds also include sulfur-containing heterocyclic furans and nitrogen-containing heterocyclic pyrazines. These substances can make pet food have a charming fragrance and have a good attracting effect, and are often used in pet food processing.

Studies have shown that directly using animal protein hydrolyzate as the substrate, adding reducing sugar, sulfur-containing compounds and other flavor-enhancing substances (phosphoric acid, 2-methylfuran, etc.) 2.1 times the feed intake of dog food supplemented with liver attractants.

The third bait attractant is sweeteners, and sweetness is also a flavor that dogs prefer.

The last food attractant is the most commonly used salty agent. Dogs are all heavy-tasting guys. Adding more salt to the food can also improve the dog's appetite.

Adding a small amount of food attractants has no effect on pets, just like we use MSG and soy sauce to taste when cooking. However, in order to save costs, some pet food manufacturers reduce the addition of meat meal or meat in the manufacturing process, and add a large amount of food attractants to the surface of the food produced by a pile of flour, which can also make pets love to eat. This is the same as taking Laoganma bibimbap. It is definitely not nutritious to eat for a long time. Excessive intake of salt will also cause lacrimal glands and other diseases. So when it comes to bait, it is not a heinous thing in itself, but it is only used by some businessmen to make money by speculation, so this has caused everyone to feel abhorrence when they mention bait.