Conscientious manufacturers of dog and cat foods strive to create balanced, nutritionally complete foods for the animals they serve. Many attentive caregivers choose to feed home-prepared meals by following a recipe formulated by a veterinary nutritionist. But in both cases, the strategies they employ inevitably fall short, because they lack a key ingredient that is crucial to providing optimum nutrition. That key ingredient is variety. Without it, the best any home-prepared recipe or packaged food can do is provide a single nutritionally balanced meal for the ‘typical,’ dog or cat – and as we know, it’s the rare animal who can be considered ‘typical,’ with regard to body composition, metabolism, energy requirements and nutritional needs. Even more concerning is that for all of these animals, eating the same food every day poses an array of health risks, including the risk of nutritional imbalances for those whose nutrient requirements deviate to even a small degree from those of the ‘typical,’ animal.