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If you’re an Australian dog, there’s never been a better time to live!
Not only is the average dog owner much more knowledgeable about dog health and nutrition, there is now a wealth of premium quality options for our pooches.
One of the latest entrants in the competitive fresh dog food market is Sydney's Northern Beaches-based Perfect Bowl, who launched only a year ago but have already made a name for themselves with an average 4.9 star rating awarded by their customers!
After taking a quick look at the nutrient profiles of their flagship recipes, we were more than happy to trial these fresh meals with our Malinois.
The story behind Perfect Bowl
It came as no surprise that dogs benefit from real, healthy food, much like us! Alex started cooking Danny the best meals he could, and over time the health benefits became more and more apparent.
Before officially launching Perfect Bowl on the market he worked closely with a leading Sydney Animal Nutritionist to develop and perfect these fresh, healthy, complete and balanced dog food options.
He then enlisted the help of lifelong friend Wes to really bring this vision to life.
Fast forward to a year later, and with thousands of customers, the backing of vets, and multiple pet retailers all over Sydney and Melbourne, more and more dog lovers are now experiencing first-hand the benefits of fresh and wholesome food for their dogs.
Discover the Perfect Bowl options
Whilst an increasing number of dog owners are walking away from processed, supermarket dog food and enjoy cooking for their pets, vets recommend only feeding food that has been designed for dogs.
Unless you have a lot of time on your hands, you can’t make yourself an animal nutritionist overnight. If your dog has intolerances or a medical condition, it is always wise to check with your vet before making any big changes to their diet.
The Perfect Bowl recipes have all been designed to meet your dog’s nutritional requirements, established by AAFCO (e.g. Dog Nutrient Profiles for an adult life stage).
Simply use their meal plan calculator to create a tailored meal plan that will fit your dog's daily energy requirement. A tailored meal plan will help your dog reach their healthy weight.
Simply use their meal plan calculator to create a tailored meal plan that will fit your dog's daily energy requirement. A tailored meal plan will help your dog reach their healthy weight.
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| Perfect Bowl pouches (500g) come in 3 flavours: Lamb, Beef & Chicken |
Perfect Bowl meals are freshly cooked to order, then quickly frozen and delivered to your door within a few days. Even if you’re not feeding them every single day, all the meals will last up to 3 months in the freezer, if stored at or below minus 18°C. Once opened, just keep your portion refrigerated and feed within 4 days (or in our case, one meal!).
Rather than having to work out exact portions for your dog and commit upfront to a subscription – always a bit daunting as you never know if your dog will like it – you can dip your toes in with their premade 500g pouches and order as little (or as much) as you want.
If you’re new to ordering lightly cooked meals for your dogs online, Perfect Bowl offers a simple choice of 3 recipes all only using human-grade meat, poultry and vegetables to ensure freshness and quality.
✔️ Perfect Bowl Beef (127kCal/100g)
✔️ Perfect Bowl Chicken (122kCal/100g)
✔️ Perfect Bowl Lamb (110kCal/100g)
A good starting point is to start using these pouches as meal toppers and then progressively switch to using these as a complete meal option.
What you'll immediately notice is how green and fresh all three recipes look, thanks to a great selection of vegetables and/or herbs (spinach, broccoli, carrot, celery, rosemary etc) and added superfoods (kelp powder, cod lover oil, turmeric).
For our large dogs (25-35kg) we used ¾ pouch daily (375g) as a meal topper option but between 1.5 – 2 pouches on the days we made these a complete meal option.
For your small dog (5-10kg), you’d only use ¼ pouch daily as a meal topper* or maybe ½ pouch as a complete meal so a little goes a long way.
* This is a guide only as your dog's feeding needs may differ from these recommended amounts due to your dog's choice of dry food and also your dog's activity level, age, sex, breed etc.
Though it is hard to gauge sometimes, our dogs’ preference of flavours appeared to be:
1) Perfect Bowl Chicken (14.5% Protein, 5.8% Fat)
2) Perfect Bowl Beef (10.6% Protein, 5.6% Fat)
3) Perfect Bowl Lamb (10.3% Protein, 5.5% Fat)
Though it is hard to gauge sometimes, our dogs’ preference of flavours appeared to be:
1) Perfect Bowl Chicken (14.5% Protein, 5.8% Fat)
2) Perfect Bowl Beef (10.6% Protein, 5.6% Fat)
3) Perfect Bowl Lamb (10.3% Protein, 5.5% Fat)
How to get started with a Perfect Bowl Subscription
1. Give a few details e.g. your dog's name and suburb (to ensure delivery is available) to create your dog’s profile.
To ensure the meal size meets your dog's daily energy requirements, input your dog's weight, current body score and activity level (sedentary or active). If your dog suffers from specific allergies or intolerances, indicate this under the dietary requirements. The whole set-up takes 5 minutes to complete and could not be easier!
2. Select your meal plan
You can choose one, two or all three recipes and how much to feed: a Half Bowl (50% of meals) delivered fortnightly or a Full Bowl (100% of meals) delivered weekly.
3. Box Delivered within 7-10 days
Your dog’s freshly made meals are delivered for free at the front door (in our experience this was on a Saturday so we were home to receive it and put our pouches in the freezer).
To ensure the meal size meets your dog's daily energy requirements, input your dog's weight, current body score and activity level (sedentary or active). If your dog suffers from specific allergies or intolerances, indicate this under the dietary requirements. The whole set-up takes 5 minutes to complete and could not be easier!
2. Select your meal plan
You can choose one, two or all three recipes and how much to feed: a Half Bowl (50% of meals) delivered fortnightly or a Full Bowl (100% of meals) delivered weekly.
3. Box Delivered within 7-10 days
Your dog’s freshly made meals are delivered for free at the front door (in our experience this was on a Saturday so we were home to receive it and put our pouches in the freezer).
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| Porthos: "Please let me have a quick sniff before you take these away!" |
This is a subscription service but with no locked in contract and you can pause or cancel at any time or even change the address if someone else is looking after your dog whilst you're on holidays!
Our Perfect Bowl Unboxing Experience:
Our Perfect Bowl Unboxing Experience:
Your pre-portioned pouches are delivered frozen to the front door in insulated packaging that will keep will keep the food fresh for hours until you return. The Woolpack technology reduces condensation and removes humidity – preventing spoilage and maintaining the integrity of the cardboard carton during transit.
Your box also contains individual recipe cards, with a detailed list of ingredients and a complete nutritional analysis.
It also provides guidelines on how to safely store (freezer is best) and thaw all your pouches based on your daily usage.
Our overall verdict on the Perfect Bowl offering
Probably the first thing that struck us most with Perfect Bowl is the simplicity because sometimes it feels like you need to have a PhD in dog nutrition in order to select some suitable options for your dogs.
We loved the fact that this dog food is not only 100% Aussie-made but also local (less than an hour from our location). Not only does this company support local farmers and businesses when sourcing their human-grade ingredients but they're also all round good guys who donate $1 of every sale to Pound Paws animal charity.
Our Malinois Porthos would definitely give his Perfect Bowl Chicken a 5 star rating for its palatability!
Our Malinois Porthos would definitely give his Perfect Bowl Chicken a 5 star rating for its palatability!
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| Porthos is a big fan of the Perfect Chicken (higher level of protein and low carbs) |
But in case you have a fussy eater, Perfect Bowl are so confident that your dog will love their freshly cooked food, they will give you 100% of your money* back if they aren’t licking their bowl clean!
* This is only available on your first order and is limited at A$50 exclusive of shipping.
However, if you opt for their ready-made 500g pouches, you should receive your order within 2-4 working days in Sydney (only) based on our experience or you could pop into one of their many stockists. If you're interested in becoming one (including Melbourne), the company would love to hear from you!
Price & Where to Buy:
Based on a weekly subscription for our Belgian Malinois Porthos (30kg), it would cost $117/week based on the Full Bowl Plan ($16.71/day based on 1,000g fed daily).
If feeding using the Half Bowl Plan as a meal topper, we’d then receive deliveries fortnightly and the cost would be $121/fortnight ($8.64/day based on 500g fed daily).
You can follow Perfect Bowl on Facebook www.facebook.com/perfectbowlau
Dealing with a small local business means that you're likely to deal directly with one of the owners (Alex or Wes) and this means a higher level of personalised customer service than you'd receive from a large business. They did go above and beyond to ensure that we were happy with our first order and overall experience.
The other thing you need to keep in mind for your first order (via subscription) is that there’s normally approximately 7-10 days processing time to receive your first delivery (e.g. a custom order placed on November 1 will be received around November 11) so remember to plan ahead.
However, if you opt for their ready-made 500g pouches, you should receive your order within 2-4 working days in Sydney (only) based on our experience or you could pop into one of their many stockists. If you're interested in becoming one (including Melbourne), the company would love to hear from you!
Price & Where to Buy:
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| "Just making sure no one steals the food!" |
If feeding using the Half Bowl Plan as a meal topper, we’d then receive deliveries fortnightly and the cost would be $121/fortnight ($8.64/day based on 500g fed daily).
This is obviously slightly cheaper than the $12.95 (500g) for the standard portioned size so our recommendation (if your dogs like their trial) is to move on to a subscription level you're comfortable with to start saving straight away on your meals and never run out!
Shipping on any orders above $100 is free. For small orders, a standard $9.95 delivery charge applies. For more information, please visit perfectbowl.com.au
You can follow Perfect Bowl on Facebook www.facebook.com/perfectbowlau
or @perfectbowl_au on Instagram.
Disclaimer: A complimentary 2-week trial (15 pouches) was delivered to us by Perfect Bowl in order to complete this review.
Disclaimer: A complimentary 2-week trial (15 pouches) was delivered to us by Perfect Bowl in order to complete this review.
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