Best Dog Food for Golden Retrievers – Chewie Approved

If you want to know the best dog food for Golden Retrievers, this will answer your questions about finding quality, healthy foods for Goldens.

Chewie, our 3-year-old Golden Retriever, is a beloved family member. We do everything we can to keep our pets healthy and happy.

We regularly take them for vet visits to get the recommended vaccines and tests.

Our last dog, Lizzy, who died 3 years ago at the age of 14, had skin allergies and we gave her grain-free food to help with the allergies.

When we got Chewie as a puppy, we started feeding him grain-free food too because we thought it was a healthy choice.

Recently, at a vet visit, our veterinarian warned us about the problems with grain-free pet food.

Are Grain-Free Dog Foods Bad?

Over the last few years, veterinarians started noticing an increase in the number of dogs with dilated cardiomyopathy.  DCM is a type of canine heart disease that affects the heart muscle, decreasing its ability to pump blood.  This, unfortunately, leads to congestive heart failure.  Some dog breeds, especially the large breeds, have a predisposition to DCM.

In July 2018, FDA began an investigation of potential links between heart disease and grain-free dog food diets.  This specifically looked into food that contained a high proportion of peas, lentils, other legume seeds, and/or potatoes as main ingredients.

Researchers found that Golden Retrievers may be predisposed to a taurine deficiency that can lead to DCM.

Because of the FDA investigation and past studies, our veterinarian suggested that we stop giving Chewie grain-free food.

How to Select the Best Food for Your Dog?

One of the best ways to determine the best food for your dog is to ask your veterinarian.  You will want to find a well-balanced, high-quality food to help their immune system, digestive system, fur, and more.

According to the American Kennel Club, dogs, as opposed to cats, are not strictly carnivores.  Grains, fruits, and vegetables give dogs essential vitamins, minerals, and fiber.  The best dog foods contain high-quality meat, vegetables, grains, and fruit selected for a dog’s digestive system.

Best Dog Food for Golden Retrievers

Large breed dogs, like the golden retriever, are at risk for bone and joint problems caused by excess calories and too much weight.  Because of this, it’s important that golden retrievers have a protein-rich diet, lower in fat and calories.

Our veterinarian recommended a few different dog food brands to feed Chewie.  We also took the recommendations of the Gold Ribbon Rescue, the organization that we adopted Chewie from.

One of the brands recommended by both was Royal Canin.

Golden Retriever Adult Dry Dog Food

There’s a dog food made just for golden retrievers.

Royal Canin Golden Retriever Adult dry dog food promotes heart health with taurine, EPA, and DHA.  It also helps dogs maintain an ideal weight with the right calorie and fat content for the breed.

Royal Canin Golden Retiever Dog Food Ingredients: Brown rice, chicken by-product meal, oat groats, brewers rice, wheat, corn gluten meal, chicken fat, natural flavors, powdered cellulose, dried plain beet pulp, wheat gluten, fish oil, dried tomato pomace, vegetable oil, sodium silico aluminate, calcium carbonate, potassium chloride, psyllium seed husk, salt, fructooligosaccharides, vitamins [DL-alpha tocopherol acetate (source of vitamin E), niacin supplement, L-ascorbyl-2-polyphosphate (source of vitamin C), D-calcium pantothenate, biotin, pyridoxine hydrochloride (vitamin B6), riboflavin supplement, thiamine mononitrate (vitamin B1), vitamin A acetate, folic acid, vitamin B12 supplement, vitamin D3 supplement], sodium tripolyphosphate, L-lysine, taurine, choline chloride, monocalcium phosphate, glucosamine hydrochloride, DL-methionine, L-carnitine, trace minerals [zinc proteinate, zinc oxide, ferrous sulfate, manganese proteinate, manganous oxide, copper sulfate, calcium iodate, sodium selenite, copper proteinate], GLA safflower oil, marigold extract (Tagetes erecta L.), green tea extract, magnesium oxide, chondroitin sulfate, rosemary extract, preserved with mixed tocopherols and citric acid.

You can buy this food at:

Chewy.com and save money on the autoship option. If you are a new customer you get 30% off your order and existing customers get 5-10% off.

Petco, where you get 35% off your first order & free shipping on $35 when you select repeat delivery.

Amazon and get 5% off with subscribe and save.

Chewie Approves

There was no adjustment time when Chewie switched over to the Royal Canin Golden Retriever dry dog food.  He loves the taste and we still need to use his dog slow feeder because he will eat his food too quickly.

In fact, our cat approves too, though we don’t purposely give him the food.  Do you see that hole in the dog food bag? Gizmo, the cat, tried to eat his way into the bag when he snuck into the pantry one day.

Do You Capitalize Golden Retriever?

As a side note, as I was researching and writing this article I started to question whether I was using the correct capitalization of the word “golden retriever”.   

I consulted Google and validated my thought that you do not capitalize golden retriever or other dog breeds, unless, they have a proper noun.  For example, bulldog is not capitalized, but French bulldog is.  You would also capitalize German shepherd, Labrador retriever, Doberman pinscher, etc.