Brown Rice

Brown rice has more fiber, B vitamins and minerals, and in people it raises blood sugar more slowly, but it still lowers a food's value when it takes the place of meat and fat.

Brown rice is whole grain rice with the bran layer left on, used in cat food as a source of starch and fiber. Tufts veterinary nutritionists say cats can digest and metabolize properly cooked carbohydrates, but adult cats have no specific dietary requirement for carbohydrate. For a cat with a medical condition, ask your veterinarian about the food.

Source: sites.tufts.edu

Brown rice supplies starch for energy and helps bind dry kibble. Its bran adds fiber along with some B vitamins and minerals. Pettings notes that the bran also contains phytate, which can reduce how much zinc and iron are absorbed. Brown rice is a common grain choice in recipes that leave out corn and wheat.

Phytate, or phytic acid, is a compound in the bran of grains and seeds that stores phosphorus for the plant. In the gut it can bind minerals such as zinc and iron and reduce how much is absorbed. Pettings mentions it for brown rice because the bran is kept. Complete cat foods are formulated with added minerals to account for the whole recipe.

Yes. Brown rice is the whole rice kernel with only the inedible outer hull removed, so it keeps the bran and germ. White rice is brown rice milled further to strip those layers away. On a cat food label, brown rice is a whole grain ingredient, while white rice, brewers rice and rice flour are refined.

Brown rice gets 2 out of 5 from Pettings, which lists it as a grain, potato or other carb source. It shows up on 21 of the 149 dry cat foods we list. Each food's page shows how the whole recipe scores, so one ingredient score is only part of the picture.