Potato Protein

No. Potato protein contains no taurine and does not provide the amino acid balance a cat needs as well as meat does.

Potato protein is protein recovered from the liquid left over in potato starch production, then dried into a powder. FDA's dilated cardiomyopathy investigation looked at diets with peas, lentils, other pulses or potatoes as main ingredients, and found potatoes in a far smaller share of reported products than peas or lentils. Most reports were in dogs. For a cat with a medical condition, ask your veterinarian.

Source: fda.gov

Potato protein raises the protein percentage of a dry food without adding meat. It also tends to show up in recipes that avoid common protein sources, since potato does not appear among the foods reported to cause allergic reactions in cats in a 2016 review of published cases, though those cats were tested against only a few foods. In small amounts it does little beyond lifting the protein figure, which is why Pettings counts it as a plant protein and not as a meat source.

Source: pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

No. Potatoes are split into a starch fraction and a protein fraction during processing. Potato starch is almost all carbohydrate and works as a binder in kibble. Potato protein is what is recovered from the liquid left after the starch is removed, and it is mostly protein. A food can contain one, both or neither, and each is listed under its own name.

Potato is not among the usual food allergens in cats. The Merck Veterinary Manual lists beef and fish among common sources of food allergens in cats and corn and wheat among less common ones, with no mention of potato. That is one reason potato protein appears in limited-ingredient recipes. Any protein can still trigger an allergy, and a veterinarian diagnoses it with an elimination diet trial.

Source: merckvetmanual.com

Pettings gives potato protein 2 out of 5 and lists it as a plant protein. It appears on 8 of the 149 dry cat foods we list. It rarely causes allergies, but it inflates the protein figure with a non-meat source and has no taurine. Each food's page shows how it scores overall.