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What's actually in Koha?
We analyzed KOHA Limited Ingredient Diet Chicken Pate, a canned wet food. The ingredient list is short by design: chicken, water sufficient for processing, ground flaxseed, chicken liver, New Zealand green mussel, pumpkin, agar agar, and potassium chloride, followed by choline chloride, taurine, salt, dried kale, cranberries, ginger, turmeric, and the vitamin and mineral package.
The first thing to understand is the guaranteed analysis, because at a glance it looks low: 10% protein, 8% fat, 1% fiber, and 78% moisture. Those single-digit protein and fat numbers are not a weakness. They look small only because the food is mostly water, and we walk through that math in detail below. The short version is that on a dry-matter basis, once you remove the water, this is a high-protein, carnivore-appropriate food.
The recipe itself is the real story. The only animal-protein sources are chicken and chicken liver. That is what makes this a true single-animal-protein, limited-ingredient diet, the format owners and veterinarians reach for when they are trying to identify a food sensitivity. Chicken leads the list as a whole, named muscle meat, and chicken liver follows as a nutrient-dense organ that supplies vitamin A, B vitamins, and highly bioavailable iron. There is no second or third meat muddying the protein picture, which is the entire point.
The supporting cast is short and purposeful. Ground flaxseed adds omega fatty acids and a little fiber; New Zealand green mussel is a recognized natural source of joint-supporting nutrients; pumpkin and dried kale add gentle fiber and micronutrients; cranberries, ginger, and turmeric round things out. Taurine appears as a named addition, which matters because taurine is an essential amino acid cats cannot make in adequate amounts, and a deficiency is linked to heart and eye disease. One detail worth flagging for texture-sensitive shoppers: the gelling agent here is agar agar, a seaweed-derived gel, rather than carrageenan or the synthetic gums some cans rely on. Importantly, this food is labeled complete and balanced for adult maintenance under AAFCO standards, not "for supplemental or intermittent feeding only," a line many premium-looking cans carry that quietly disqualifies them as a sole diet. Shop on Amazon →
The good stuff
The single-protein, limited-ingredient design is the headline strength, and it solves a specific, common problem. Food allergies and intolerances in cats usually trace back to a protein the animal has eaten for a long time, and the only reliable way to pin one down is an elimination diet: feed a single, simple protein and nothing else for several weeks, watch whether the itching, ear infections, vomiting, or loose stool clears, then reintroduce foods one at a time. A food like this one, with chicken and chicken liver as the only animal proteins and a deliberately short supporting list, is exactly the tool that process calls for. There is nothing hidden to confound the result. For cats with inflammatory bowel disease, chronic soft stool, or a generally sensitive stomach, that simplicity is genuinely therapeutic, not just marketing.
The second real strength is the moisture, and it is easy to undervalue. Cats descend from desert-dwelling hunters and have a famously low thirst drive; in the wild they get most of their water from prey, not from a bowl. On a dry diet many cats live in a state of low-grade chronic dehydration, which is one reason urinary problems are so common. A canned food at 78% moisture roughly mirrors the water content of actual prey and floods the system with water at every meal. That matters most for cats prone to feline lower urinary tract disease (FLUTD), urinary crystals, constipation, or megacolon, where keeping urine dilute and stool soft is part of the day-to-day management. Compare that 78% to the roughly 10% moisture of dry kibble and the difference in water intake over a day is substantial.
It is also worth crediting what is not in the recipe. There is no second or third meat, no by-product ambiguity, and the gel is agar, a seaweed extract, rather than carrageenan. The inclusions that are present pull their weight: chicken liver is one of the most nutrient-dense ingredients available to a cat, New Zealand green mussel is a credible source of joint-supporting compounds, and added taurine covers the single most important amino-acid risk in feline diets. For an obligate carnivore, a high-moisture food built on real chicken and organ meat is close to the shape of an ideal meal.
The not-so-good stuff
The most important caveat is the flip side of the single-protein strength: this is a targeted or rotation diet, not automatically a forever sole food for every cat. A limited-ingredient diet is, by definition, narrow. That narrowness is the feature during an elimination trial or for a cat with a known sensitivity, but feeding any single protein and a short ingredient list as the only food indefinitely is a decision worth making with eyes open, ideally alongside your veterinarian. For many cats it is perfectly fine long term; for others, rotating proteins or pairing this with a complementary formula is the better call. The point is that "limited ingredient" is a tool with a job, not a blanket upgrade for every situation.
The second honest concern is cost. Canned food is expensive per calorie to begin with, because you are paying to ship and store a product that is mostly water, and a limited-ingredient, single-protein recipe sits at the premium end of that already-premium category. Feeding a cat entirely on a food like this, especially in a multi-cat household, is a real budget commitment. The water you are paying for is doing genuine work for hydration, but it is still water, and the per-calorie math is steep next to dry food.
The third item is less a flaw than a literacy issue, and it is the one most likely to make a shopper wrongly pass on this food: the as-fed macros look low. A label reading 10% protein and 8% fat can scare off someone comparing it to a kibble bag boasting 40% protein. That comparison is invalid, because the two foods contain wildly different amounts of water, and we explain exactly why in the next section. If you read the guaranteed analysis without adjusting for moisture, you will badly underrate this food.
How it compares
The most useful comparison is to the moisture math itself, because it is what turns the as-fed numbers into something meaningful. To compare any two foods fairly, you convert to a dry-matter basis, which simply means subtracting the water and looking at what is left. This food is 78% moisture, so only 22% of the can is actual dry food. Take the 10% as-fed protein and divide it by that 0.22 of dry matter, and you get roughly 45% protein on a dry-matter basis. Do the same with the 8% fat and it lands near 36%. Suddenly this is a high-protein, high-fat, carnivore-appropriate food, exactly what you want for an obligate carnivore, and nothing like the "low protein" it appeared to be. Dry kibble looks higher on the label only because it has already had most of its water removed; once you put both foods on the same dry-matter footing, the canned food's protein is fully competitive. This is the single most important thing to understand before judging any wet food by its label.
Against other foods in our catalog, KOHA's B grade (86/100) places it ahead of Weruva Paw Lickin' Chicken (B/75), another canned chicken option. Both are honest, moisture-rich chicken foods, but KOHA earns the edge by pairing muscle meat with chicken liver and by being labeled complete and balanced for adult maintenance, where the Weruva recipe leans almost entirely on plain chicken breast in broth.
At the top of the canned tier sits Tiki Cat After Dark (A/90), also a high-moisture pate. It scores higher precisely because it goes the opposite direction from KOHA: it stacks multiple proteins and organ meats nose-to-tail rather than limiting itself to one. That breadth earns more points on our rubric, but it also makes it the wrong tool for an elimination diet, which is exactly where KOHA shines. For readers weighing fresh options, Smalls (A/90) reaches the same A tier through human-grade, cooked-fresh chicken. KOHA's value is not in out-scoring those foods on variety; it is in being a clean, single-protein, shelf-stable can for the cats that specifically need one.
The bottom line
KOHA Limited Ingredient Diet Chicken Pate earns a B grade (86/100) from KibbleIQ. It is a true single-animal-protein, limited-ingredient canned food built on chicken and chicken liver, at 78% moisture, gelled with agar rather than carrageenan, and labeled complete and balanced for adult maintenance rather than supplemental feeding only. That combination makes it one of the cleaner choices we have scored for elimination diets, food allergies, and sensitive or IBD-prone stomachs, and the high moisture is a real asset for cats at risk of urinary problems or constipation. The honest caveats are that a single-protein recipe is a targeted tool rather than an automatic forever-food for every cat, that canned food is costly per calorie, and that you have to read its low as-fed macros on a dry-matter basis to see the high-protein carnivore food underneath. If you want a simple, honest, high-moisture chicken food for a cat that needs a limited ingredient list, this is an easy one to recommend. Shop on Amazon →