How can I get my cat to start eating cat food again?

[ShoeWhore]

My lovely 15yo tabby had pancreatitis a couple of weeks ago, she was really poorly and ended up being admitted overnight by the vet. She looks much better now and has now been eating again for about 10 days.

As she hadn't eaten for so long the vet advised offering her anything she wanted to tempt her to eat - tuna, chicken etc.

But now she is refusing to eat any cat food. She usually has mainly Iams (loves it) but won't touch that. I've bought a load of Whiskas pouches (usually loves these) but she's mainly licking the gravy off and perhaps eating 1/3 of the actual food. I've been offering little and often.

Tuna on the other hand she is wolfing down like there is no tomorrow Which is all well and good but it's costing me a fortune and I can't help thinking is not as good for her as a proper balanced cat food in the long run.

Any thoughts on how I persuade her to eat the cat food? (I tried mixing tuna and cat food together but she cleverly ate round the cat food ) Any ideas on different cat foods to try - are there any that she might find totally irresistible?

[issey6cats]

you could try fish based cat food being as she has taken to liking tuna, whiskas actually isnt good food anyway as it has cereal in it, my lot love butchers classic meat in jelly or asdas fish in jelly as both high meat/fish no cereal, you could try putting a tiny bit of cat food to tuna ratio and each day increase the cat food by a tiny bit more till its more cat food than tuna

[HazeltheMcWitch]

Have you tried mushing up her food, and also warming it slightly, so it's more... aromatic ?

[ShoeWhore]

I've ordered some more fishy food to try

Have been mushing it up a bit but haven't tried warming it guess that'll be the next thing to try!

[cozietoesie]

Just my usual recommendation (if you have one near you) of the Cooperative Gourmet Chicken in Gravy. (Comes in single black pouches with an orange picture and is a very respectable 8% ish meat.) Seniorboy, who is elderly, is desperately finicky with his food and having to take meds daily in his food, it gets quite awkward. That Co-op food is a long term favourite where everything else has palled. If I didn't have that to give him every day for tea, I'd be in a pickle.

[ShoeWhore]

Perfect cozie have a coop just round the corner. Will try that tomorrow.

[cozietoesie]

PS - that's the Co-op own brand top notch food - which happens to be called Gourmet. (Not to be confused with the Gourmet Gourmet.) Buy a single sachet to see how it goes. (More expensive than boxes but less expensive to only buy one if it's then a total failure.)