Feeding Your Pet (Cat)

One of the things I have been thinking about lately is how to feed my cat in a healthy and sustainable way. We currently feed our cat Science Diet Hairball Control Light dry food and Fancy Feast wet food. Both have pretty low fat content percentages. Fancy Feast Classic Seafood Variety has 2.0-4.0% fat content, depending on the type of fish, and Science Diet has 7.2-9.5% fat content. Kia, our cat, has lived with us for about 5 1/2 years. I say lived because, as many cat "owners" know, I believe she probably owns me more than I own her. We first met her at an ASPCA shelter about 5 1/2 years ago and adopted her then (she was almost a year old).

Kia has struggled previously with her weight and overeating, so we have had her on a meal plan for a number of years instead of free-feeding. We would like to give her healthy, nutritious food that doesn't have all of those additives and chemicals that most pet food brands include. For example, the Science Diet we feed Kia has chicken by-product meal, chicken liver flavor, and animal fat with mixed tocophenols. How about naming the specific animals? The Fancy Feast wet food has meat by-products, Red Dye #3, and Turkey (in seafood?). I know from having read
Fast Food Nation by Eric Schlosser that Red Dye #3 is not good for people, so I think I can safely assume it is not good for cats either. As for the other ingredients, I took a few minutes to peruse the Internet and found some disturbing factoids. However, since this information is not coming from a source I know and trust, I will not expand until I have conducted further research. I recently went to both Petsmart and Petco to get a few other things for Kia and decided to go through all of their "natural" food choices. Although some of them do use healthier ingredients, such as real meat, brown rice and veggies, they all had a high fat content, especially compared to the dry food she eats now.

Why is there nothing available that is low-fat with quality ingredients, providing all the nutrients that a cat (or dog) needs? I would like to be able to make food for her myself, but since I am not a veterinarian, I am not even sure where to begin. I don't know exactly what my cat needs on a daily basis in terms of protein, fat, carbs, etc. and I don't know what other vitamins and nutrients she needs. Are there resources for people who want to make their own cat food?

I was thinking of suggesting that my vet have a workshop or seminar on this topic. I feel like a lot of people could benefit from learning more about this topic. Plus, as with most foods, I suspect that homemade would actually be cheaper than store-bought cat food, and it would be nice to control what is going into Kia's system.