Why does wet pet food smell so awful?

Our vet advised that cats "taste" food with their nose - smelly to hoomans may be delightful to our puddycat!

I use Purina Gourmet for my cat, mainly because he won't eat anything else, I have never noticed a bad smell, whereas when I feed next door's cat who eats something I've never heard of. it smells vile.

@Whitewavemark2

It’s actually “wolfs it down” - not “woofs”.

My adult son decided ordinary cat food pouches didn’t contain enough goodness for our two cats so he ordered some frozen very expensive stuff online. They hated it!!!!
I’m back to ordinary pouches now but does anybody have an idea as to how to get all the food out of the pouches? I pull the top off and squeeze the pouch down but invariably some food refuses to come out! I wish there was a little roller or something that I could feed the pouch through.

I worked for Quake Oats in my teens - they made dog and cat food then. There was a whole load of testing and research to ensure that the right amount of nutrients and vitamins were in the can. Then there were colour, smell and taste tests first with kennels, and then blind tasting with members of the public all over the country, to ensure the taste and smell was making your pets happy. Then the labs would take a sample can every so often from the production line to ensure that the standard formulation was being met.
You may not like it but bet your pet does

Does anybody remember Kit E Kat from back in the day?

My God you could virtually smell it from 200 yards away. It made my sister feel nauseous. No she didn't eat it.
And my mother had to really scrub the cats bowl to get the smell out of it.

I've bought Purina Gourmet - which the kitten quite liked - and Sheba which she ate reluctantly. The sachets are only 50g each, whereas the Whiskas is 85g per pouch.

I'll have a look around for some more brands. The rescue people did tell me to vary the brands, so that she doesn't 'stick' on just one brand.

And I agree about it being impossible to get all the food out of the pouch.

I agree, it's absolutely vile.

One of my mutts had a bad case of gastroenteritis (literally coming out both ends) 2 days in vets, half that time On drip, sent home with tin of gastro food!

The food stunk before she ate it and her poo stunk exactly the same!

I defrosted chicken breast and cooked that for her so half the tin was binned and she had chicken and rice 3 times a day then I put her back On her kibble.

Made us realise how their poo DOESN'T pong on kibble (not cheap stuff either! They both get fed 3 times a day and each meal is a different flavour, trust me, they won't eat the flavours at the wrong time, each will sulk, beef breakfast, duck dinner, chicken tea. Yes, the one will answer back and really whinge if you try to give the wrong flavour!)

We use Butternut Box made from fresh ingredients and comes frozen.