Cat food flavors

I was watching TV and finally paid attention to a cat food commercial. What caught my attention was the bragging about the wonderful flavors: salmon, chicken and beef.

Beef? For a cat?

I got a mental picture of a barn cat bringing down a cow. Pretty comical. But not very realistic.

Why do we develop animal food flavors that sound like they belong on a human plate? How do we even know cats like these flavors? Are we wrecking their taste for what they’d naturally eat and changing their behavior as a result? Shouldn’t we be feeding animals something that corresponds to their natural instincts so they keep doing what they’re hard-wired to do?

Shouldn’t we be making a mouse-flavored cat food?