I think it really does come down to the world building style. Is the fantasy society pretty much a parallel world, or is it supposed to have very different cultures, nations, histories, languages etc. that are just being "translated" into English?
In the latter case, proper names that specifically reference people, places, cultures,and historical events from our own world jump out at me. Idiomatic expressions that reference concepts that wouldn't exist in a given time and place feel odd to me as well, even if the world is an alternative version of our own.
It gets dicier when a word is so ubiquitous that most people don't think about a particular reference when they hear of it. Do most people think of the Greek god of the forge when someone mentions a volcanic eruption? Does calling a volcano an "exploding mountain" or something feel weirder and more awkward than using the only widespread name we have for such in English?
I suppose that's a blurrier line.
With the cat, simply describing the animal is best, I think, unless it's critical that the reader know which part of your world its ancestors hailed from.