by Rebekah Hindman

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Smoothies for Lunch

Lunch can be a monotonous meal. Often seniors don’t work up a lunch time appetite, especially if they eat a late breakfast. Sometimes a well-made fruit smoothie is a rich but not overwhelming meal. A fruit smoothie is a blended combination of frozen fruits, ice, and other ingredients. There are innumerable smoothie recipes available.

The secret ingredient for any smoothie is the thickening agent. Yogurt or pureed bananas work well. Bananas are a great source of potassium. You can easily sneak some carrot juice into a fruit smoothie without damaging the taste. In fact, the vegetable juice helps temper the sweetness. Don’t feel as if you have to use fresh fruit all the time. Blended frozen fruit helps to thicken the consistency. A smoothie is a great way to tailor the liquid diet to personal tastes and to exercise creativity.

Soup Lunches

Soup is a staple for a liquid diet, but that doesn’t mean that it has to be tasteless or overdone. Countless canned soups and soup recipes are out there. Cheese based and potato based soups are good for a liquid diet, but almost any soup can be pureed so that it is easy to swallow.

If you are in a hurry and don’t have time to stop and puree the soup, some name-brand soups market drinkable, microwavable soups. Make sure the soup is not too hot, but also remember that warm foods are easier to taste.

Lunch Side Items

Although few doctors would recommend eating just dessert for lunch, Jell-O’s and puddings are great side items as a source of protein and calcium. A variety of flavors are available, and fruit can be added too.

Protein in puddings and Jell-O repairs muscle and tissues. Bedsores, which plague older bedridden people, can take additional time to heal without protein. Puddings are also a perfect medium for crushed medicine that cannot be swallowed in capsule form. Help your loved one remember the good old days. Get creative with the presentation of Jell-O by using molds.

Entrée Options

A Cuisinart or blender is the most essential tool for a liquid or soft diet. Basically by using one of these, you are cutting out one step in the process of eating: chewing. Most vegetables can be blended, but make sure you still include traditional spices.

Many meats can be blended with broth. Be careful about the presentation of these courses. Try not to be too exotic in what you blend together. Two great tools for cooking no-chew meals are The I-Can’t-Chew Cookbook and The Easy-to-Swallow, Easy-to-Chew Cookbook, which are available online at Amazon.