Postpartum Recovery: What to Eat in the First Week
What can you eat to support your postpartum recovery best? Well, let’s start with you’ve had babe, and are headed home from the hospital. The last thing you really want to do is cook, let alone cook strategically.
I’ve got a few recipes to lay out some options to support your postpartum recovery. All are easily made in bulk, and freezable, and are great nesting party recipes. Many are great to use as first meals for babe as they enter toddlerhood as well.
Postpartum Organ Stew
I know. Organs. Organ meats are intensely wonderful for post partum recovery. Easily digestible, filled with nutrients, and supportive of all the things as you recover from childbirth—organ meats are a good standard in post partum recovery.
Ingredients:
1/2 lb ground beef
1/2 lb minced liver, heart, and kidneys
1/2 tsp fennel seeds
1/2 tsp fenugreek powder
1/2 tsp cumin
1 inch peeled ginger root diced
2 garlic cloves peeled, and minced
3 good sized carrots, peeled, and chopped
1 cup red cabbage chopped
2 medium sized sweet potatoes chopped and peeled
1 cup of fresh kale chopped
1 red onion diced
1/2 cup celery diced
1/2 cup lentils
1/2 cup chickpeas
4 cups of beef broth
salt and pepper to taste
grassfed butter or EVOO
Directions:
In a sauce pan over medium heat, brown your meats with a little salt and pepper along with EVOO or grassfed butter.
Once browned, add to soup pan.
In the sauce pan with all the juices, over medium heat, brown your garlic, carrots, red cabbage, onions, and celery.
Add all to a soup pan over low heat and add your spices. Cook for a few minutes till your spices are fragrant.
Add your lentils, and chickpeas, along with your sweet potatoes, and kale. Stir well.
Add your broth, and bring to a slow boil. Let cook until your sweet potatoes are tender.
Serve immediately or freeze using Souper Cubes.
Organ Chili for Postpartum Recovery
I will say organ chili leaves room to hide some of the taste of organs, and if organ meat is not your thing balance it with more of the ground meat. Minced very fine, loaded with spices, this is a great option if organ stew just doesn’t seem like something you can do.
Ingredients:
1/2 lb ground beef
1/2 lb beef liver, kidneys, and heart diced
2 cans chickpeas
1 can black beans
1 can chili beans
1 cup corn
2 28 oz cans stewed tomatoes (dice the tomatoes)
1 red pepper diced
1 red onion diced
1/2 red cabbage diced
2 cloves of garlic minced
3 Tbsp chili powder
1 Tbps cayenne powder
2 tsp salt
1 tsp black pepper
1 Tbs dark chocolate chips
Directions:
Over medium heat, brown the ground beef, liver, kidneys, and heart meat with salt and pepper
When cooked through, add to a soup pot over low heat, and sauté the vegetables in the leftover pan (with all the meat juice left behind!)
Add the hot veggies to the soup pot
Add the drained beans to the soup pot, along with the stewed tomatoes. If you want to make it a little less thick you can add some beef broth as well.
Stir well together, and allow to cook over low heat for a few hours until the beans are falling apart.
If you want to, you can also add a can of full fat coconut milk to this to create more of a creamy chili.
You can then portion this out into soupper cubes or serve fresh.
One of my Favorite Postpartum Recipes: Stewed Dried Fruits
While this isn’t the most savory meals, it’s one of my favorite cravings post partum. A staple in post partum recovery, stewed dried fruits reduces constipation, supports recovery and iron depletion post partum.
Ingredients:
Equal parts dates, figs, apricots, cranberries, blueberries, or other dried fruits.
Coconut milk and oatmilk to desired consistency
A an inch of ginger root (or more to taste)
1 tsp of cinnamon and nutmeg (or more if desired)
Directions:
Bring coconut milk and oatmilk to a slow simmer.
Add all of the fruits, and spiced.
Allow to stew until the fruits breakdown and can be pulled apart easily.
Serve immediately with ice cream, oatmeal, yogurt. You can also freeze using Souper Cubes or similar.
Finnish Salmon Soup
A favorite easy, breezy soup, Finnish Salmon Soup is one of my favorite post partum recovery meals. I use local fluke, shrimp or flounder instead of salmon often—it’s not like Connecticut is a salmon capitol or anything.
An easy to freeze meal, I often make the base en masse—like I’m talking 30-40 servings at a time—and freeze through these Soupper Cubes. I do find the potatoes get a little mushy after freezing. I do reduce the liquid when freezing and use half the normal amount of broth. When I defrost, I add more vegetable broth and the fish.
There isn’t a ton of research but dill is considered a galactogogue, helping to support breastfeeding. There’s some rumors that it supports breastfeeding through stimulating blood flow to the breasts, having oxytocic effects (meaning that it can help let downs), and provide fatty acids.
Ingredients:
1/2 cup diced celery
1/2 cup diced carrots
1/2 cup diced red onions
1/3 cup chopped fresh dill
1 cup chopped potatoes
4 cups vegetable broth
salt and pepper
choice of salmon, fluke, scallops, shrimp, flounder, etc. chopped or pealed
Grassfed butter or EVOO
Directions:
Dice the celery, carrots, and red onions finely.
In a soup pot, brown the three vegetables with grassfed butter or EVOO, and salt/pepper over medium heat.
Add the chopped potatoes, and veggie broth and bring to a mild boil.
Let boil until the potatoes are tender. You can remove from heat and freeze at this point if this is what you’re wanting to do.
Add both the dill and choice of seafood.
Reduce heat to a simmer for 5-8 minutes until the seafood is fully cooked.
Serve warm.
Chickpea Tikka Masala and Eggs
This recipe is one of my favorite breakfast recipes. I often bulk make the tikka itself, and freeze in batches for me to defrost and add eggs or other meats to. It’s a hefty breakfast option, or a nice brunch option.
Instead of chickpeas you can also add any meats to this recipe. This meal is also a great toddler meal later down the road—I like to keep this recipe in my back pocket as a parent.
Chickpeas are a great postpartum recovery food. With lots of phytoestrogens, chickpeas help support breastfeeding, hormonal regulation, and more. Loaded with protein, healthy fat, and fiber, chickpeas are also a great diet staple.
Ingredients:
2 Tbs grassfed butter, EVOO or avocado oil
1/2 cup red onions diced
1/2 cup red cabbage diced small
1/4 cup jalapenos diced smaill
2 cloves of garlic minced
1/2 cup of tomatoes diced small
2 Tbs of tikka masala paste
1/2 can full fat coconut milk
1/2 tsp cornstarch
1 tsp maple syrup or brown sugar
1 cup canned chickpeas drained
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp ground black pepper
1 avocado
4 large eggs
Directions:
Dice your vegetables up nice and small. I use a chopper if I’m pressed for time. The base vegetables of red onions, red cabbage, jalapenos, and garlic I also use for other soups, and salads often so it’s nice to make a whole ton of this combination and section it out per serving for different recipes.
In a medium pan, heat the oil on medium heat. Add the onions, red cabbage, and jalapenos, stirring well, and sautee for about a minute to allow the vegetables to become a little tender.
Add the garlic, stirring well, for another minute until all are browned. Add the tomatoes mixing well and saute for another minute or so to break down the tomatoes.
Add the tikka masala paste, and stir well. Saute for a minute or so to seep the curry paste into the vegetables.
In a separate small mixing bowl add the cornstarch and 1 Tbs of hot vegetables to the coconut milk and mix well.
Reduce the heat to medium-low, add the coconut milk mix and combine well. Make sure there’s a gentle simmer versus a bubbly boil, and add the chickpeas, sweetener of your choice, and stir well.
Make a well in four spots of the pan and crack an egg gently into each well. Keep the eggs about a half inch away from each other. Cover and cook for 3-4 minutes.
The egg whites should be cooked thru when the meal is ready for you.
Remove immediately from the stove, and serve with avocado slices.
