What to eat for confinement meal? 30-day confinement meal recipes and methods

Confinement is the best time for mothers to recover and replenish their nutrition. During this period, they must eat and drink well to avoid various physical problems later. So, what is the best confinement meal? If you make your own confinement meal, how should you arrange the 30-day menu?

Have you ever thought about cooking your own confinement meals? If you don’t want to stay in a confinement center, don’t want to hire a confinement nanny, and don’t trust confinement meals sold outside, then why not try cooking it yourself! You can ask your elders or your husband to help you, and you can still enjoy fresh confinement meals by following the recipes!

Three major purposes of postpartum meals

1. Postpartum recovery period conditioning for women.

2. Provide comprehensive nutrition and calories.

3. Improve breast milk nutrition and promote baby's growth and development.

Diet tips for postpartum mothers

1. For balanced nutrition every day, you should consume food from six major categories.

2. Protein: focus on protein sources, meat (pork, chicken, beef, fish) and beans (soy products).

3. DHA: Choosing foods high in DHA content can enhance brain function, such as mackerel, salmon, tuna, saury, etc.

4. Calcium: Supplement calcium by consuming more milk, yogurt, tofu, sesame seeds, etc.

5. Eat less offal to avoid excessive steroid intake.

6. Cooking methods: Avoid frying, crisping or stir-frying. Steaming, boiling, stewing or baking are the best methods.

7. Pay attention to your daily calorie intake. Don’t consume too much, and don’t eat too little because you’re afraid of getting fat! (For daily calorie recommendations, refer to the table below)

Daily calorie control table for confinement meals

Postpartum meal suggestions for one to four weeks (thanks to the online mothers for sharing)

The first week of conditioning focus: metabolic detoxification

After giving birth, there is still lochia and other old substances in the body, so food is needed to improve metabolism and promote blood circulation.

Recommended diet

1. Pork liver: Stir-fry with ginger, rice wine and sesame oil, two servings per day.

2. Shenghua Tang: Seven doses are needed for natural births and fourteen doses are needed for caesarean section births.

3. Sweet glutinous rice porridge, red bean soup

4. Blackbait, sea bass or fresh fish: bake at low temperature, cook with sesame oil, rice wine and ginger, one fish per day.

5. Eucommia health-care tea or litchi shell or longan and wolfberry tea: drink as boiled water every day when thirsty, to quench thirst or to nourish the body.

6. Wheat teeth or chives: For those who want to stop breastfeeding, eat one bowl a day for three consecutive days, a total of three bowls. (Not for breastfeeding women).

7. Peanut pork trotter soup: Promotes milk secretion, and should be eaten from the third day onwards. (Suitable for breastfeeding mothers)

8. Qi-tonifying and nourishing soup: regulates Qi and blood.

9. Yuanqi Chicken Soup: promotes blood circulation.

Second week conditioning focus: visceral contraction recovery

In the second week of confinement, you can focus on the recovery of the waist and kidneys, the restoration of the pelvic cavity, promoting metabolism, and preventing back pain.

Recommended diet

1. Pork kidney (2 pieces): stir-fry with ginger and sesame oil.

2. Shenghua Tang: Those who delivered by caesarean section must drink it until the fourteenth day.

3. Eucommia health-care tea or litchi shell or longan and wolfberry tea: drink as boiled water every day when thirsty, to quench thirst or to nourish the body.

4. Oily rice or sweet glutinous rice porridge: Choose the same thing every day, a bowl of oily rice or a bowl of sweet glutinous rice porridge.

5. Red bean soup.

6. Blackbait, sea bass or fresh fish: roast at low temperature and cook with sesame oil, rice wine and ginger.

7. Glutinous rice chicken soup.

8. Vegetables: Choose one of carrots, red amaranth or red cabbage, two bowls per day.

9. Pig's trotter and peanut soup: Promotes lactation. (For those who do not breastfeed, try other dishes instead)

10. White rice or red yeast rice, barley rice, sesame oil rice: one bowl a day. If you can’t eat it, you can skip it. You can also choose to eat noodle dishes.

The third and fourth week's conditioning focus: nourishing and replenishing

After two weeks of conditioning, the body's organs have generally recovered a lot. Starting from the third week, it is recommended to take nourishing tonics to allow the body to recover more completely, regulate qi and blood, restore physical strength, and prevent aging.

Recommended diet

1. Sesame Oil Chicken: Cook with a whole chicken or selected chicken thighs.

2. Red bean soup, sweet glutinous rice porridge or oily rice: choose one, one serving per day.

3. Fish: Both black and red fish can be cooked in rice wine (those who have undergone caesarean section can eat sea bass), one fish per day.

4. Nutritional beauty drink: formulated by nutritionists, rich in vitamin C and collagen, one bottle per day, for seven days.

5. Vegetables: cabbage + carrot or spinach, A vegetable, red amaranth, and hair algae, two bowls a day.

6. White rice, red yeast rice, barley rice or sesame oil rice: 1 to 2 bowls a day. You can skip it if you can’t eat it.

7. Eucommia health-care tea or litchi shell or longan and wolfberry tea: drink as boiled water every day when thirsty, to quench thirst or to nourish the body.

8. Fruits: cantaloupe, papaya, grapes, wax apples, cherries, and peaches, delivered the same way every day.

9. Yam Chicken Soup or Medicinal Beef Soup or Medicinal Four Gods Soup: Cook with rice wine.

10. Eucommia health-care tea or litchi shell or longan and wolfberry tea: drink as boiled water every day when thirsty, to quench thirst or for health-care.

We also recommend that mothers refer to the "Happy Mommy Healthy Confinement Meals SO EASY" recipe book designed by the Health Bureau, which is the first complete 30-day menu in the country, with 3 meals and 3 snacks a day, totaling 500 dishes. The main theme is balanced nutrition and increased vegetable and fruit fiber intake. Not only are the ingredients and cooking methods for each meal, but even the daily calories, protein, fat, and carbohydrates are clearly marked, so that everyone knows what to do from the first day of confinement!