Has your diagnosis or treatment affected your diet? Has it changed your palate? Is there something you used to love you no longer eat as it doesn’t appeal?
Hello @Dawn. I remember that food tasted bland and needed spicing up. I knew that I had to keep my strength up so tried to eat healthily, but tended to use more spices, pepper or mustard. I had a craving for chocolate croissants with warm raspberries. I also got through a lot of crystallised ginger which helped nausea, and pineapple (tinned or fresh) to freshen my mouth
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My diet is pretty similar to before, but I do try to make sure that I have fresh homemade food as often as possible rather than takeaways or packaged meals.
My palate was all over the place during treatment and still a bit variable now.
Even something as innocuous as toast can be great one day and the next day the smell will put me off.
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Pineapple? I love the stuff but didn’t ever think of it as a mouth freshener. Good idea!
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Apparently it has an enzyme which encourages saliva
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I didn’t know that, wow!
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I find on this site I learn something nearly every day!
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@MissP143 do you have any recommendations for diets and eating well?
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Has your palate readjusted the longer its been since treatment? It must be hard not knowing whether a favourite food (like toast!) will make you feel ill or not.
I remember after my Dad had chemotherapy (for bowel cancer) his appetite was so reduced and he’s a big guy with a big appetite usually! It took about a year before he was eating normally again, I don’t know if that’s normal for chemotherapy patients in general?
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My palate has settled down now.
Also about 6 months after treatment finished I developed GvHD and my appetite reduced considerably. Once I was on steroids and immune suppression it came back again.
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Hello @Nickmarks57,
Sorry to hear that you have developed GvHD and your appetite reduced, but I am pleased to hear that your palate has settled down now. What types of home made dishes do you make at home?
I’ve found that during treatment I couldn’t tolerate strong flavours and my mouth was so delicate that even an ice lolly left it very sore ! I could only eat half a bag of crisps.
Since then (now three years on) my taste has pretty much gone back to normal although I can’t tolerate spicy things and I have to wait til meals and drinks have cooled until I can eat them.
Nutrition wise, this is something I am really interested in. I had some advice from a nutritionist because I was getting some physical rehab and this was part of the package. I found that eating food and having supplements, cooking from scratch and not having sugar etc really did make a difference. However I find it hard to maintain with everything else in my list, my daughter, work etc. But I do notice when I am not eating food that is good for me! It is something I’d like to really get into.
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I was at The Christie Wellbeing event on Thursday and a dietician spoke about diet during treatment. There is also Bloodwise information about a neutrophenic diet which would help during treatment and in the recovery phase. My problem is now getting weight under control, especially as RT on my neck has meant I now have an underactive thyroid (but also I love food) and no gallbladder!
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After my treatment I was feeling a bit useless so decided to take on cooking the dinner in the evening, I quite enjoyed it so carried on even after going back to work.
Most things I make take a maximum of half an hour to prepare.
Due to my gout I usually have a vegetarian lunch and for dinner I make quite simple dishes such as:
Pasta Bolognese; Chilli con carne; Cottage Pie; Bacon, courgette & creme fraiche with pasta; Stir fried rice with vegetables and Linda McCartney Vegetarian Shredded Hoisin Duck; Chicken and sweet pepper kebabs; Chicken Kiev, new potatoes and vegetables.
I try and do at least one vegetarian dinner a week, which, at the moment, seems to be the Stir fried rice mentioned above.
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Hello @Nickmarks57,
Those sound like some delicious recipes! You are quite the chef! Did you find some of these recipes online or did you create your own unique dishes? Although I am not a vegetarian, I do love the Linda McCartney red onion and rosemary sausages. They pack quite a bit of flavour. Also do you have a signature dish you love to create and eat?
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Oh, Nick, your dishes sound lovely and they are making me hungry just reading them. I am a chuck it all into the slow cooker girl myself, a great way of using bits and pieces of veg up. I also wash all the ketchup bottles etc. to get the hard to reach bits out. I also put sultanas in to most dishes. My favourite is my pork shoulder chops dish. I get caught out when someone asks for the recipe for a dish as I do not follow recipes, I just won’t waste anything!! I await hearing your signature dish?
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Linda McCartney produce some really good food. I think most, if not all, of it is Tofu based so is good for gout sufferers too. Quorn based products are not so good for gout sufferers.
My favourite dish of all is a nacho platter. Layers of nachos and chilli con carne with spoonfuls of s,alsa, guacamole and sour cream. Topped off with a layer of cheese. To finish it off you put it in the oven for about 10 minutes until the cheese starts to brown off. We first had it at a local Tex-Mex restaurant and I have managed to recreate it.
A close second is the fried rice dish. My niece who is vegan, told us about the vegetarian hoi sin ‘duck’, which is really good and really hard to tell it isn’t duck. I had the idea of creating a fried rice dish using it and it works really well.
Similar to @Erica, I like to use up bits and pieces of veg. So the dishes often have a variety of different veg in them.
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Nick you have made me really hungry now, ooh, that nacho platter. I brought a £7 steamer a few years back, a real bargain, I have used it nearly every day since. I do struggle cutting into a red or green cabbage, I get the knife in to start cutting it and then the knife gets stuck with a cabbage on the end of it. Standing on a stool helps as it changes the angle of cut so I am cutting downwards more, you have to laugh.
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@Erica. Ha ha, do we need to buy you a machete?
I must admit that I do struggle with certain things because my hands and fingers don’t seem to be as dexterous as they used to be. Not sure if that’s age or treatment related.
The wok is the most used item in our kitchen!
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Hello @Nickmarks57. I was interested in your recipes as you have gout. When I developed gout earlier this year I investigated diet as i wanted to avoid medication if possible. I found the information very confusing, and also vegetables like spinach (one I used quite a lot) are not good. I have cut right down on bacon, sausage and red meats, so wondered if you used a substitute in your Bolognese, Chilli and cottage pie? I do like the red onion and rosemary sausages, and now have chicken sausages too. Incidentally I had to succumb to medication as in my case it is better to prevent as treating a flare up is more difficult…and my gout markers were high
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