Come December, one looks forward to destress as well as celebrate with friends and family. However, with the increasing scare of the new variant of coronavirus i.e. Omicron in India; Christmas celebrations this year too will remain indoors. Hence, in order to help patients who are on a kidney diet or dialysis diet select a health friendly menu; our expert Renal Dietitian – Dr Rachana Jasani has enlisted recipes that are simple, easy, delicious at the same time safe to brighten your Christmas eve.
Before getting started lets quickly understand a few tips for a kidney friendly diet
Quick kidney friendly tips explained by our Renal Dietitian:
- Prefer homemade instead of outside food
- Avoid food colours and artificial flavours
- Few recipes mentioned below have be modified in terms of its cooking methods and ingredients to make it suitable for kidney patients, hence; food may need to be cooked separately
- Food should contain less salt and salt substitutes like low-sodium salts should be avoided
Below are few kidney friendly healthy and safe options to make your Christmas eve special:
1. Mini bruschetta with onion, corn and olive toppings:
Dr Rachana Jasani suggests you either prefer making a homemade dough for brushetta or procure them readily from a home baker. This helps ensuring less salt and additives.
Kidney patients with complains of high potassium levels can sieve the wheat flour 2-3 times before kneading the dough for making bruschettas. Mini brusheetas helps in controlling the portion size. One can make a topping of chopped bell peppers, onion, boiled corn and then allow it to get baked on a low flame in a non-stick pan. Olives can be added towards end.
As a Renal Dietitian she further elucidates how this recipe can be modified to make it safe for individuals on dialysis. As dialysis patients need extra proteins, she suggests them to add paneer or tofu.
2. Stuffed cabbage rolls:
Dr Jasani highly recommeds these cabbage rolls as they are completely kidney friednly and easy to make. For the stuffing, one can add boiled rice noodles tossed in finely chopped veggies like onion, capsicum, carrots, baby corn and zucchini. This stuffing can be used for adding into fresh cabbage leaves to make a roll. These rolls can then be steamed in a steamer or a microwave. They can be served with homemade garlic and mint leaves chutney or onion-tomato chutney instead of tomato ketchup. These rolls too can be had as a starter or as a sider with the main course.
As a Renal Dietitian, she further explaisn that to keep away the extra minerals, it is important to avoid sauces and ketchups with this recipe. A homemade dip using olive oil with red chilli flakes and garlic can be used instead of sauces
3. Corn and soya salad:
Tender corn is moderate to low in potassium and hence can be preferred by ones who need a kidney friendly diet. Soya chunks are a perfect high biological value and low potassium protein source that can be preferred by both CKD as well as dialysis patients. Amongst vegetables, you can opt for a combination of low and medium potassium vegetables like cucumber, cabbage (green and purple), zucchini (yellow and green), capsicum, bell peppers and baby corn. It is advisable to skip addition of salt and instead add vinegar or amchur powder to this salad to make it healthy for kidneys. One may also choose to add oregano, mixed herbs, olives and fresh/ dry basil leaves.
A salad bowl containing 100 grams boiled tender corn and 4-5 mini soya chunks with 75-100 grams of the above listed veggies can make a perfect appetizer for kidney/dialysis patients on the eve of Christmas.
4. Pasta in red sauce:
Dr Rachana Jasani recommends using rice pasta instead of wheat pasta. You may select pasta of any shape. As cheese is a rich source of food additives and phosphorus, we recommend avoiding white sauce. Also when we use red sauce; it is possible to leach tomatoes (rather than blanch them) before making a puree hence, we have herewith preferred red sauce instead of white sauce. It is advisable to add a low potassium vegetable i.e. bottle gourd (lauki/ dudhi) to red sauce in order to decrease the proportion of tomatoes in the puree. Therefore, it is ideally important to prefer homemade puree over packaged puree. Again low potassium veggies like zucchini (yellow and green) should be enough along with boiled pasta to make this sizzling recipe more kidney friendly. One can top it up with spices like oregano, mixed herbs, basil, olives, thyme, etc.
To know more about low, medium and high potassium foods, click here
5. Burnt garlic rice with egg:
White rice is a low potassium, high calorie cereal which is a good combination needed for both pre-dialysis (CKD) as well as dialysis patients. A small portion when combined with 2 egg whites and when given a tempering (tadka) with finely chopped garlic and when garnished with finely chopped coriander, oregano and mixed herbs makes an excellent main meal for patients with kidney issues. This is an excellent main course option as it neither contains extra sauces nor any high potassium veggies and is also free of additives. This recipe can be preferred as the main course option.
Kidney patients with complains of high post-meal blood sugar can prefer brown rice instead of white rice.
6. No Bake brownie:
As the festival of Christmas is not over without cakes/ pastries; when it comes to kidney patients a NO BAKE cake is a huge thumbs up as it does not need baking soda/ baking powder. To begin, one can make a smooth slurry from equal amounts of corn flour, cocoa powder and chocolate powder (2 tsp each) and heat it on a non-stick pan. Then add 1/4th cup roasted oats and finely chopped 1-2 dates, 1-2 walnuts and 1-2 cashews. Mix this well on a low flame and allow the dates to melt completely. Once done set this mixture on a tray and allow it to cool down. Refrigerate it and then cut into small pieces while serving.
This recipe is a simple and hassle free kidney friendly dessert as it does not involve tedious procedures like baking or icing. Patients with high levels of potassium and / or phosphorus may prefer only 1 piece (of 2 inches) in order to avoid any complications after the celebrations.
At NutriKonnect, our Renal Dietitian – Dr Rachana Jasani offers personalized nutrition counseling with innovative recipes. To avail a 1 to 1 diet consultation, click here
We offer Therapeutic diet recipes for kidney issues, they can be availed here
These recipes have been carefully curated by our expert Renal Dietitian to help you navigate smoothly through the journey of chronic kidney disease without any complications
