Jaw Surgery Recovery Foods

Healthy RecipeJaw Surgery
Written By Megan Veenstra OTD OTR/L

After jaw surgery, you’ll typically be on a liquid diet for about six weeks. Finding blended meals and snacks that fit dietary restrictions while also providing enough calories and nutrients to support healing can be incredibly challenging. I created this blog post to share the meals I found most filling, nutritious, and enjoyable during recovery. Personally, I’m very intentional about the foods I eat. I follow a dairy-free and gluten-free diet and prioritize clean, wholesome ingredients whenever possible. With that in mind, here are a few recipe and snack ideas for the health-conscious, nutrient-focused individual navigating recovery after jaw surgery.

Snacks

For the first few weeks of my recovery, drinking/eating things that were thickened went down a lot easier than thin liquids. Apple sauce pouches will be your best friend, trust me! There are many good brands out there but here are a few brands that I really enjoyed. Very flavorful and nutritious.

  • Mamma Chia

  • Noka

  • Pumpkin Tree

Notes:

  • All of these are available for purchase at Thrive Market. Use my link to save 40% off your first order.

Loaded Protein Shake -

Carrot Cake

I relied heavily on protein shakes throughout recovery to help meet my calorie, nutrient, and protein needs each day. I typically made one large smoothie that would last from morning through mid-afternoon, so feel free to adjust the measurements depending on the portion size that works best for you.

Carrot cake was one of my favorite guilty pleasures.

Ingredients:

Instructions:

  • Blend all ingredients until thickness desired

Notes:

  • My Vitamix blender worked great to blend everything up

  • Adjust measurements depending on how large of a protein shake you want.

  • If you do not have chai protein powder you can use Vanilla protein powder - however I would add cinnamon and nutmeg to get the carrot cake flavor.

Loaded Protein Shake - Dark Cherry Chocolate

Again, I relied heavily on protein shakes throughout recovery to help meet my calorie, nutrient, and protein needs each day. I typically made one large smoothie that would last from morning through mid-afternoon, so feel free to adjust the measurements depending on the portion size that works best for you.

Ingredients:

Instructions:

  • Blend all ingredients until thickness desired

Notes:

  • My Vitamix blender worked great to blend everything up

  • Adjust measurements depending on how large of a protein shake you want.

Loaded Protein Shake - Pistachio Banana

Ingredients:

Instructions:

  • Blend all ingredients until thickness desired

Notes:

  • My Vitamix blender worked great to blend everything up

  • Adjust measurements depending on how large of a protein shake you want.

  • Pistachio milk available for purchase at Thrive Market. Use my link to save 40% off your first order.

Sweet Potato Brownie

This is a great recipe for those craving something sweet. I personally felt like it tasted like a warm chocolate brownie!

Ingredients:

  • 1 baked sweet potato

  • 1 tbsp nut butter of choice

  • 1 tsp cocoa powder

  • Squeeze of honey to desired sweetness

Instructions:

  • Bake 1 sweet potato at 400 °F for 1 hour.

  • Separate sweet potato skins from potato

  • When potato is warm mix all ingredients together

  • If you need this softer - add milk of choice to soften

Links:

Blended Tacos

For some reason, tacos became my go-to meal during recovery. Once blended together, the flavors were surprisingly delicious, and it never felt like I had to force myself to get it down like I did with some other meals. The ingredients are all very healthy too. It reminded me of a flavorful taco soup. You can really customize it with whatever taco ingredients you enjoy and blend it with bone broth, but here’s the combination I used if you’d like a starting point.

Ingredients:

Instructions:

  • Brown your meat and add taco seasoning

  • Cook white rice

  • Blend all ingredients together (again Vitamix works wonders)

Now this is going to make a lot - once I found a recipe I liked, I made a large portion so I could have a few meals prepped and ready for the next couple of days. (You can even freeze it too)

Protein Yogurt - Lemon Blueberry

I lived off of protein yogurts combinations. Lemon blueberry was one of my favorites.

Recipe:

Notes:

  • Now for this recipe you could either blend up frozen blueberries or do what I did - I blended an entire bag of Catalina Crunch and used 2 tbsp of the cereal. I personally liked the added protein, carbs, and texture of the cereal.

  • Adding 1/2 tsp of beef gelatin gave it a good thickness.

Protein Yogurt - Strawberry

Protein-packed yogurt can be a great recovery food after jaw surgery because it provides nutrients that support healing while still being easy to eat on a liquid or soft-food diet.

Here is another protein packed yogurt.

Recipe:

Notes:

  • Now for this recipe you could either blend up frozen strawberries or do what I did - I blended an entire bag of Catalina Crunch and used 2 tbsp of the cereal. I personally liked the added protein, carbs, and texture of the cereal.

Simple Protein Yogurt

Keep it simple with adding just chocolate or vanilla FeelFit protein powder to your yogurt. So simple and so delicious.

Protein-packed yogurt is a great recovery food after jaw surgery because it provides protein your body needs to support tissue repair and healing.

Its smooth texture makes it easy to eat during the liquid and soft-food phases, while also supplying important nutrients like calcium and probiotics to support overall health and digestion during recovery.

Protein Yogurt - Cinnamon Pumpkin

Recipe:

Protein Yogurt - Cookies & Cream

Recipe:

Protein Ice Cream Root Beer Float

First off, make your vanilla protein ice cream in your Ninja Creami a head of time. This is probably the healthiest root beer float you will ever consume - with no guilt either!

Recipe:

Instructions:

  • Mix ingredients together

  • Freeze for 24 hours

  • Run Ninja Creami on Lite Ice Cream

  • If dry add a little almond milk - a little goes a long ways - run on Re-Spin - repeat if still dry

Enjoy with a Poppi Root Beer!

Salmon and Potatoes

Around week 5 to 6 post op, I was able to progress to a soft diet. I found that I was able to break up fish and potatoes in my mouth.

Salmon Recipe:

Potatoes Recipe:

Megan Veenstra OTD OTR/L
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