Low-FODMAP meal plan

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Method

1. 1

   Understand which phase you are in before you cook anything

   Elimination runs two to six weeks and is not meant to be permanent. Reintroduction tests one FODMAP group at a time. Personalization is the version you actually live on, and it is almost always broader than elimination. This plan covers week one of elimination only. If you have been eating this way for three months without reintroducing, the plan you need is the reintroduction schedule, not another restricted week.

2. 2

   Portion size is the whole diet, not the food list

   Very few foods are absolutely out. Most are fine below a threshold and a problem above it, which is why Monash publishes portions rather than a simple yes and no list. Half an avocado is high, an eighth is low. Three broccoli florets are fine, a whole head is not. Forty grams of tinned chickpeas rinsed is low, a full cup is not. Learning four or five of these thresholds does more for you than memorising any list.

3. 3

   The safe pantry build, and the two bottles that save the week

   Garlic-infused olive oil and the green tops of spring onions are the two ingredients that make this diet taste like cooking. Fructans do not dissolve into oil, so infused oil carries garlic flavour without the FODMAP, and the green part of a spring onion is low while the white bulb is not. Add chives, ginger, lemon, hard cheeses, rice, oats, quinoa, potato, carrot, courgette, red pepper, and lactose-free dairy.

4. 4

   Seven dinners with no onion and no garlic bulb

   Low-FODMAP pasta with garlic oil, courgette and parmesan. Roast chicken thighs with potato and carrot. A rice bowl with grilled prawns, cucumber and ginger dressing. Beef and green bean stir-fry with tamari and spring onion tops. Salmon with lemon and roasted red pepper. A frittata with courgette and hard cheese. And a lamb or beef mince bolognese built on plain tinned tomatoes, herbs, and garlic oil rather than a jarred sauce.

5. 5

   Breakfast is where most people relapse

   Wheat toast, honey, most yogurts, apple, pear, mango and cashews all cause trouble, which removes a lot of standard breakfasts at once. What works: oats with lactose-free milk and blueberries, sourdough spelt toast with peanut butter, eggs with spinach and hard cheese, or lactose-free yogurt with strawberries and a few walnuts. Pick two and rotate them rather than trying to reinvent breakfast every morning.

6. 6

   Lunch travels if you build it around rice, not bread

   Cook a pot of rice or quinoa on Sunday. Lunch is that plus last night's protein plus a low-FODMAP vegetable plus a dressing of garlic oil, lemon and salt. Rice-based lunches also sidestep the wheat question entirely, which matters because low-FODMAP is not a gluten-free diet but wheat is the biggest fructan source in most Western diets, so a lot of practical overlap ends up in the same place.

7. 7

   Four places FODMAPs hide in things you did not cook

   Stock cubes and shop-bought broth are almost always onion and garlic. Anything labelled natural flavouring or spice mix frequently contains onion powder, which is concentrated fructan. Sugar-free gum, mints and protein bars carry polyols, sorbitol and mannitol and maltitol. And sausages, marinades and premade sauces carry all three. Read every label for the first fortnight, then you will know your shops.

8. 8

   Fiber drops on elimination, and you should plan for it

   Removing onions, garlic, wheat, most pulses, apples and pears takes a lot of fiber out at once, and constipation is a common and entirely avoidable side effect of doing this carelessly. This plan lands near twenty-five grams a day, deliberately, using oats, kiwi, carrot, courgette, potato with skin, quinoa, chia, and small rinsed portions of tinned lentils. Two kiwifruit a day is the single most effective addition for most people.

9. 9

   Move into reintroduction on schedule, not when you feel like it

   After two to six weeks with genuine symptom improvement, start testing groups one at a time: fructans, then lactose, then fructose, then sorbitol, then mannitol, then galacto-oligosaccharides. Small dose on day one, medium on day two, large on day three, then three days back on elimination before the next group. Do this with a dietitian if you can, and write it down, because six untracked tests tell you nothing.