Mechanical Soft Diet

A mechanical soft diet is a diet that follows the principle of the balanced diet but includes only foods that are easy to chew and swallow. This diet is prescribed to persons with chewing difficulty or disability. Depending on the patient’s tolerance, food is broken down to smaller particles by mechanical means such as grinding, mashing, chopping, and pureeing.


This diet therapy is given to person having dental caries, dental extraction, and poor dentition.

Some Tips for a Mechanical Soft Diet

• Choose foods that could be mashed, ground, chopped, pureed or blended.

• Cook rice and other cereals until soft.

• Work with clean hands, equipment, utensils and containers to minimize contamination and spoilage.

 

Foods Allowed for Mechanical Soft Diet

Carbohydrate-rich Foods

• Soft rice (if tolerable to patient)

• Oats

• Rice gruel (lugaw)

• Mashed potato, mashed sweet potato (camote), mashed cooking banana (saba)

• Soft bread

• Soft cookies

Protein-rich Foods

For Vegetarians

• Well-done legumes cooked with broth

• Chopped or ground vegetarian products

For Non-Vegetarians

• All well-cooked chopped, flaked or ground lean meat and fish

• Flaked fish

• Poached egg

Vegetables

• Diced string or Baguio beans

• Diced chayote, carrots

• Mashed squash

• Well-cooked eggplant

Fruits

• All soft fruits

• Crispy fruits which can be scraped like apple, pear

• Any fruits blended

Beverages

• Fruits juices, milk, fruit shakes, milk shakes

 

Foods Not Allowed

Carbohydrate-rich Foods

• Hard-cooked rice and cereals

• Hard crackers

Protein-rich foods

• Tendons, ligaments

Vegetables

• Raw or half-cooked

Fruits

• Hard

Beverages

• Alcoholic beverages, coffee, tea and cola drinks

Reference: Healing Wonders of Diet Effective Guide to Diet Therapy p.134 & 136 © 2003 Philippine Publishing House ISBN 971-581-013-6