What are the benefits of chicken liver during breastfeeding and the best recipes from it for a nursing mother?

02/21/2018 Category: Nutrition for a nursing mother Author: Galina Knyazeva

Liver is a healthy and tasty by-product with a specific structure. Its beneficial properties are not inferior to meat. When prepared correctly, it makes excellent dishes! Culinary experts consider liver a delicacy; nutritionists include it in their programs. A nursing mother also wants to eat a varied diet and introduce liver dishes into her diet. But there are concerns: will this product harm her and the child?

• Types of liver, their effects during breastfeeding, proper use
  Hypoallergenic product
• Beef
• Pork
• Chicken
• Video: Live healthy! Chicken liver vs beef liver
• cod
• Pollock

Why is it useful?

Chicken liver is an offal. In other words, it contains most of the beneficial substances found in meat. The only difference is that the liver is less fatty. Is it possible to eat it during lactation? Definitely. Moreover, the body itself absorbs it more easily, allowing a woman to recover and recover faster after childbirth. The child’s body also notices the beneficial effects of the offal. Thanks to him, it is growing and developing rapidly.

The benefits of chicken liver during breastfeeding are determined by its composition. Judge for yourself, it contains:

• Vitamin A, which is responsible for visual acuity, as well as healthy skin and hair. This includes the absence of a grayish tint on the face and a minimum of split ends in the hair.
• B vitamins. It is difficult to list all the processes in which these substances participate. But, in general, they are responsible for metabolism, as well as the timely development of all organs and systems of the adult and child’s body.
• Vitamin C. It provides strong immunity.
• Folic acid. Its effect on the body is multifaceted, but first of all it ensures the formation and development of nerve cells.
• Calcium is essential for healthy bones, nails and teeth.
• Zinc. The speed of wound healing depends on it. In addition, it helps strengthen bone tissue.
• Iron. This is the very substance on which the level of hemoglobin in the blood, which is so necessary for nursing mothers, directly depends.
• Sodium. It is responsible for the sodium-calcium balance, the disturbance of which affects the nerves and muscles, and also ensures the normal rhythm of the heart.
• Copper. This substance affects the functioning of the respiratory and nervous systems and is involved in protein synthesis.
• Choline. Improves memory, activates brain activity, relieves fatigue, and promotes speedy recovery.

What is also important during lactation is the daily requirement of amino acids, which is provided by just one serving of liver. With all this, dishes from it are easy to prepare. They themselves turn out healthy, healthy and incredibly tasty.

Harm

Scientists are still arguing about the dangers of chicken liver for a young mother and newborn. There is an opinion that in some dishes that involve the use of fats during cooking, it becomes too high in calories.

In addition, it itself is a kind of filter for the body, which passes through itself all harmful substances entering it. And even though under normal conditions they are excreted in bile, when choosing a liver for use during breastfeeding, you should be extremely attentive to its quality.

Another drawback of the product is excess cholesterol. In moderate quantities it is even useful, but in huge quantities it is not.

Therefore, it is not recommended to consume offal without consulting a doctor:

• overweight people;
• those who have been diagnosed with peptic ulcer disease, kidney pathologies due to the high protein content of the product;
• allergy sufferers and those who have been identified as individual intolerant to the product;
• people with high cholesterol levels.

Which one to choose: chicken or beef?

Chicken and beef liver contain approximately the same amount of protein, 20% of which is the iron-forming protein ferritin. The presence of any of these types of liver on the table of a nursing mother will help avoid the occurrence of iron deficiency forms of anemia and anemia.

In terms of vitamin and mineral composition, chicken and beef liver are also almost the same, except that chicken offal contains slightly more vitamin A.

If the cooking time is important to your mother, it is better to choose chicken liver, as it is softer and more tender than beef, and it takes much less time to cook.

Advice! In order for the liver to be juicy and tender, you can soak it in cow's milk. 30-60 minutes is enough to get rid of the characteristic taste of liver and increased hardness.

From what time and in what quantities can it be introduced into the diet?

When prepared correctly, without using a huge amount of fat, doctors allow nursing mothers to introduce chicken liver into their diet from the eighth day after the baby’s birth. The main thing is to remember in moderation.

Initially, it is recommended to try the product in the first half of the day, and then monitor the baby’s reaction. He should not have a rash, redness, colic, or severe and causeless anxiety.

Rules for using pate during breastfeeding

• For breastfeeding, prepare the pate yourself. To prepare, use chicken or beef liver. Other types of offal are more difficult to tolerate and take longer to digest;
• Beef liver is not recommended for high cholesterol. It is better not to consume pork and cod liver until the baby is 3-4 months old. Duck and goose - up to six months;
• Choose dark, smooth pieces of liver without white spots. For more information on whether a nursing mother can have liver, and which offal is best to choose, see here;
• You can try homemade pate for the first time two to four weeks after the baby is born. Try a small piece and observe your child's reaction. If negative consequences appear, stop administering for a while and try again in a month;
• If there is no negative reaction, you can sometimes eat pate in small quantities, no more than twice a week. Otherwise, the child may experience constipation and other intestinal problems;
• When preparing the dish, do not use a large amount of spices and butter, do not add lard. This will make the product allergenic, fatty and high in calories;
• If you are worried about excess weight, eat pate with black bread or use dietary recipes. Note that fish or chicken livers are lower in calories than beef livers;
• If you nevertheless decide to purchase a finished product in a store, carefully check the composition, production date and expiration date of the pate. Do not take products with high amounts of preservatives;
• A quality product should contain over 55% liver. The mass has a uniform consistency, light brown, beige or grayish tint. If it is pinkish or dark brown, this product contains an increased amount of preservatives;
• Opened pate cannot be stored for longer than five days. The liver quickly deteriorates, dangerous microorganisms appear in the offal, which cause intoxication and various infectious diseases;
• Check the packaging for integrity. It should not be swollen, deformed or go in waves, have traces of smudges and other defects;
• Both homemade and purchased liver should be stored in a sealed glass container in the refrigerator.

How to choose correctly

When breastfeeding, it is important to carefully monitor the quality of everything you eat, and liver is no exception. It is better to buy it defrosted. It should be dark brown, have a glossy, smooth surface with no obvious blood vessels or blood clots. The latter speak of depravity, as does a strong unpleasant odor.

By the way, about smell and taste. Young mothers often wonder if they can eat chicken liver. After all, even fresh and cooked, it is slightly bitter and has a special aroma. Will it affect the taste of the breast milk itself, causing the baby to refuse it?

Doctors answer this question in the negative. According to them, you can get rid of unpleasant phenomena simply by following all the rules for preparing the product. About them below.

As for where to buy offal, everything is clear. During breastfeeding, it is extremely important to give preference to trusted manufacturers. The fact is that unscrupulous people can add feed to poultry with harmful additives to accelerate growth or use antibiotics to prevent the development of various ailments.

If there is the slightest suspicion of this, it is better to purchase chicken livers from farms or from familiar relatives in the village, especially in the first month after childbirth.

We should not forget that due to the huge amount of water in its composition, chicken liver was and remains a perishable product. Therefore, it can be stored for no longer than 2 days.

Cooking rules

In the question of whether a nursing mother can have chicken liver, the cooking method plays a significant role. As we have already said, you will have to forget about frying in oil for a while, since with such processing food is poorly digested. Knowing how to cook liver, you will only get positive effects from it. Choose the stewing option, it is ideal during breastfeeding. Simmer with a little onion and carrots.

Spices may also be included. Here is the allowed list:

• Salt.
• Pepper.
• Natural herbs: French, Provençal, Italian.
• Dill.
• Parsley.
• Oregano.

But it is better to refuse packaged nursing formulas, the reason is that given the low price, the manufacturer does not always use high-quality raw materials. Often the seasoning already contains salt, due to this you can simply over-salt the food. High salt content causes excessive swelling.

Pate

Pate is a quick delicacy that you can make in half an hour. It is necessary to simmer the meat until soft, adding a small amount of spices. Separately prepare carrots, grated on a fine grater, and onions, also finely chopped. Scroll the offal and vegetables through a meat grinder. The pate can be spread on bread and added to all kinds of side dishes.

It is important that during your cooking, the gallbladder does not get into the dish. Therefore, the piece must be thoroughly washed, inspected and excess parts removed.

Before putting it in the frying pan, inspect the piece, because only one gall bladder will give an unpleasant bitterness and spoil the taste. The bubble is quite easy to recognize by its greenish color and elongated shape. The piece should not be weathered or have dark spots. The smell should not be pungent, but rather pleasant.

Read also: Is it possible to drink apple juice during breastfeeding: pros, cons, how to choose

In the cauldron

The following simple recipe will take no more than an hour. To prepare, you need to prepare and cut vegetables and potatoes into cubes. Try not to make the pieces too large. We process the pieces of offal and cut them, put them in a dry non-stick cauldron, and after five minutes fill them with water. Place onions, peppers, carrots, zucchini and potatoes into a cauldron. Simmer until done over low heat.

How to prepare liver for nursing mothers

Every housewife has a lot of ways to prepare offal. Among them: frying, boiling, baking, steaming, stewing. All of them allow you to get a tasty product, but not for a young mother.

Both in the first and second months after birth, she needs only low-fat, low-calorie foods. In other words, the following will do:

• boiled liver dishes;
• dishes with liver baked in the oven;
• stewed liver;
• steamed liver.

It is not recommended to fry the liver with a large amount of oil, even in the third month from the moment the baby is born.
Such combinations increase blood cholesterol levels and do more harm to the young mother than good. Another extreme is adding too much salt. Due to the fact that meat absorbs it well, women can oversaturate it with it, but in vain. Salt leads to a slowdown in the process of removing fluid from the body and the formation of edema.

Top 3 recipes for dishes with chicken liver while breastfeeding

Recipes for chicken liver dishes amaze with their diversity. Among the most popular: pate, liverwort and stewed liver with potatoes. How to cook them correctly? This is exactly what we’ll talk about.

The most important stage is preparation. In order to rid the liver of unpleasant odor and taste, it should be soaked in milk for 30 minutes. It is worth noting that if after such manipulations the offal has not lost its bitterness and aroma, most likely it was already spoiled. You should not eat it.

Chicken liver pate

To prepare it you will need:

• chicken liver – 300 gr.;
• butter – 1 tbsp;
• onion – 1 pc.;
• carrots – 1 pc.;
• salt - to taste.

1. The prepared liver is washed, dried, and then cut into pieces. Then place in a saucepan and boil in water under the lid for 15 - 20 minutes. An alternative option is stewing in a frying pan. Do not overcook the product, otherwise the finished pate will turn out too tough.
2. While the liver is cooking, it’s time to peel the vegetables, after which you should cut the onion into small cubes and grate the carrots. Then they are laid out in a frying pan with butter and simmered for a couple of minutes.
3. When all the ingredients are ready, they are cooled and ground in a blender. The finished pate is tested for salt and placed in a container.

It is worth noting that for all its usefulness, such a dish can be harmful for mom. It should not be abused, especially if the baby has a liver allergy that has manifested itself previously. In addition, the pate is heavy on the stomach, so in large quantities it can provoke the development of colic and tummy discomfort in the baby.

Liverwort in a slow cooker

You can prepare a tasty and healthy dish in your mother’s real helper. To do this you should take:

• chicken liver – 1 kg;
• eggs – 2 pcs.;
• onion – 1 pc.;
• flour - enough to bring the mixture to the state of thick sour cream;
• salt, black pepper optional;
• vegetable oil for lubrication.

1. The liver and onions should be chopped in a meat grinder.
2. To the resulting mixture you need to add eggs, salt, and lastly flour.
3. Grease the multicooker bowl with oil and pour the ingredients into it. Bake in the “oven” mode for 70 minutes (temperature 160 degrees).

Liver stewed with potatoes

You will need:

• liver – 500 gr.;
• onions – 2 pcs.;
• butter – 2 tbsp. l.;
• broth – 2.5 tbsp;
• potatoes – 5 pcs.;
• parsley, salt.

1. The liver is cut into slices and placed in a casserole dish along with onion rings and potato cubes.
2. Then salt, pour in broth and leave covered over low heat for 25 minutes.
3. The finished dish is seasoned with chopped parsley and served in a casserole dish. In addition to it, you can prepare a vegetable salad.

I hope, thanks to the article, you learned whether you can eat chicken liver while breastfeeding. Share it on social networks and subscribe to the blog! It was Lena Zhabinskaya, see you soon!