Pureed Food Brought to Life

A challenge for most care homes when providing pureed meals for individuals who require a soft-food diet is making it appealing to eat.

The introduction to pureed food can often make eating less enjoyable for the person which can lead to loss of appetite and reduced nutritional intake, as well as diminish the ‘joy of food’ and their overall dining experience. This is why finding tasty pureed meals are so crucial for their health and emotional well-being.

However, this task is not an easy one. Pureed food ‘done right’ takes additional time, presentation, seasoning, and lots and lots of practice.

One person who knows this all too well is Allison Frew, Head Chef at Buckingham House care home in Gerrards Cross, Buckinghamshire. She has been working on encouraging food intake for residents of the home who required a pureed food diet. Here she shares her insight into her experiences of developing pureed meals and desserts at the home:

You’ve done a huge amount of work in developing and improving meals for people who require a pureed diet. What is it that drives your passion?

What got me started on this was that our home holds a regular afternoon tea and on this particular day I was pushing our tea trolley around when a gentleman, who loves cakes and has dysphagia*, grabbed me as I was passing, pointed to one of the cakes on the trolley and said, ‘I’d like that one,’ and I had to say, I’m afraid you can’t have that, but you can have this instead [a pudding dessert served as an alternative menu option],’ and he said, ‘But I don’t want that, I want that cake.’

I was so upset that I couldn’t give him what he wanted. I went away and immediately started researching pureed cake recipes, which set me down the road to where we are now. What impact have you seen as a result of your improvements? The most important thing to me is that our residents who require a pureed diet are enjoying their food much more now. We’ve seen other benefits to their health, such as healthy weight gain. It’s been very rewarding. We’ve had some fantastic comments from residents and their family members too who said that they’d even happily eat the pureed meals we serve. It makes it all worthwhile.

Do you find presentation makes a difference to the resident’s enjoyment of their food?

Yes, very much so. Obviously we all eat with our eyes so if something looks appetising then we’ll want to try it. That’s why we put a lot of work into replicating the look of the meals so that they resemble the ‘real thing’.

That being said, it’s not enough for the meal to just look like the real thing, it needs to taste like it too. Otherwise it’s pointless. Whatever is on the menu we strive to match the pureed meals to the same taste, look and consistency.

We are constantly taste testing at every stage of the process, tweaking recipes and seasonings so we get it right. We experiment and test recipes so much that staff call our kitchen the science lab!

What’s your favourite pureed food recipe?

That’s a tricky one…I’d have to say the Tiramisu is my favourite. We make it with mascarpone cheese, Marsala wine and ground coffee – it went down an absolute treat and it looked and tasted just the same as the non-pureed tiramisu. I was really proud. The sandwiches are cool too. They take a long time to get right but they’re worth it.

What’s been your most popular culinary creation?

The most popular has been our afternoon tea cakes as they look just the same and are served and presented the same way so they have the wow factor.

They also really enjoy our fillet of fish with peas, cheesy mash and homemade ketchup.

Do you have any tips for other people looking to improve the dining experience of someone who requires a pureed diet? Do your research and regularly taste test. Put the hours in and remember that you have to keep working at it to get it right. Sometimes when plating up it takes us 3 or 4 goes to get it just right but we keep on at it.

You need to be passionate about the food you serve. If you don’t have passion for what you’re cooking then it will show on the plate. If you’re willing to do your research and take the time to do things right then you’ll see that reflected in the food you serve.

Buckingham House in Gerrards Cross, Buckinghamshire provides luxurious accommodation for 53 elderly people. The home offers a combination of nursing, residential and dementia care. *the medical term for swallowing difficulties. Some people with dysphagia have problems swallowing certain foods or liquids, while others can't swallow at all.

click here for more details or to contact Buckingham House Care Home