When you have food poisoning, the priority in the first several hours is fluids, not food. Your body is losing water and electrolytes rapidly through vomiting and diarrhea, and replacing those losses matters more than eating. Once the worst nausea passes and you can keep liquids down, you can start reintroducing small amounts of bland, easy-to-digest food.
Start With Fluids, Not Food
Most people with food poisoning become dehydrated before they become malnourished. Sipping clear fluids in small amounts is the first step, even if you’re still vomiting occasionally. Water alone isn’t ideal because it doesn’t replace the sodium and potassium you’re losing. Broth, diluted fruit juice, and electrolyte drinks are better choices.
The gold standard for rehydration is an oral rehydration solution, which balances glucose and sodium in concentrations that help your intestines absorb water efficiently. The WHO’s formula uses equal concentrations of glucose and sodium (75 mEq/L each) at a total concentration designed to pull water into your cells rather than sitting in your gut. You can buy premade versions at any pharmacy, or make a basic version at home with water, salt, and sugar. Avoid sports drinks as your primary source: they tend to have far more sugar and less sodium than what your body needs right now.
Take small sips every few minutes rather than gulping a full glass. If you vomit, wait 15 to 30 minutes and try again with even smaller sips. Popsicles and gelatin are also useful because they deliver fluid slowly.
What to Eat in the First 24 to 48 Hours
Once you can keep fluids down for a few hours, you can begin eating. Start with small portions of bland, low-fiber foods that won’t challenge your irritated digestive tract. Good options include:
- Plain white rice
- Mashed potatoes (without butter or cream)
- Plain toast or saltine crackers
- Plain noodles
- Bananas
- Plain chicken (boiled or baked, no skin)
- Gelatin
These foods are easy to break down, low in fat, and unlikely to trigger more nausea. Eat small amounts every two to three hours rather than full meals. If a few bites are all you can manage, that’s fine. Your appetite will return gradually.
The BRAT Diet: Useful but Limited
You’ve probably heard of the BRAT diet (bananas, rice, applesauce, toast) as the classic recommendation for stomach illness. It still works as a starting point when you’re at your sickest, but it’s no longer considered a complete recovery plan. The American Academy of Pediatrics no longer recommends it for children, and Cleveland Clinic notes it lacks calcium, vitamin B12, protein, and fiber.
For adults, sticking to BRAT foods for a day or two while symptoms are severe is reasonable. But staying on it longer than that can actually slow recovery by depriving your body of the nutrients it needs to repair your gut lining. As soon as you can tolerate it, start adding lean protein like chicken, and well-cooked vegetables to your meals.
Foods to Avoid Until You Recover
Some foods will make your symptoms noticeably worse, even if you’re starting to feel better. Your digestive system is inflamed and temporarily less efficient at processing certain compounds.
Dairy is one of the biggest culprits. Food poisoning can temporarily damage the cells in your small intestine that produce lactase, the enzyme needed to digest milk sugar. Even if you’re not normally lactose intolerant, you may struggle with dairy for several days after a bout of food poisoning. Skip milk, cheese, ice cream, and creamy sauces until your stools return to normal.
Fatty and fried foods are also a problem. Fat takes longer to digest and can trigger cramping and diarrhea in a gut that’s already irritated. Spicy foods, acidic foods like tomato sauce and citrus, caffeine, alcohol, and carbonated drinks all have similar effects. Raw fruits and vegetables with tough skins or high fiber content can also be hard to handle in the first few days.
Ginger for Nausea
If nausea is your dominant symptom, ginger is one of the better natural options. Clinical trials consistently show it reduces nausea severity. In one study of chemotherapy patients (who experience nausea far more intense than typical food poisoning), those receiving ginger-containing supplements reported nausea scores less than half as severe as the control group.
Ginger tea, made by steeping fresh sliced ginger in hot water, is the simplest way to get it during food poisoning. Ginger chews and ginger ale made with real ginger (check the label, as many brands use only flavoring) can also help. Sip slowly, and don’t force large volumes if your stomach isn’t ready.
Probiotics Can Shorten Recovery
Certain probiotic strains can reduce how long diarrhea lasts. Two strains have the strongest evidence: Lactobacillus rhamnosus GG (often labeled LGG) and Saccharomyces boulardii, a beneficial yeast. Both have been shown across multiple clinical trials to shorten the duration of infectious diarrhea by roughly one day. Saccharomyces boulardii is particularly well-suited for food poisoning because, as a yeast rather than a bacterium, it isn’t affected by antibiotics if you end up needing them.
You can find these strains in supplement form at most pharmacies and health food stores. Look for products that list the specific strain on the label and contain at least 10 billion colony-forming units per dose. Yogurt contains some probiotic strains, but it’s a dairy product, so it’s better to wait until your symptoms improve before using it as a source.
A Sample Timeline for Eating Again
Everyone recovers at a different pace, but here’s a general framework. In the first 6 to 12 hours, focus exclusively on small sips of fluids: water, electrolyte solutions, broth, or ginger tea. Don’t force food.
Between 12 and 24 hours, if you’re keeping fluids down, try a few bites of plain toast, crackers, or white rice. Keep portions tiny. If it stays down, eat a little more an hour or two later.
From 24 to 48 hours, you can expand to mashed potatoes, bananas, plain noodles, and small amounts of lean chicken. Continue drinking fluids between meals.
After 48 hours, most people can begin transitioning back toward their normal diet. Add foods back one at a time so you can identify anything that still triggers symptoms. Dairy and high-fat foods should be the last things you reintroduce, often not until three to five days after symptoms started. If diarrhea or nausea returns after eating a particular food, give it another day or two before trying again.