Are you concerned about your dysphagia diet recipes? Are you freaking out about IDDSI* standards? Are your Minced & Moist (Level 5) foods too dry? Or too moist? Are your Pureed (Level 4) dishes too sticky? Or too dry? At SimplyThick, we have one magic trick that solves all of these problems: use SimplyThick® EasyMix™ to create an Extremely Thick (Level 4) cooking stock solution. We usually work with vegetable, chicken or beef stock. But if you have another favorite, use that. To prevent diluting calories and/or flavor, we try to avoid using plain water, but water will work, too.
Extremely Thick Cooking Stock is MAGICAL. It will lubricate. It will effectively thicken free thin liquids. But it will not get sticky. Once we realized how well it works, all of our recipes for Minced & Moist (L5) and Pureed (L4) foods were easy to write.
How does it work?
SimplyThick EasyMix hydrates completely and easily. And very quickly. A characteristic of beverages thickened with SimplyThick EasyMix is that they are very smooth and lubricious. When you add some Extremely Thick Stock to a food that is too dry and crumbly, the Extremely Thick Stock lubricates and moistens. But because it is Extremely Thick (L4), it holds the moisture together and won’t fail an IDDSI Fork Drip Test. The liquid stays within the food.
If you have a food that gives off free thin liquids when processing them for a dysphagia diet – like a vegetable or scrambled eggs – simply drain away the excess and add a little Extremely Thick Cooking Stock. This will effectively thicken and bind any loose liquids into the food. But it WILL NOT and CAN NOT get sticky. Stickiness happens when too much powder thickener is added or when a lot of is starch released from the food without enough liquid. The easy and complete hydration of the SimplyThick EasyMix thickener in the Extremely Thick Cooking Stock means that it cannot get sticky.
Try it yourself!
If you are a healthcare provider, send an email with your shipping address to magic@simplythick.com and we will send you a sample kit with enough SimplyThick EasyMix to thicken a quart of cooking stock to Extremely Thick (Level 4).
*IDDSI is the acronym for the International Dysphagia Diet Standardisation Initiative. Developed in the early 2010s, IDDSI standards were published in 2014 and are currently in the process of being adopted across North America. If you want to know more about IDDSI and the texture standards, their website is the best resource – www.iddsi.org.