CANDIDA DIET FOOD LIST
A snapshot of all the things you can eat during the candida diet
You can literally enjoy as many of these foods as you like as they are incredibly good for you and promote your healing.
It might not seem like it but there are actually delicious foods that you are allowed to eat!
But it’s not so much what you CAN eat, as I can almost hear you thinking “But what about all those foods to avoid?”.
“I won’t be able to eat ANYTHING!”
Easy tiger, you’ll be fine.
I’ll show you some simple & mouthwatering recipes that will tide you over until your taste buds have got used to your new diet.
But before I’ll let you familiarise yourself with the Candida Diet Food List that might soon enough be the base for your next shopping list…
…remember that there are many different variations of Candida Diets out there – They all allow you slightly different foods to eat.
This is very confusing at first. But it’s just like every other diet. There is not 1 size fits all.
Just like there are conflicting opinions in your family about what tastes nice and whether coffee, chocolate or meat are good for you.
There are different camps amongst the candida sufferers who have their very own ideas of what helped them and what didn’t.
So if you feel like you cannot stick to this candida diet food list unless you slightly adapt it – that’s fine. Go ahead.
It’s important that your new diet fits your beliefs and your life-style.
Don’t worry though, 96% of this Candida Diet Food List everyone agrees on. (controversial items are highlighted in italic). And if you are unsure about including a certain food item then just ask me
Don’t be shy.
Protein-rich Foods that you can eat
- Eggs
- Fish
- Poultry (preferably fresh & organic)
- Bacon (unsmoked)
- Feta, Goats-cheese or Tofu (mozzarella in small amounts towards the end of the diet)
- Probiotic yogurt, best goats or sheeps yoghurt (as this is easier to digest).
Some clarification on why I think yogurt, feta and bacon are ok to eat:
Some people don’t allow any dairy on this diet. This is something you need to decide for yourself. There is no right or wrong way.
Pro Eating Yogurt and Feta:
The diet is hard enough as it stands. Yogurt & feta are great sources of protein and as such when you combine them with a small amount of carb they will fill you up until your next meal. So it’s much easier to stick to the rest of this candida diet food list and not give into naughty snack temptations.
Say about yogurt what you want but it’s undeniable that it promotes bowel movements which is a clear issue for most candida sufferers. Too much info I know, but it had to be said 
Contra Eating Yoghurt and Feta:
One of the reasons why some people are completely against consuming dairy products is its specific protein structure which makes it hard to digest for humans. Especially cows yogurt can lead to bowel problems like lose stools and bloating in sensitive individuals.
On the candida diet of course you also have to worry about the remaining milk sugar in the dairy product which can still aggravate your yeast problem. Less so with goats cheese than with milk, but still. Every little adds up…
My experience with eating yogurt & feta on the diet:
I personally noticed that eating yogurt or feta cheese to begin of phase 3 did not agree with me very well at all (more sinuses problems mainly). It was months into phase 3 that I noticed no problem when eating it. These days I stick to goats/ sheeps yogurt when I eat it and still limit myself to just a few spoons full. By the way there are huge differences in taste in goats jogurts (they are not all pungent and runny) – I found one that is just like greek yogurt it’s from Woodland Dairy. I avoid cows milk/ yogurt alltogether and I am very intrigued by the idea of making Kefir. I have heard that it helps to bring the yeast problem under control. You can make it with water, rice milk or coconut milk. Not just with cows milk.
Conclusion: Small Amounts of Yogurt & Feta are ok
- Don’t eat yogurt, feta or goats cheese at the beginning of the diet- it would slow your recovery down. It should agree better with you from phase 3 onwards.
- If you do decide to have some, stick to no more than 2- 4 tablespoons and don’t eat it every day.
- Try it with desiccated coconut, sunflower seeds, cinnamon and puffed rice – yum – ok, it took me a while to grow to like it, but your taste buds adapt, promise!
Why I also include Bacon on my Candida Diet Food List:
Regarding the bacon: Cured meat is not healthy, don’t get me wrong. I’m not telling you this is the optimum diet. All I’m saying is if you are used to eating a lot of hams and meats like I am (hey, I come from Sauerkraut land – I had no choice then you can still eat it occasionally.
I tend to sprinkle some grilled bacon over cauliflower soup or omelette about twice a week, and I’m prepared to live with that vice as I really enjoy it and I’m sticking to the candida diet food list in every other respect.
All Veggies are allowed on our candida diet food list
- Salad (avoid the mixed prepacked variety)
- Onions, leek, garlic, Bragg’s seasoning, organic tomato paste/ tinned tomatoes (as long as no citric acid)
- Green & Leafy Vegetables
4. Sweet & Starchy Veg like butternut squash, potatoes
- combine with green veg or salad and seeds to keep blood-sugar levels constant
- best eaten from phase 3 of the candida diet onwards and only small amounts e.g. 2 small potatoes as a side dish
- choose cold potatoes over baked potatoes – lower glycaemic index
More Yeast-Free Foods for you to try
Legumes and heart-warming soups make up a big part of our candida diet food list because they are the ideal comfort food.
- Beans & lentils (from phase 3 onwards)
- Chickpea flour dishes like onion bhajis (occasionally as fried foods are not good for you…)
- Yeast-free stock
- Soups, Stews, Quiches
Candida Diet Food List Ideas For Vegans
- Increase the intake of dark green vegetables and sea vegetables like nori and wakame – they are higher in protein.
- Small amounts of tofu are ok.
- Protein powders like pea protein or preferably even hemp seed protein are good.
- Chickpeas make a great addition to a lot of dishes and as a snack as a meat substitute.
- Rice milk and almond milk are great milk alternatives and you could have a small amount of soya yogurt if you like.
A few Real Treats for Phase 3 of your diet
- Soda bread made from wholemeal flour (spelt flour preferably or rice flour) with coconut oil (no yeast)
- Sugar free homemade cakes and biscuits
- Grains (Buckweat, Millet, Spelt, Quinoa, Amarandt) Best to rotate grains, wash thoroughly, cook properly and eat only small amounts to avoid allergy symptoms. Be careful. (brown rice agreed with me best)
- Brown pasta: spelt or rice pasta is best, so are soba noodles which take the shortest time to cook (corn pasta can cause symptoms)
Some filling snacks to tame your cravings
What use would a candida diet food list be without at least a few snacks when you get ravenous?! Here are a few quick to prepare and filling treats for you to try:
- Porridge Oats with Rice milk, cinnamon and shelled hemp seeds (occasionally from phase 3 if it agrees with you; from my experience you’ll heal quicker the less grains you eat- I say that with a tear in my eyes since I LOVE porridge, granola, breads…).
- Brown Rice with Coconut Oil
- Rice milk with desiccated coconut flakes, sunflower seeds and cinnamon
- Freshly cracked nuts and seeds
- Hummus and veg sticks
4 Not so healthy Snacks that are just about allowed on our Candida Diet Food List once in a while
- Brown Rice Cakes/ Corn Cakes, Pop Corn (1-2 corn cakes/ a handful of Popcorn)
- Puffed rice
- Nachos, Tacos (in moderation – well as far as possible – aim for no more than 2 helpings )
- Almond butter
- Carob chocolate (no more than 1-2 pieces)
A word of warning about making your own chocki snacks from cocoa:
These might not have any sugar in it but since the cocoa stimulates your adrenals, this triggers your body to release sugar from your cells into the clood stream where it can encourage candida to grow. It also plays havoc with your bio clock, overriding your feeling of tiredness… zapping up nutrients and bringing the digestive processes to a standstill, promoting constipation, which in turn can trigger more candida. Not to mention, that you’d be craving more sweets, coffee, tea… very quickly to maintain the elated feeling the chocki snack gives you.
That’s why I didn’t include any home-mode coco snacks in this candida diet food list although they are of course delicious, healthy and ideal to curb your appetite and elevate your mood. Now you know, and there’s no reason you couldn’t once in a while enjoy a snack like that instead of bought sweets. Just not ALL the time 
Try to eat mostly alkaline foods. This will help you beat Candida faster. Alkaline foods are mostly salad and vegetables and almonds, in other words limit your meat intake.
List of Hot Drinks that are allowed on our yeast-free Diet
- Green tea
- Chamomile Peppermint tea (calms nerves and aids digestion)
- Ginger tea (double thumb size piece of ginger chopped and boiled in 1 liter + of water)
Hot Detox Drinks that are part of every good Candida Diet Food List
- Warm water (cooking the water for 20 minutes or longer makes it alkaline, very good for you)
- Nettle Mullein Tea (good detox, combats cold symptoms, not sold in stores – have to buy it lose and mix yourself)
- Hot lemon
- Dandelion Root coffee (not the granules they contain sugar)
- Pau D’arco tea
List of Cold Drinks that you can drink
- Filtered or ionised water (lots of it!)
- Rice milk and almond milk (soya milk occasionally if you like)
- Apple cider vinegar drink (2 tea spoons of cloudy acv diluted in a glass of water – drink on awakening and before/ with every meal-if you can stomach it, some people are sensitive and need to heal those areas first)
- Ice-cold sparkling water with fresh lemon juice (refreshing summer drink)
- Green juice (glass of water with half a teaspoon of chlorella powder, a hint of Spirulina and optional: the juice from half a lemon)
Aim to drink at least 2-3 liters of these healthy beverages to help your body flush out candida.
Click here for an overview over the different anti candida diet phases so you know what to expect.
And before you know it the Candida Diet is over and you can enjoy a big cup of cafe latte or hot chocolate again – It’s worth fighting for.
Hey, don’t forget to bookmark this candida diet food list
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{ 19 comments… read them below or add one }
what about fruits?
are they aloud?
my daily menu contains at least three types of fruits.
Hi Bio,
fruits are a bit tricky, as regardless how healthy they are in terms of vitamins, they still contain sugar.
That’s why fruit also belong to the “foods to avoid” group in most candida diets unfortunately.
At least for the first 4-6 weeks of fast and strict diet.
That said – I used to drink fresh juice made from apples, ginger, carrots and celery in the morning – even when I had already started on the candida diet. I just needed an occasional energy boost.
But I suffered the consequences – I sneezed a lot more and so on. On the days when I had no fruit I had noticably less symptoms.
So from my experience I would say you’ll heal much quicker if you reduce your fruit intake as much as possible.
If you can’t live without, try to stick to green apples, grapefruit or blueberries – they don’t have as much sugar. Perhaps have a bit of jogurt with it as well.
I suggest you try to have small portions as a treat rather than having fruit every day.
You might find this very hard to do initially if your menu contains of three types of fruit at the moment. I personally missed fruit almost more than eating bread and bakery products.
Maybe you can slowly cut the fruit back a little bit over the next few weeks to get used to the low sugar diet.
Hi
Regarding the fruit, my Doctor told me to have 1 – 2 cups of fruit a day only and either first thing in the morning (before coffee or water) best on an empty stomach, or as an afternoon snack two to three hours before dinner only. That way the sugar in the fruit has a chance to break down before adding a protein/fat/or carb. I don’t know if this helps it is just what I was told and I am severe candida sufferer. xoxox
Hiya, I still say fruit is fruit is sugar and it feeds candida. The yeast in your system won’t think “Oh hang on a minute it’s afternoon now – I’m going to give Laney a rest and will not have a nice feast on the lovely fruit!” If it’s in your bloodstream candida can get to it and make you ill. Simple. (She said haven given in to a bowl of strawberries temptation only just yesterday
But I agree with your doc that eating fruit before a meal is definitely a lot easier to digest and therefore healthier, and if you are going to have fruit then this is the way to do it.
I will like this!!!
I think you will! It’s not as bad as it first sounds. You’ll become very creative and inventive with food. Not to mention how quick the weekly grocery shopping is…
Have been reading up about this for weeks since finding out I have this. This is one of the most helpful and sensible sites I have seen. Thanks.
Hi Sandra, I found your website so helpful and thank so much. I have question. Is lamb, beef and chicken would be okay to eat on the diet as long as they are organic?
Thanks Addy
All organic meat is fine on the diet. It does not feed candida.
White meats like Chicken and Turkey are best. Dark meats are best only enjoyed on special occasions, because they take a long time to digest (which can lead to fermentation in your gut particularly if eaten at dinner time).
Opt for lamb rather than beef. It also helps if you stick to only small portions of meat when you do eat them (about the size of the inside of your palm). Eating meat creates acidity in your body and is a strain on your liver that has it’s work cut out anyway from filtering out yeast by-products out of your blood stream. So you can speed up your healing by eating twice as much vegetables as meat and a little bit of grains occasionally (from phase 3 onwards).
It also helps digestion if you drink some applecider vinegar with water before and during your meals. See if you can replace some meat meals with fish – it’s anti-inflammatory and easier to digest. All my best.
Hi Sandra, thanks for the quick reply. Today is the 7th day of my 1 stage cleansing, and I am happy it finally got over.
I lost 15 pounds within the past week. I have one other question that I couldnt get answer everywhere though. Is tomato ( tomato paste or sauces ) acceptable on stage two diet? Thx
Wow, that’s fantastic! 7 days is a serious cleanse – well done! Yes, it’s easy to lose weight in stage 1 and 2. That’s why I often still follow a bit of a phase 2 diet whenever I have put on weight
Regarding tomatoes – a sauce from fresh tomatoes is great, and there are several tomato pastes and tinned tomatoes available that really just contain tomatoes – you can eat all of those.
It’s just the tins and tubes with citric acid that you need to worry about. The brands I’m using are Napolina, So Organic and Suma. They all do tomato sauce that you can eat during the candida diet.
Hello, thank you so much for your thorough information. I’ve got chemical sensitivities, severe gut disbiosis…and although I’ve done a lot of low carb diets in the past, I don’t think I’ve done thinks properly. My digestive tract is very impaired and so far I’ve found all the candida diets I’ve tried to difficult to digest. Now, after years being ill and doing a lot of research, I want to give your diet a go, as it’s time to tackle things! I like your aproach and I think I am stronger now (emotionally speaking).
I’ve got some questions I would love you to answer me:
stage two is supposed to last about two weeks, then, when we move to stage three, shall we continue with the antifungals and add the probiotics at the same time?
When can we introduce nuts? and rice milk?
What about green tea?
You may have talked about this questions, but I don’t remember them at the moment.
Thank you so much for your help,
Eva Vinent (Spain)
PS. I must apologize for the mistakes!
Hi Eva, thanks so much for your kind words.
I totally understand how frustrated you must be after years of trying different diets and still feeling ill. There are so many different aspects that can sabotage a recovery plan, it can feel like playing Sherlock Holmes, can’t it! Finding the right candida diet food that agrees with you is just one factor of many!
I honestly hope my diet is will help you. But even if it didn’t, there is a big chance that it might at least give you a nudge in the right direction or it might spark a conversation with me or an even better health buff in this community who has gone through what you are going through and can help.
I hope you don’t mind me asking, what type of symptoms are you struggling with at the moment? When you say “too difficult to digest” what do you mean by that? Do you have stomach pain, heart burn, constipation, gas? Feel free to send me an email if you’d like to make this conversation private
The answer to your questions depends a little bit on how severe your candida problem is.
You start with the probiotics in phase 3. Make sure that you are taking them NOT at the same time as the antifungals, so the antifungals don’t demolish the friendly bacteria.
Say for instance you can take a Probiotic before or with breaky and then you can take olive leaf, oil of oregano or whatever antifungal you are taking at least 2-3 hours afterwards or before lunch. It’s a bit of a headache but you get used to it quickly.
Technically nuts are fine from phase 2 if they are fresh. But I’d recommend you don’t eat nuts until you are considerably better and well on your way with phase 3. Do you have any known food allergies/ sensitivities? I always find that I heal much faster when I don’t snack on nuts, bizarre… but hey ho!
Rice milk is fine from phase 2, but stick to smaller amounts while you still have a higher candida count.
Re green tea: When I started the diet I was an absolute green tea advocate. I drunk it from phase 2 onwards if not earlier. I have since then changed my view on this. In my opinion it’s best to stick to herbal teas, especially ones that promote digestion like lemon balm, chamomile, dandelion, mint, fennel… But if you enjoy green tea then I’d carry on drinking it if I were you, but I’d also drink lots of herbal teas.
PS: Didn’t notice any mistakes. I’m a German living in the UK with most of my readers in the US and Australia
We’re all friends here!
Dear Sandra,
thank you so much for your prompt response. If I could have your private email I would love to write to you and let you know, briefly, my case. Unfortunately this January I’ve had to postpone my idea of starting your diet, as all of a sudden my dad is very poorly and we are off to Barcelona (I live in Menorca, Balearic Islands) for a serious open-heart operation. As I’m not going to be at home for a while it is impossible for me to start stage 1 of your diet. I’m going to take care of all I eat of course, and I’m going to take advantge of this unforseen trip, to keep reading your blog, and write down all the stages, foods, tips…properly.
Sorry to bother you with this. Once again thank you so much for your help. I hope we keep in contact.
I hope we keep in touch.
Eva
What are your thoughts on Sashimi? Raw Salmon, Tuna etc. It’s like sushi minus the rice.
Unless you live in Japan or somewhere where you have access to amazingly fresh Sashimi I would stay away from it for now.
Because in order to maintain the flavor in sushi, it isn’t frozen at any point usually, and so the process of decay has already begun.
Most commercial fish is caught, and immediately iced, so the decomposition is temporarily halted, at least until it makes it to the grocer. Then it is thawed, so the decay process can continue while it sits under the glass. I would not consume any fish that isn’t frozen from start to plate! The last thing you need during the candida diet is food poisoning.
I’m in Koreatown in Los Angeles. Since I’m on the Pacific coast, it’s probably fresh… But seems like it might be a bit of a gamble. I’ve had it before with no problem, just not on the diet. Hm… Tricky. Thanks for the input, Sandra! You’re a godsend
You’re so sweet, thank you Hannah. You can probably try it again a few weeks into Stage 3 of the diet I’d say. Maybe even earlier if you feel good and it’s a food place you trust… Hang in there, you’re doing great