Skip to main content
liquid diet

liquid diet

4 4.1
A diet mainly of liquids like soup or juice to help you get better after surgery
  • noun
  • /ˈlɪkwɪd daɪət/
translation icon : dieta líquida
  • After surgery, I was on a liquid diet for six weeks.

And I landed in LA and she picked me up and she had gone to this nutritionist and gotten this like liquid diet thing.

Examples

  • Each of the three approaches requires patients to organize themselves twenty-four hours prior to the test by eating a definite liquid diet and cleaning the colon using laxatives or special diets.

    Blog text (5)
  • Typically, it involves one or two days of a complete liquid diet.

    Blog text (8)
  • Grandpa's strict liquid diet keeps him as fresh as a rose.

  • A liquid diet of clear fluids will not only help prevent dehydration, but it will also be less likely than solid foods to trigger further vomiting.

    Academic text (2007)
  • Last month, as her ability to swallow had begun to disappear, she had been hospitalized for the insertion of something called a PEG, a percutaneous endoscopic gastrostomy, a little plastic button that allowed a liquid diet to be fed directly into her stomach four times a day.

    Fiction book (1999)
  • After surgery, I was on a liquid diet for six weeks.

  • I've been adhering to a strict liquid diet to aid my recovery.

  • For a week, she followed a liquid diet that included only soups and juices.

Antonyms

11 1.0

Food that is not a drink and you chew before you swallow

How Restricted

fasting
30 3.1
clear liquid diet
  • Specialized
1 3.7
liquid diet
4 4.1
soft diet
1 2.9
diet
283 1.0

Surface Forms

liquid diet singular
liquid diets plural

Morphology

liquid + diet

The meaning 'a diet consisting mainly of liquids' is directly and compositionally derived from combining 'liquid' (material that flows) with 'diet' (a planned way of eating); the adjective-noun relationship is literal and predictable. This is a common, medical/ordinary descriptive pattern found in many languages, so a B1 learner who knows both words will readily understand the MWE.

Etymology

Liquid diet comes from doctors' instructions for people who must only eat liquid foods like soup, juice and broth after surgery or illness. Picture a bowl of broth instead of solid food, and you can see why it means 'a diet of mainly liquids'.