Healthy Living Recipes
Healthy Recipes just for you
Ready for some healthy recipes to kick start your way to wellness? A change in the foods you eat may give you some surprising results. We have a few healthy living recipes from known organ and tissue recipients who have beaten the odds and are now on a new path of life and health. Take a moment to browse through their shared healthy recipes. You may just find your new favorite eats that just so happens to be healthy.
Heart Recipient and Registered Donor
Almond Butter Avocado Brownies
It took a virus about 10 months to irreversibly scar my birth heart in 2019. My hospitalization, decline and subsequent heart transplant occurred in a total of roughly one month. Just like that, my life changed and I will forever look forward to how I can continue to live fearlessly, healthily and gratefully for my donor and myself.
After my heart transplant, I knew that I needed to adjust my diet. I loved baking and eating desserts and searched for healthy recipes that also tasted good. Unfortunately, there weren’t many, so I decided to try mashing together two recipes that I liked the looks of and came up with this one.
Kidney Recipient donated by her Living Donor, husband
Vegan Carrot and Ginger Soup
I was born with kidney disease and when I got pregnant with my youngest son, my kidneys started to fail. I had a stroke, was unconscious for three days and put on dialysis. My husband turned out to be a match and became my living donor 13 years ago.
With chronic kidney disease, I needed to make more plant-based foods to stay healthier. Determined to see me healed, my best friend got me into juicing. She bought me a 30lb bag of carrots to juice and I came up with a raw carrot and ginger soup to use some of them.
Heart Recipient
Oatmeal Bars
I had my heart attack in January 2012 and received my transplant in December 2014. Being given a second chance brings an awareness to change certain aspects of your life and provides an opportunity to give back to the community that has made it possible.
One very rewarding way I have found to give back is volunteering at Mid-South Transplant Foundation. Here is a heart healthy recipe that is both enjoyable and easy to prepare.
Community Advocate, Registered Donor, and Nephrologist
Southern Smoked Vegetarian Turnip Greens
While I was an undergraduate student, our local Donate Life organization was searching for volunteers for a campus event. Though I had very little awareness about transplantation, I enjoyed learning and immediately signed up as a volunteer and a donor.
After graduation, I met another Donate Life volunteer whose story shaped my future. A young, black female in need of a kidney transplant, she became ineligible to fulfill a sports scholarship and her dreams were shattered. This fueled me to learn more about kidney disease and why this had happened to her. Not only did she “look like me” but those on dialysis “looked like my family”. This is why I am a registered donor, a community advocate for donation and a Nephrologist. My healthier Soul Food recipe recreates greens vegetarian-style with less salt, but the same flavor.
Caregiver, Double Lung Recipient Family and Registered Donor
Monkfruit Nut Granola
My husband received a double lung transplant 22 years ago. As a diabetic, this is a snack he can enjoy without overdoing his sugar intake. It is also a great low sugar yogurt topping, ice cream topping and treat that our friends ask for as gifts for birthdays and Christmas.