After throwing up from drinking, your stomach needs time to settle before you eat anything solid. Start with small sips of water or an electrolyte drink, wait a few hours until you can keep liquids down, then gradually move to bland, easy-to-digest foods. Rushing straight to a meal will likely trigger more nausea.
Wait Before You Eat
Give your stomach a break of at least two to three hours after your last episode of vomiting. During that window, take small sips of water, not full glasses. Gulping down liquid on an irritated stomach can send it right back up. Once you’ve kept water down for a couple of hours without any nausea returning, you can start introducing other liquids and then soft foods.
Rehydrate With Electrolytes First
Vomiting after drinking strips your body of more than just water. Alcohol itself acts as a diuretic, and when you add repeated vomiting on top of that, you lose significant amounts of potassium, magnesium, sodium, and calcium through both your gut and your kidneys. Vomiting specifically increases kidney losses of potassium because it shifts your body’s acid-base balance, causing the kidneys to dump extra potassium into your urine.
Plain water alone won’t replace what you’ve lost. An oral rehydration solution or a sports drink with electrolytes will help restore sodium and potassium faster. Coconut water is another option since it’s naturally high in potassium. Pedialyte-type drinks designed for dehydration tend to have a better electrolyte profile than most sports drinks. Sip slowly rather than chugging.
Best First Foods to Try
Once liquids are staying down, start with foods that are bland, low in fat, and easy on an inflamed stomach lining. Good options include:
- Bananas: High in potassium, which you’ve lost from vomiting. They also contain pectin, a soluble fiber that helps bind excess water in your digestive tract and firm things up if you’re also dealing with diarrhea.
- Plain white rice: The starch converts into soluble fiber in the gut, making it gentle to digest. It provides quick energy without challenging your stomach.
- Plain toast (white bread): Bland and unlikely to trigger nausea. Skip the butter for now.
- Applesauce: Like bananas, apples contain pectin. The cooked, pureed form is easier on your stomach than a raw apple.
- Saltine crackers: A small amount of salt helps with sodium replacement, and the simple carbohydrates give you energy.
These are all low-fiber, low-fat, and low-flavor, which is exactly what an irritated stomach needs. Eat small amounts. A few bites at a time is better than a full plate.
Broth and Soup for the Next Step
Warm broth, whether chicken, vegetable, or bone broth, sits in a useful middle ground between liquids and solid food. It delivers sodium, some potassium, and a small amount of protein without requiring your stomach to do much work. Bone broth specifically contains collagen-derived amino acids like glycine that have anti-inflammatory properties, though the concentrations vary depending on how it’s prepared. A store-bought carton works fine. Sip it warm, not hot, since heat can aggravate nausea.
Once broth feels comfortable, a simple soup with soft noodles or rice is a natural next step before returning to regular meals.
Eggs When You’re Ready for Real Food
Eggs are one of the best recovery foods once your stomach can handle something more substantial. They’re a rich source of the amino acid L-cysteine, which plays a role in breaking down acetaldehyde, the toxic byproduct your liver produces when it processes alcohol. Acetaldehyde is responsible for much of the misery you feel during a hangover, and L-cysteine helps your body clear it.
Scrambled or boiled eggs are easiest to digest. Avoid frying them in butter or oil, which adds fat your stomach doesn’t need right now. Pair them with plain toast for a simple, effective recovery meal.
Ginger for Lingering Nausea
If nausea is hanging around even after you’ve started hydrating, ginger is one of the most well-studied natural remedies for settling a stomach. It works across multiple types of nausea, from motion sickness to chemotherapy to pregnancy. The most commonly recommended dose in clinical studies is about 1,000 mg of ginger, which translates to roughly one teaspoon of freshly grated ginger, two pieces of crystallized ginger (about one square inch each), or four cups of prepackaged ginger tea.
Ginger tea is the most practical option when you’re recovering. Ginger ale is less reliable because many commercial brands contain very little actual ginger and a lot of sugar, which can make nausea worse. If you have ginger capsules or crystallized ginger on hand, those work well too. The FDA considers up to 4 grams of ginger per day safe, so you have room to adjust.
Replenish B Vitamins Over the Next Day
Alcohol interferes with your body’s ability to absorb and use B vitamins across the board. Thiamine (B1), riboflavin (B2), B6, folate, and B12 are all affected. Alcohol reduces the absorption of riboflavin in the small intestine, blocks the conversion of tryptophan into niacin (B3), and impairs the release of B12 from food proteins. Folate levels drop because alcohol interferes with intestinal absorption and reduces how much your liver and kidneys can hold onto.
You don’t need to worry about supplementing each one individually. As you return to eating normally over the next 24 hours, focus on foods naturally rich in B vitamins: eggs, whole grains, leafy greens, avocados, and lean meats like chicken. A bowl of oatmeal with a banana covers several of these at once. If you keep a B-complex vitamin around, taking one during recovery is reasonable.
What to Avoid Until You Feel Normal
Your stomach lining is inflamed after vomiting, and certain foods and drinks will make that worse. Skip these until you’re feeling fully recovered:
- Coffee and caffeinated drinks: Caffeine irritates an already-inflamed stomach lining and is also a diuretic, which works against your rehydration efforts.
- Spicy foods: They won’t cause lasting damage, but they’ll cause discomfort on an irritated stomach.
- Greasy or fried foods: Fat slows digestion and can trigger nausea when your stomach is sensitive.
- Dairy (for some people): Milk and cheese can be harder to digest when your gut is irritated. If dairy normally sits fine with you, plain yogurt is an exception since the probiotics may help.
- Acidic foods: Citrus fruits, tomato-based sauces, and vinegar-heavy foods can sting an inflamed stomach.
- More alcohol: “Hair of the dog” delays recovery and adds more irritation to an already damaged stomach lining.
A Simple Recovery Timeline
For most people, the progression looks like this. In the first two to three hours after vomiting, stick to small sips of water or an electrolyte drink. Once you’ve kept liquids down comfortably, try broth or ginger tea. After that, move to bland solids like toast, crackers, rice, or bananas. Within six to eight hours, if everything is staying down, you can try eggs or a simple soup. By the next day, most people can return to relatively normal eating, though your appetite may still be reduced.
If you’re still unable to keep water down after several hours, or if vomiting continues for more than 24 hours, that’s a sign your body needs more help than food and fluids alone can provide.