The best foods to eat when you’re hungover are bland, easy-to-digest options that restore fluids, replace lost nutrients, and stabilize your blood sugar. Think eggs, bananas, toast, oatmeal, broth, and honey. Your body is dealing with dehydration, an irritated stomach lining, and a liver that’s been too busy processing alcohol to keep your blood sugar steady. The right foods address all three problems at once.
Why You Feel So Terrible
Understanding what’s happening inside your body helps explain why certain foods work and others make things worse. When you drink, your liver prioritizes breaking down alcohol over its normal job of releasing stored glucose into your bloodstream. The result is low blood sugar, which contributes to that shaky, weak, foggy feeling the morning after. On top of that, alcohol is a diuretic, so you’ve lost fluids along with key vitamins and minerals, especially B vitamins like thiamine, folate, and B12.
Hangover symptoms typically peak 8 to 12 hours after your last drink, bringing the worst of the headache, nausea, and light sensitivity. The full recovery window stretches 18 to 24 hours. That timeline matters because what your stomach can handle shifts as you move through it. Early on, keep things light. As the nausea fades, you can eat more substantial meals.
Foods That Actually Help
Eggs
Eggs are one of the best hangover foods because they contain an amino acid called cysteine, which helps your body break down acetaldehyde, the toxic byproduct of alcohol metabolism that’s responsible for much of your misery. They’re also gentle on the stomach when scrambled or poached, and they deliver protein to help stabilize blood sugar. Two eggs with a piece of plain toast is a near-perfect hangover breakfast.
Bananas and Avocados
Both are rich in potassium, an electrolyte you lose when alcohol makes you urinate more than usual. Low potassium contributes to muscle weakness, cramping, and fatigue. Bananas have the added advantage of being extremely easy on a sensitive stomach, making them a good first food if you’re still feeling queasy.
Oatmeal and Whole Grain Toast
Complex carbohydrates are your best tool for fixing the blood sugar crash that alcohol causes. Unlike sugary cereals or white bread, oatmeal and whole grains release glucose slowly, giving your body a steady supply of energy instead of another spike and crash. They also contain B vitamins that alcohol depletes, particularly thiamine and folate, which are found naturally in whole grains and fortified grain products.
Honey
Honey is roughly 40% fructose, and fructose plays an interesting role in alcohol recovery. A study published in the South African Medical Journal found that honey increased blood alcohol clearance by 68% and shortened total intoxication time by about 43%. The mechanism involves fructose helping your liver process alcohol more efficiently. Stir a tablespoon into tea or drizzle it on toast for an easy way to get it in.
Broth and Soup
Chicken broth, miso soup, or any clear broth delivers sodium, fluids, and warmth in a form that even the most rebellious stomach can usually tolerate. Sodium helps your body retain the water you’re drinking rather than just passing it straight through. Broth is the ideal first meal if you wake up feeling too nauseous for solid food.
Ginger
Ginger has been used to treat hangover nausea since the Middle Ages, and it remains one of the most effective natural remedies for an upset stomach. You can sip ginger tea, chew on crystallized ginger, or add fresh ginger to broth. Clinical trials have used doses ranging from 170 mg to 1 gram taken three to four times daily for nausea relief. A thumb-sized piece of fresh ginger steeped in hot water gets you into that range.
Foods That Make It Worse
Greasy, fried food is the classic hangover “cure,” but the timing is all wrong. Fat slows down alcohol absorption, so a greasy meal before drinking can reduce how drunk you get. The morning after, though, that same heavy food just sits in your already irritated stomach and can trigger acid reflux or make nausea worse. Fatty foods linger longer in the stomach, increasing the chance that stomach acid backs up into the esophagus.
Spicy foods, tomato-based sauces, citrus juice, and vinegar all intensify heartburn and can aggravate a stomach lining that alcohol has already inflamed. That spicy Bloody Mary or glass of orange juice might seem like a good idea, but both are likely to make your stomach feel worse. Skip acidic and spicy options until your gut has had time to calm down.
What to Drink (and What to Skip)
Water is obvious, but don’t stop there. Coconut water or a sports drink with electrolytes will help you rehydrate faster because the sodium and potassium help your body actually absorb and retain the fluids. Sip steadily rather than chugging, which can trigger nausea.
Coffee is where most people get tripped up. Caffeine narrows blood vessels and raises blood pressure, which can amplify the pounding in your head rather than easing it. Coffee is also a diuretic, meaning it pulls more water out of your body at the exact moment you’re trying to rehydrate. As a Cleveland Clinic physician put it, drinking coffee could actually slow down your rehydration process. That said, if you’re a daily coffee drinker, skipping it entirely might give you a caffeine withdrawal headache on top of your hangover. A small cup is fine if it’s part of your routine, just don’t treat it as medicine.
A Simple Hangover Meal Plan
In the first few hours after waking up, when nausea is at its peak, start with ginger tea, broth, or a few sips of an electrolyte drink. Nibble on plain crackers or a banana if you can manage it.
Once the nausea starts to ease, move to a real meal. Two scrambled eggs on whole grain toast with a drizzle of honey on the side covers nearly every base: protein and cysteine from the eggs, slow-release carbohydrates and B vitamins from the toast, and fructose from the honey to help your liver finish clearing out the remaining alcohol. Pair it with water or coconut water rather than coffee or juice.
By the afternoon or evening, your stomach should be ready for a normal meal. Lean protein, vegetables, and complex carbs like rice or sweet potatoes will replenish the last of what your body lost. Leafy greens and broccoli are particularly good choices here because they’re rich in folate, one of the B vitamins most depleted by alcohol.