Foods to Avoid in Pregnancy: The Full List, and the Much Longer Safe List

The list of foods that are genuinely off the menu during the pregnancy period is fairly short, while the list of foods women give up unnecessarily is far longer. This guide covers both and explains the reasons why some foods are off-limits so you can make decisions in a supermarket more confidently.

The short version

If you're short on time, start here. What follows gives the full detail, but this is the list that matters most.

• Raw or undercooked meat, poultry, fish and shellfish, including sushi made with raw fish.
• Liver and liver products, for vitamin A.
• High-mercury fish: swordfish, shark, marlin, king mackerel and bigeye tuna.
• Unpasteurized dairy of any kind.
• Mold-ripened and blue cheeses, unless cooked until steaming hot.
• Cold cured meats and cold-smoked fish, unless heated until steaming hot.
• Game that may contain lead shot.
• Alcohol, because none is the safest option during pregnancy.
• Vitamin A supplements and cod liver oil.

Not banned but limited: caffeine is capped at up to 200 mg a day and oily fish is capped at up to two portions a week. More detail on this below.

The much longer safe list

This part matters just as much, if not more, because the food people give up for no good reason is often food they could have carried on eating without any problem. All of the following are still fine.

• Pasteurized milk, yogurt, cream and ice cream.
• Hard cheeses including cheddar, Parmesan and Gruyere, whether pasteurized or not.
• Pasteurized soft cheeses without a white surface rind: cottage cheese, cream cheese, mozzarella, feta, paneer, ricotta, mascarpone, halloumi and goat cheese without a rind.
• Cooked shellfish, including mussels and shrimp.
• Hot-smoked fish such as hot-smoked salmon and mackerel.
• Canned tuna, up to four cans a week.
• Oily fish such as salmon, trout, sardines and mackerel, up to two portions a week, and actively encouraged at one to two.
• Well-washed fruit and vegetables, including salad.
• Eggs, cooked through.

If a food isn't on the avoid list and isn't on this safe list either, it usually comes down to how it's made, stored or served rather than the ingredient itself.

Cheese, properly explained

A lot of people go through pregnancy with one simple rule in their head, which is "no soft cheese". It sounds easy to follow, but it's wrong because it cuts out cheeses that are perfectly fine and it can miss the ones that need more careful preparation.

The better way to think about cheese is to ask two questions:

• Is it pasteurized?
• Does it have a white rind or blue mold?

Pasteurized soft cheese with no rind is fine cold. That includes feta, mozzarella, ricotta, mascarpone, cottage cheese, cream cheese, halloumi, paneer and rindless goat cheese. In the UK, supermarket versions are usually pasteurized as standard, though it's still worth checking labels at deli counters, markets and farm shops.

Mold-ripened cheeses such as brie, camembert, chevre with a rind and similar cheeses, along with blue cheeses such as Roquefort, Gorgonzola, Stilton and Danish Blue, should be heated until steaming hot right through. This is why baked camembert or a hot blue cheese sauce is fine even though the same cheese served cold is not.

Unpasteurized dairy is the firmer no, though hard cheeses are usually treated as an exception because they carry less risk than softer ones. In practice this means dishes like our Greek Pasta Salad with Pasteurized Feta or Caprese Skewers with Balsamic Glaze are entirely ordinary pregnancy food.

Fish: the two separate rules

Fish gets confusing because two different rules apply at once, and they are about different things.

The first rule is mercury. A small number of large, long-lived predatory fish accumulate mercury over time, so avoid swordfish, shark, marlin, king mackerel and bigeye tuna. The FDA and EPA also list tilefish and orange roughy.

The second rule is portions, and it applies to fish that is otherwise good for you. Oily fish is capped at two portions a week because low levels of pollutants can build up over time. Tuna has its own separate limit. In UK guidance that means no more than four medium cans a week or two tuna steaks, because fresh tuna contains more mercury than canned tuna does.

Oily fish is one of the few genuinely good sources of the omega-3 DHA that matters in pregnancy, and one to two portions a week is the target. Our omega-3 rich recipes are built around that.

Raw fish is a separate issue and stays off the menu. That includes sushi made with raw fish, ceviche, carpaccio and fish that has been cured rather than cooked. Cold-smoked salmon sits in that group too, so if you want it, heat it until steaming hot. Hot-smoked fish is already cooked, which is why it doesn't fall under the same rule.

Meat, deli meat and pate

Cook meat properly. There should be no pink left in poultry, pork, sausages, burgers or ground meat, and anything made from ground meat should be cooked right through.

Liver and liver products should be avoided outright, and the reason isn't bacteria but vitamin A. Liver contains a very large amount, and too much vitamin A during pregnancy carries its own risk. That is also why cod liver oil and any supplement containing vitamin A, often listed as retinol, are advised against. If you're taking a multivitamin that wasn't made for pregnancy, it's worth checking the label rather than assuming it's suitable.

Pate needs a more precise answer because the official wording is more specific than the blanket ban most people hear. Liver pate falls under the liver rule, so that is out. The NHS places chilled meat pate and vegetable pate in the category to be careful with rather than a flat no, as long as they're kept chilled and eaten before the use-by date. Across this site, we take the simpler and stricter advice and leave pate out of pregnancy recipes entirely.

Cured meats such as salami, chorizo, prosciutto and pepperoni are fine when they're heated until steaming hot. For example, pepperoni as a pizza topping is cooked, so it's fine, while on a cold charcuterie board it isn't, so be careful.

Eggs, and where we're stricter than the NHS

NHS guidance permits runny yolks in eggs carrying the British Lion mark, because that scheme's controls make the salmonella risk very low. US guidance has no equivalent scheme and advises fully cooked eggs.

Every egg in every pregnancy recipe on this site is fully cooked with the yolk set. That's a deliberate editorial choice and it's stricter than the NHS position. We do it because the site is read in more than one country and the British Lion mark means nothing outside the UK, so the more cautious rule travels better.

If you're in the UK, eating British Lion or Laid in Britain eggs with runny yolks is absolutely fine.

Caffeine, in cups rather than milligrams

The limit is 200 mg a day. That's a ceiling, not a target, so there's no reason to aim anywhere near it.

According to NHS figures:

• Mug of instant coffee: around 100 mg
• Mug of tea: around 75 mg
• Can of cola: 40 mg
• 250 ml energy drink: 80 mg
• 50 g bar of dark chocolate: under 25 mg
• 50 g bar of milk chocolate: under 10 mg

Filter coffee and coffee-shop drinks are often much stronger than instant coffee, sometimes by quite a lot, so one large to-go cup can get much closer to the daily limit than people expect.

Alcohol

Here the advice is clear. The NHS, the CDC and other major health bodies take the same line that no amount of alcohol has been shown to be safe during pregnancy, so the safest option is not to drink at all.

This site takes that advice seriously, which means no alcohol is used in cooking in any of our recipes.

Fruit, vegetables and salad

These are all fine, and they are worth keeping in. The issue is the soil and contamination on produce that hasn't been washed properly. So rinse fruits and vegetables well before eating them and, if you want to be extra careful, wash bagged salad too even when it says pre-washed.

Enoki mushrooms are better cooked thoroughly rather than eaten raw. Beyond that, this is mostly a washing rule rather than another list of foods to fear.

Herbal tea

Herbal teas are generally fine but not unlimited, and the usual suggestion is no more than four cups a day. Licorice root tea is the one to skip entirely. If you are using an herbal remedy rather than a supermarket tea bag, that is a conversation with your doctor or dietitian, since "herbal" and "harmless" are not synonyms.

Leftovers and reheating

Per FSA guidance, cool cooked food and refrigerate it within one to two hours, eat leftovers within 48 hours or freeze them on the day you cook, defrost in the fridge rather than on the counter, and reheat until steaming hot right through.

Rice has tighter rules than most leftovers. Chill it quickly, use it within 24 hours and never reheat it more than once.

What to do if you've already eaten something

If you ate something from the avoid list because you forgot or before you knew you were pregnant, don't stress; the risk from one exposure is usually low and there's nothing useful to do after the fact. Just don't make yourself vomit and don't take anything "just in case".

Instead, mention it at your next appointment so it's on the record. Then, if you develop a fever, flu-like symptoms, diarrhea or vomiting afterwards, contact your midwife or doctor promptly. Those symptoms are the part to act on, not the meal itself.

If you're worried about anything, ask your doctor.

Where to go next

Remember the avoid list or save it in your phone, and focus on the foods you should eat to support your pregnancy:

• What to eat in the first trimester, for the folate window and the nausea that will not lift.
• Pregnancy recipes, all of which follow every rule on this page by default.
• Iron-rich recipes and folate-rich recipes, for the two that matter most.

Sources & further reading

• NHS: Foods to avoid in pregnancy
• FDA/EPA: Advice about eating fish
• NHS: Vitamins, supplements and nutrition in pregnancy
• ACOG: Healthy eating during pregnancy
• Food Standards Agency: Cooking your food
• Food Standards Agency: How to chill, freeze and defrost food safely