If you’re like most people, you want to eat right—at least most of the time. But sometimes it can be hard; you may not know the healthiest choice, maybe you don’t have time to cook, or you’re derailed by sweet or salty food cravings. In addition, it seems like weekly there’s new information about diet and nutrition that can be confusing and contradictory. And unlike most animals, we humans are able to eat and digest a huge range of foods, including plants, grains, meats, beans, nuts and seeds, which only makes it harder to know what’s healthy or not.
Understanding Chinese Food Therapy
In Chinese medicine, food therapy is considered to be an important healing tool because it’s inexpensive, can be implemented daily at home and it’s effective. The ability to heal through your diet is very real. However, while foods usually aren’t as potent as Chinese herbs, they have a very tangible effect on your health—so much so that some foods are actually used as herbs too.
In healing through diet, specific foods are chosen over others based on their inherent actions. Foods can be chosen to enhance your digestion, boost your energy, drain edema, dry out phlegmy lungs, cool the fires of inflammation and help you fight off the common cold. Foods may also be chosen for their innate temperature, which isn’t about spiciness, but rather whether it has a warming or cooling effect on your body. While the effects can be subtle, foods are considered to be hot, warm, neutral, cool and cold. For example, ginger isn’t spicy but can make you feel warm and even sweat; and mint has a cooling effect even when it’s consumed as a warm tea.
It’s also important to know that food therapy isn’t a one size fits all plan. Your body and health needs are very different from anyone else’s, which translates into a need for foods and dietary modifications that are specific to you.
Choosing Foods that Cool You Off
While choosing the right foods for you is unique to your specific health challenges, food therapy can also be helpful in maintaining your well-being as the seasons change. You’ve heard about the benefits of eating local foods that are in season, and in Chinese theory that rings especially true. The foods that are growing in your area currently are those that are best suited to enhancing your health right now. That’s because the foods that are ripe in July and August tend to be cooling in nature to dial back the heat, and they’re moist to prevent dehydration. For example, melons, especially watermelon, are very cooling and are full of water. So are cucumbers, celery, berries of all kinds, eggplant, broccoli, cabbage, summer squash and leafy greens, such as lettuce and spinach. In the late summer, ripening fruits are also moistening and cool. This includes apples, pears, plums and peaches.
It’s important to know that how you cook a food has an impact on its inherent temperature, too. Essentially, the longer you a food, the warmer and easier to digest it becomes. This means that greens and produce right out of the garden and eaten raw or lightly cooked are more cooling than if you grilled or roasted them for longer. This is a good rule of thumb to remember in the winter too—soups, stews and roasted foods are better at warming you up than a meal of raw veggies.
In Chinese medicine, there’s actually a condition that’s unique to the hottest days of July and August. It’s called Summerheat, and it only occurs when it’s really hot and usually very humid. It can include feeling queasy, fatigued or light-headed after you’ve been outdoors too long in the heat. Treating Summerheat involves eating cool foods, such as melon and mung beans or mung bean sprouts.
When it comes to Chinese food therapy, it’s not a coincidence that watermelons, strawberries and cucumbers are a welcome treat, especially on the hottest days of the year. They help cool your body off and taste delicious. And when you’ve overdone it, the antidote to Summerheat is growing in gardens locally. Eat well and stay cool!
Cindy Chamberlain is an acupuncturist in Overland Park, KS and the founder of Eastern Healing Solutions, LLC. She is licensed in Kansas and Missouri and has been practicing traditional Chinese medicine since 1996.
