Diet
Breakfast Congee Ideas
For anyone who is vegan, sensitive to eggs, or just dislikes them, here is a breakfast idea I’ve been experimenting with, both for the sake of variety and, well… experimentation.
In China, (white) rice congee is a common breakfast, often with egg and pickled vegetables, although I realize in the States rice is rather vilified for being a simple carb and high on the glycemic index. While this might be the case, it is also a food that is very gentle on the stomach and internal organs, which from our perspective aids in absorption and digestion, and in the proper dosages can be beneficial. However, for those who can’t get past the glycemic index, I recommend using quinoa, millet, or amaranth.
1 cup of your grain of choice
5 cups of liquid (if you’re going to make the sweeter, I recommend some kind of dairy-free milk—if you’re going for the probably healthier, more Oriental style I recommend just water or either vegetable, beef, or chicken broth) Oils don’t mix as well with the sweet flavors so if you’re making the sweeter version be sure to stir often so as to avoid sticking to the pot.
Boil and simmer about 15-25 minutes, or until it is the consistency of porridge.
Treat the sweet version like you would oatmeal: Top with berries, granola, as little maple syrup as you can discipline yourself to, cinnamon, and/or nuts if you like.
For the Asian version I recommend leftover vegetables and/or pickled cabbage or kraut. Plus, an over-easy or boiled egg if you want the best of all worlds.
Enjoy warm if possible! For those of us with babies or toddlers, we long for the days when we will return to eating hot food.
Whatever you eat, EAT BREAKFAST. I cannot stress this enough. They said breakfast is the most important meal of the day because it is, not because grandma said it, but because science and biology do. Here is a link to an NIH study correlating the skipping of breakfast with increased insulin resistance and risk for diabetes: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7246451/
I like coffee as much as anyone, but coffee alone (or with a piece of toast) is not breakfast. Protein and/or fat should be consumed, preferably in great quantity.
Nor do I doubt the potential benefits of intermittent fasting, but it is more biologically aligned to skip dinner—not breakfast. If this is impossible, maybe a later breakfast, like 9am? Supposedly, any longer than 2-3 hours after waking constitutes “skipping breakfast,” which is to say the insulin resistant mechanism is set in motion by that time.
If you have no appetite for breakfast this probably indicates your dinner being not fully digested and some metabolic syndrome at work. Please reach out—or try licorice and/or ginger tea 🙂
Chinese Medicine on Fainting, Dizziness
A friend of mine recently expressed having experienced great bouts of dizziness and fainting during the third trimester of her last pregnancy, which was in the dead of summer and was thus not surprising. I felt bad to hear of her struggles, but grateful that it inspired an idea for a new entry, on how Chinese medicine views fainting and dizziness, whether in pregnancy or not, and how we can treat or prevent it.
As with any Chinese medical diagnosis, the specifics get complicated, but we can still relatively easy to simplify into a couple of broad strokes. With any manifestation of dizziness, whether orthostatic, vertigo, passing out, or anything else, we are considering patterns of either blood deficiency, dampness, or a combination of the two, the latter of which obviously being the most difficult to treat. The final one is where your toddler at home forces you to “dance” with her around the house by spinning endlessly, for which there is no cure.
Blood Deficiency: More common in vegans, vegetarians, and pescatarians (most likely descending order), more common in women (especially while pregnant), the elderly, or anyone on long-term medications, which compromise the body’s absorption and capacity to produce blood. There is either a lack of cerebrovascular fluid or its flow and the head becomes faint.
Recommended treatment is herbs and moxibustion (acupuncture not as effective here), red meat or eggs, and earlier bedtimes.
Dampness: More common with obesity, more common in men, and/or people who consume a lot of alcohol, sugar, dairy, or raw foods. The microbiome grows congested with fluid retention, so the pathway by which our cellular energy carries healthy fluids to the brain is obstructed. “The clear yang qi cannot rise,” as we say, and our clarity or stability suffer.
Recommended treatment is minimizing all of the aforementioned foods, herbal medicine for 1-3 weeks to purge fluid retention, and acupuncture, especially along the vertigo line along the scalp located directly above the top of the ears. Note, this point will not be as effective on blood deficiency patterns, who are suffering a pattern of “deficiency,” not “excessive damp,” which responds better to aggressive manual treatment. As for self-care, drink hot ginger tea and black teas until symptoms subside.
Combination Blood Deficiency/Dampness: This is most common in pregnant women and very difficult to treat, because to nourish blood we must generate fluids, but to resolve dampness we must purge it. Not to mention the fact that we must be careful with purging fluid retention in pregnant women, since the fetus is ultimately a form of fluid retention—albeit an adorably magical one.
Dizziness and vertigo are serious conditions, not generally life threatening, although potentially dangerous when leading to the physical risks that accompany fainting. As always, Chinese Medicine can have much to offer in the way of hands-on treatment, internal medicine, and recommended self-care.
When in doubt: red meat, eggs, ginger tea, good rest, and steamed vegetables for the dampness.
Is Green Tea Healthy (for you)?
In the western world we are often guilty of over-polarizing and labeling. This political viewpoint is good, that one is bad, this diet is healthy, that one is not. Further on that point, one food is healthy—while that one is not.
While there are many foods that can be oversimplified and universally agreed upon—refined sugars are pretty much always bad and steamed vegetables good—most others depend on the dose, the patient, and time of year. For example, red meat in the winter for an anemic girl trying to conceive is eons more advisable than it is in the summer for an overweight male alcoholic trying to tame his heartburn. Also from a Chinese medical perspective, eating 5-6 ounces of red meat 1-3 times a week alongside vegetables will have an infinitely different systemic effect than 16 ounces 3-5 times a week alongside bread.
Green tea and kale have earned great reputations in the west, polarized as “good,” labeled “healthy,” and presumed to help anyone who consumes them, no matter the body type or time of year. From a Chinese medical perspective: False.
Almost anyone who’s ever drank green tea on a completely empty stomach has experienced the nausea or queasiness its bitter properties can induce. Bitter foods and herbs, while integral to a healthy diet and our pharmacopeia, are harsh on the stomach and less advisable for “Tai Yin” patients—those with weaker, more vulnerable stomachs. Such people generally do better with hot black teas, such as pu-erh or Earl Grey.
When written into herbal formulas, bitters are generally dosed lower and balanced with acrid and/or sweet-flavored herbs. This doesn’t mean to always consume your green tea with sweets, but it is that much more encouraged to never be drank cold or on an empty stomach. In fact, green is the one kind of tea we might encourage to take with honey—that is as long as you’re not the snob that I am, in refusal to corrupt any tea (or coffee) with outside flavors.
The same principle applies to kale. While undoubtedly possessing of all the literal health benefits it claims to, kale is a bitter green, therefore a bit more difficult to digest than other veggies. For this reason, it is important to always consume cooked, with warming spices, such as garlic, onions, or ginger to aid in proper metabolism. I’m not sure about honey on kale—maybe in the context of a salad—although in that case the raw food might cancel out any benefits of the honey. Better to have it with rice or yams to balance your “formula.”
According to teachers, green tea is best taken hot, more in the summer than winter, and more after a night of red meat and/or alcohol to sort of “drain” the heat that these foods create in the gut. Personally, I almost always drink green tea the morning after I go to baseball games! In these instances, the benefits far outweigh its “side effects.”
Please fall victim as infrequently as possible to the idea that certain foods are always healthy or unhealthy. This is rarely the case, also rare that the opinion of the general American public on anything health-related is accurately informed. If you have any questions about a particular food, please don’t hesitate to ask. And don’t take too much kale or green tea.
Tips for Resting & Digesting (food)
It’s nice to eat nice foods—expensive and high quality foods—organic foods, locally grown, homemade, etc. But it isn’t just about what we eat, but how we eat, that will maximize the conversion of our food into nutrients, which will convert into globally good health.
Whether you use your hands or utensils is up to you and your social circle, but across the board everyone advises chewing our food until it is liquefied in our mouths. This is for the same rationale that Eastern medicines recommend warm and cooked foods—they are easier to digest. Whenever I bribe my toddler with dark chocolate, cheese, or bread, she’s suddenly lightning fast at shoveling two handfuls of vegetables into her mouth in anticipation of her treat; my wife and I have to remind her, almost like a cheerleading chant: “Chew, chew, chew!” “Mastica!”
Each organ channel has its many correspondences, to particular seasons, colors, of the five elements, as well as shapes. The spleen and stomach are ruled by circles (and the color yellow), which means the ideal way to eat and digest is at a roundtable (of loved ones), I suppose with a yellow tablecloth. Ironically, such interior design would likely make my wife vomit.
The point is, we supposedly metabolize our foods that much better when seated surrounded by the company of loved ones. This might explain why many cultures that are known more for their tight-knit communities than their health-conscious diets, live late into life before experiencing any ailments or disease.
Finally, and most importantly in my opinion, is the parasympathetic nervous system cliche of “rest and digest.” It’s not in our power to have a big family meal 21 times a week. Most of us are super busy, eating on the go, if not at least shoving the last bite of food into our mouths like my daughter, before standing up to pay the check, throwing our coats on, and rushing back to work. Unfortunately, in such cases, one will likely absorb only about half of the nutrients they otherwise would have had they just sat for 10-20 minutes after finishing. Needless to say, over time this can be dangerous.
My understanding is it should take at least 15 minutes to eat our food, plus 15 minutes afterwards to sit and digest. Depending on our energy levels, this can be followed by either a 15-minute walk or a 15-minute cat nap, as they do in Europe (though theirs’ is more like an hour). My wife told me about a study that contrasted the blood sugar levels in two groups against one another after eating identical meals, where the one that took 20 minutes to eat it showed a much lower glucose spike than the one that ate the same food rapidly.
On my busy days, which is every day, I try to make a habit of looking at the clock after my last bite and not allowing myself to get up until at least 15 minutes later. Although the general consensus is it is bad to look at screens while eating, my opinion is it is better to use the phone for a few minutes to bide the digestive time window than it is to get up and physically rush out.
Work-induced stress and anxiety compromises our health enough without allowing it to directly interfere with our organs and metabolism. I encourage everyone to take the 30 minutes three times every day to properly rest and digest!
Balancing the Bitter Cold with Chinese Medicine
Welcome to the “Bitter Cold.” Holidays are over, New Year’s has passed, viral plagues have not, and single digit temperatures have arrived. Although we do not hibernate, nor could we, even if the more introverted of us might prefer to, in theory we should do so at this time. Instead, how can we compensate for the nature of the present climate?
In Chinese Medicine herbal formulas that contain bitter and cold ingredients, such as coptis root, phellodendron, or gardenia fruit, generally harmonize their harsh properties with more acrid, warm ingredients, such as ginger, dry-fried ginger, tangerine peel, or pinelliae root. This enables the bitter, cold herbs to purge systemically damp/hot inflammation without compromising the integrity of the stomach qi, or microbiome. This is holistic medicine.
Self-care can be “holistic” as well. Ie. If we eat a cold salad or ice cream it should be had with or followed by hot ginger or cinnamon tea (No, it doesn’t help to have ginger or cinnamon flavored ice cream). Conversely, if we eat an especially rich or spicy meal, and/or have alcohol we might accompany it with a few cucumbers or radishes—or follow it with peppermint or barley tea the next day (still hot, as cold beverages can never benefit the gut from our perspective). If we exercise or work out hard on a particular day we should get to bed early that night, in order to properly recover the body fluids used in the workout. If we slept awful the night before we should take it easy. Nap if possible. If we slept and feel wonderful we should exercise and strive for progress. It is said that we should view each day as a lifetime in itself, and try our best to balance it accordingly.
From a climactic perspective, we might counterbalance the bitter cold weather with similar choices. As the low temperatures and more difficult commutes exhaust our cellular energy, which is what engenders our immunological energy, all forms of conservation are advisable: Less exercise, less sex, less work (if possible), and earlier bedtimes as often as possible. All of these, with the exception of less exercise for the “New Year, New Me” crowd, are relatively intuitive in January.
As goes the outdoor environment, it is most advisable to eat like Eastern Europeans for now. Think beef or lamb stews, chicken soups, even sausages and pork chops, all of which paired with roasted or steamed vegetables. Vegetables might be sauteed with ginger, garlic, onions, any warming spices to recover from the bitter cold that surrounds us. Duck is actually considered to have a “cooling” effect on the body, although I am inclined to think that a duck confit roasted with onions and garlic and served with red wine should amply warm the body. While 11pm is the advisable bedtime for summer, 10pm is ideal for winter. Beer and other cold beverages should be minimized, as should raw fruit and all forms of sugar. For my apple-loving daughter, I roast them at 350 or 375 for 10-20 minutes with a sprinkle of cinnamon and a drizzle of maple syrup. For myself I would also add clove powder, but it is too spicy for her.
For my purposes, many of you will notice me doing a lot more moxibustion on the body at this time of year. Whether on the belly, along the spine, or at point, “Stomach 36,” just below the knee, no hands-on modality is more effective at regenerating healthy fluids and moving the blood than “moxa.” My opinion is that acupuncturists who do not use moxa at all are likely doing their patients and the entire medicine a disservice, as at its inception Chinese Medicine was not called “Chinese Medicine,” but “Zhen Jiu,” or “Acupuncture and Moxibustion.” Our classical texts dictate: “Use acupuncture to treat ‘yang patterns,’ moxibustion to treat ‘yin patterns’.” My understanding of this is that acupuncture excels at clearing heat and releasing stagnation, but the mugwort is necessary to dissolve unhealthy fluids and regenerate healthy ones.
