It’s about every food I’ve cooked with heart and loves
“Strengthen your lungs to fight the epidemic virus together”
“强身健肺，必能打败肺炎！”
An on-going viral epidemic, Wuhan coronavirus, is primarily affecting everyone in the world. Other than protecting ourselves by making sure personal hygiene, wash your hands for at least 20seconds on regular basis, we will also want to be healthy and strong body. Having good body immune system is equally important to fight any virus!
Haze hit a severe unhealthy level of over 200 PSI this morning. My windows and door were all closed, but I was still feeling dizzy, sore throat and eyes discomfort. Everyone was supposed to be out there enjoying the public holiday, but the road seemed quieter than usual, looking down from my windows.. Yes, it was best to stay home, especially young children.
To ease my throat pain and help in strengthen my lungs, I have been boiling this super convenient homemade herbal tea. Sorry that I did not post to share earlier, I did not expect the haze to be that bad.
I hope my post still come in handy. It really is super easy to cook. No matter how busy you are, or for someone who doesn’t know at all how to cook herbal tea, make this and drink as if your usual plain water. It’s good for your eyes, great to flush out toxins in your body through urination as well as soothing your throat. For those who cannot take cooling stuff, the addition of aged ginger in this recipe will help to balance the cooling effect.
For the utmost convenience, I used store-bought dried Chrysanthemum flowers which easily available at major supermarkets (dried goods compartment) and Chinese medical halls at the neighbourhood estates.
Same goes to aged ginger, I bought the instant ginger & red date tea cubes which I have gotten from my last Taiwan trip. Of course, if you do not have this, use any instant ginger tea sachets, sweetened or not. If you still prefer the more natural ones and do not mind to take a little extra step for it, cut and add 1-2 slices (0.5cm in thickness) of the aged ginger. Add also 3-4 pieces of red dates, if you do not feel like adding any rock sugar in it. I preferred not to.
Serves 1 large pot
Ingredients
20-30g of dried chrysanthemum flowers (about a handful)
1 sachet of instant aged ginger cube (or 1-2 slices of age ginger)
3-4 pieces of medium red dates
1 large pot of water (about 1-1.5litre)
Method
(1) Bring a large pot of water to a boil over high heat. Add rinsed chrysanthemum flowers and red dates. Cover lid and reduce heat to low fire to simmer for 10 minutes.
(2) Heat off and add aged ginger cube/ slices. Immediately put the lid on to let the remaining heat to continue simmer the herbal tea for another 10 minutes. Sieve petals, and serve tea warm or chilled.
A cup of my herbal tea has less than 25kcal.
Tips: The amount of ingredients are adjustable, depending on how string you want the herbal tea to be.
* Any type of dried Chrysanthemum will do. No particular brand. If you are feeling generous, get the white chrysanthemum with small petals type (Chinese: 杭白菊). Not exactly white, but off white in colour, I heard it has better nutrition value in these effects. Of course, price are slightly higher.
Just come back from a 2-stop trip, all the way up to the north of Malaysia. We visited The Lost World, Tambun, Ipoh, followed by Hatyai, Thailand, in 6 days. :)
Yes, very tight schedule. That’s why we were worn out after the trip. Body heat arose with feverish feeling. I knew it was time for herbal tea, then.
Snow pear has its cooling effect for such heatiness in body. To eliminate ‘heat in liver’ (we referred it as 肝火 ‘Gan Huo‘), I added Sha Shen (沙參) which claims to cleanse and rejuvenate liver health.
It’s good to drink it during hot weather or after a hectic event.
It’s easy to cook!
Ingredients
5 – 6 snow pears, trimmed stem and thinly sliced
10 honey dates
15 dried figs (无花果）
Handful of dried longan (桂圆)
Handful of Glehnia Root aka Sha Shen (沙參)
1 large pot of water
Method
Place all ingredients into the large of water. Bring it to a boil over high heat, with lid tilted on the pot. Then, reduce heat to low fire and continue to simmer for 1 – 2 hour, with lid fully covering the pot. Heat off. Serve warm.
Taste of this snow pear tea was really pleasant. Lightly scented, with a tinge of natural sweetness, yielded from the snow pears as well as the honey dates. Anyone would love to drink this.
Tips: Need not to peel or core the pears.
* If sweeter taste preferred, or intend to make it a sweet dessert soup, add 2 big lumps of rock sugar towards the end of the simmering. About 20 minutes before heat off.
A strict confinement is more like a Asian ritual. For Chinese in Singapore and Malaysia, we have to go through a 30-40 days long of confinement after birth, with various confinement restrictions as well as confinement diet comprising ‘heaty’ tonic food that helps to get rid of inner wind and water retention in the body.
According to my mum and many Chinese old folks, consumption of quality confinement food and tonic soup is vital in achieving great post natal recovery. The main ingredients of confinement cooking are old ginger, sesame oil, red dates, rice/ glutinous rice wine, sweet vinegar, and etc. During the confinement period, we are not allowed to drink plain water, too. Sounds crazy? That’s what my mum believes, at least. She claimed that drinking plain water within a month after birth may introduce more wind into the body. Hence, only red dates drink, herbal soup, hot beverages, such as Milo and Horlick, are to be drank. You won’t believe it, even to take a bath, this special herb, Da Feng Ai, has to infused into your hot bathing water! No plain water allowed, even for a bath… (laughing).
But well… I have to thank my mum who takes care of me and my diet during my confinement this month. My mum is not an expert in cooking confinement food, but she managed to come up with a wide variety of confinement food, both traditional and modern kinds. With her help, I need not to engage external confinement lady and still get a good confinement period, an even better one indeed (smile).
Let’s start with the most important recipe first. Your important daily drink – the red dates tea.
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120 gram of red dates (红枣)
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Low caloric healthy tea. You may cook this even if you are not doing confinement (smile).
Tips:
* Cut the DangShen into shorter length for easy handling.
* Eat the red dates, if you don’t mind.