Food Benefits in TCM

Goji Berries Benefits in TCM and Who Can’t Eat Them

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goji berries benefits in tcm

Goji berries have been one of the most commonly used foods in TCM and medicated diets.

In this blog post, I will share the benefits of goji berries, what it should be mainly used for, and what types of people should avoid eating them.

goji berries benefits in tcm

In TCM, the two organs that will benefit the most from eating goji berries are the liver and kidney.

Goji berries not only can strengthen the kidney, but they also have strong anti-aging properties. In TCM, the kidney affects how a person ages. A strong kidney will slow down the aging process in a person.

In addition to the kidney, goji berries also help to strengthen the liver. In TCM, the liver affects one’s eyesight, thus, goji berries have proven to help strengthen and protect eyes from weakening and diseases.

How To Choose Goji Berries

If possible, always choose goji berries from China, NingXia (宁夏) as that place is the original place to harvest goji berries and its medicinal effect is known to be more effective than in other parts of China.

Goji berries from NingXia are also bigger and rounder when compared to those from other areas.

The Difference Between Black and Red Goji

You may have noticed that in recent years, there are also black-colored goji berries available in the market or TCM shops.

The main difference between black and red goji berries is that the black goji berries contain Anthocyanidin (花青素). Anthocyanidin is a natural antioxidant and it helps to protect the eyes as well.

However, if you boil the black goji berries, then the Anthocyanidin will be dissipated. Make sure you don’t cook black goji berries beyond 60 degree celsius in order to retain the Anthocyanidin benefits.

On the other end, the red goji berries can be boiled to 100 degree celsius as it does not contain any Anthocyanidin.

You Should Avoid Eating Goji Berries If…

Goji berries generally have tonic effects, so it is best to avoid eating them if a person has flu symptoms or fever.

Goji berries also contain sugar so for people with diabetes, it should be consumed in a lesser or moderate amount.

This Simple Drink Will Help To Strengthen Your Eyes And Vision

There is a classic recipe that involves goji berries that help to prevent/treat many eye-related diseases.

Nowadays, many people are reading from computers or mobile devices’ screens in extended hours. This can result in dry eye symptoms and make one’s eyes very irritated and sensitive. Hence, this simple drink recipe can help to relief this symptom. (But I would like to say here is that the best way is to reduce screen time if you find your eyes are drying and irritated )

The ingredients (for one person serving) are:

  • Water
  • Red goji berries, 15g
  • Dried chrysanthemum, 15g
  • Rock sugar (if you can’t drink it plain), 10 to 30g

First, wash and rinse the goji berries got a few minutes. Briefly wash the dried chrysanthemum.

Second, put both goji berries and dried chrysanthemum (& sugar if you prefer) into the water and bring it to boil. 

Once it started boiling, turn off the fire and let it cool down naturally (with the lid covered). Wait for 10 minutes before opening up the lid and serve.

Two things to note here.

  1. While bringing the water to boil, it is best to keep the lid on so that the effectiveness of dried chrysanthemum will not be dissipated to the air.
  2. Chrysanthemum can’t be boiled for too long as this will reduce its effectiveness. Thus, once the water starts to boil, you can turn the fire off and let it sit for 10 minutes before serving.

goji berries chrysanthemum drink

Dried chrysanthemum is known to dispel heat in the body especially in the liver so it works very well with goji berries to cool the liver (a person will have heat in the liver if he/she always sleeps late) and strengthen it.

You can drink this water for 3 to 5 times per week depending on how serious is the eye dryness. It is best to drink consistently for three days a week to see the effect.

I hope you find this blog post useful!

Dried Longan Benefits In TCM

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If you want to find out about the benefits of dried longan especially in terms of TCM (Traditional Chinese Medicine), then do continue to read further.

In this post, I will share what kind of people are suitable (and also not suitable) to eat dried longan.

The Chinese name of longan is 龙眼. If you direct-translate these two words into English, it means Dragon’s eyes. In this post, we will focus on dried longan (on the left image below), and not those fresh ones (right image below) that you see in fruit stalls.

You can buy dried longan in most TCM shops or supermarket.

In the records of TCM, it refers to dried longan because its tonic effect is much greater than its fresh counterpart.

Dried longan
Fresh longan

There is a saying in ancient times that in the North, they have ginseng and in the South, they have longan. This means that the tonic effect of longan is comparable to that of ginseng.

Dried longan is best known for its blood and qi tonic effect. This means it is very suitable to the following:

  • People feel weak (after illness, surgery or giving birth).
  • People who having difficulty falling asleep.
  • People who tends to be forgetful.

Dried longan has a warm thermal nature. This means over-consumption will lead to heatiness. It is recommended to only consume 10g of dried longan.

In the record of TCM, dried longan is beneficial to the heart and spleen.  And in respect to TCM, the heart also mean our mind. And dried longan has a claming effect to the mind (heart) and this is why it helps people in falling asleep.

If you want to be more specific on what types of people can consume dried longan, you can take the TCM body constitution test. And if your body constitution is blood deficiency or qi deficiency, then you are generally ok to take dried longan.

People Who Are Not Suitable To Take Dried Longan

In general, if you are having flu symptoms, then it is best to avoid dried longan.

Also avoid eating dried longan if you are having sore throat.

The following body constitution types are not suitable to eat dried longan too:

  • Tropical
  • Phlegm and dampness
  • Yin deficiency

How To Prepare A Morning Porridge With Dried Longan

The following is a simple recipe for morning porridge that I make from time to time.

Its main benefits is to energize, provide qi and blood boosting to our body. It also has some effect of calming the mind and hence, improving sleep quality.

It is suitable for people who feels lack of energy, can’t sleep well and can help in strengthening the back and legs too.

Ingredients (for 2 pax):

I use this kind of chinese chestnut. It is like snack which you can just eat it without cooking.

Steps:

  1. Wash and rinse the dried longan.
  2. Remove the seeds inside the red dates and cut it into small slices.
  3. Wash the rice and bring it to boil. Note: You will need quite a bit of water here because we are cooking porridge. For me, I add as many as up to 6 cups of water to 1 cup of rice.
  4. Once the rice starts to boil, put in dried longan, red dates and chinese chestnut (I use those instant snacks ones so it needs minimum cooking). Wait till it boils again then bring the fire to smallest and let it simmer for 15 to 20 mins. Then it is ready to eat!
  5. As I am using thermal cooker, I only let it simmer for 4min then remove from heat and put inside the thermal pot and let it retain the heat for one hour before eating. I find that using thermal cooker is very gas efficient, instead of having the need to simmer on fire for 15 to 20min, I just need to let it sit inside the thermal pot for an hour. And thermal cooker does not require any electricity or fire to work!
Morning porridge with dried longan, red dates and Chinese chestnut

I hope you find this post useful! Let me know if you have any questions.

Barley Water Benefits In TCM

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chinese barley water

Barley drink is very common in Singapore but do you know that not everyone is suitable to drink it?

In this post, you will learn what are the benefits of barley and how to cook an effective barley drink for you and your family!

First things first, the Chinese name for barley is 薏苡仁 or 薏米. Its English name is coix seeds but we often call it barley here in Singapore.

There are two types of coix seeds – Chinese barley (they are bigger and rounder in shape) and Holland barley. The following is a comparison of these two types of barley:

For the purpose of healing effects, we will be focusing on Chinese barley in the rest of this post as its benefits are stronger than the Holland version. 

In TCM (Traditional Chinese Medicine), Chinese barley has cooling properties, so it can help to reduce heatiness in body.

The other main benefit of Chinese barley is that it helps to reduce water retention, especially in the lower part of your body. Drinking Chinese barley water can also help with weight loss because it eliminates excess 湿 (dampness) in your body.

Additional Chinese barley benefits recorded in TCM include detoxing, preventing formation of cancer cells and relieving diarrhea (this is more of a secondary effect and I wouldn’t recommend using just Chinese barley to treat diarrhea).

In short, it is a wellness drink for most people when the weather is warm or you want an effective and affordable way to lose weight through eliminating water retention. 

People Who Are Not Suitable To Drink Barley Water 

In general, everyone can enjoy Chinese barley water except for women who are pregnant. The reason is because Chinese barley also has 滑利 properties (sorry, I can’t find a suitable English translation for this word). 

How To Prepare An Effective Barley Drink

The following recipe is for one person (two cups). Do adjust the amount accordingly if you are preparing for more people. The ingredients you need are:

  1. Chinese barley (30g)
  2. Winter melon sticks (15g to 30g,  depending on your sweetness preference)
  3. Water (750g to 900g), depending on how fast the water vaporises during cooking. At the end, you should have two cups (about 250ml each) of water left.

The cooking method is very simple. Wash and rinse the Chinese barley and winter melon sticks and put them into the water.

Turn on the fire and bring the water to a boil.

Once the water boils, turn the fire to smallest and let it simmer for 20 minutes to 30 minutes. Turn off the fire and enjoy the barley drink!

Winter melon sticks
Winter melon sticks

Adding winter melon sticks to your Chinese barley drink will enhance the effect of relieving water retention in the body.

Most melons, especially winter melon, has the effect of getting rid of excess dampness in body. Two common ways to know whether you have dampness in your body is to check whether you have water retention symptoms or loose / sticky stools most of the time.

Do note that you need to consume Chinese barley water for a period of time before you can see results. I suggest you can take it two to three times per week for a start.

Also, avoid (if you can’t do it totally, then reduce) fried, oily and spicy foods as they encourage the formation of dampness in your body.

Enjoy your barley drink and its healing effects and let me know if you have any questions below!

chinese barley water
Chinese barley water (you can add some lemon slices to flavor)

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