Chiyang Daoren, Eastern Taoism
Summer has arrived, and rising temperatures are a law of nature. Nurture the heart-spirit, regulate the spleen and stomach, and take good care of the five organs, so as to lay a solid foundation for body and mind to thrive after midsummer.
Eat less cold and iced food to avoid harming the spleen and stomach; warm tonics are the best choice. Why not follow the methods Taoism recommends and safeguard the internal organs of your whole family?
1. Drink Lotus Seed Soup to Clear Heart Fire
Heart fire commonly shows as a feeling of restless heat, a dry throat, a parched mouth, and sores in the mouth and on the tongue. In Chinese medicine there is the saying that the heart, on earth, is fire.
Symptoms: There are two kinds, deficiency and excess. Deficiency fire shows as low-grade fever, night sweats, restlessness, and a dry mouth; excess fire shows as recurring mouth ulcers, a dry mouth, scanty dark urine, and restlessness and irritability.
Food remedy: Take 30 grams of lotus seeds (with the plumule left in) and 15 grams of gardenia fruit (wrapped in gauze), add a suitable amount of rock sugar, and simmer in water; eat the lotus seeds and drink the soup. Lotus seeds tonify the spleen and stop diarrhea, benefit the kidneys and secure the essence, and nourish the heart and calm the spirit. Gardenia drains fire and relieves restlessness, clears heat and promotes urination, and cools the blood and resolves toxins.
2. Eat Pork Liver to Clear Lung Fire
When the body cannot adapt to a sudden change in the weather, or when overwork consumes an excessive amount of the body's yin fluids, lung fire can flare up. This is fairly common among the elderly.
Symptoms: A dry cough without phlegm, or with scanty, sticky phlegm; tidal fever and night sweats; heat in the palms and soles; insomnia; a red tongue.
Food remedy: Take 500 grams of pork liver, 30 grams of chrysanthemum (wrapped in gauze), and 5 grams of fresh ginger, and cook them together with the liver until done; eat the liver and drink the soup. Pork liver is rich in iron and phosphorus, indispensable raw materials for making blood, and eating it in hot summer can clear lung fire.
3. Eat Mung Bean Congee to Clear Stomach Fire
Chinese medicine calls the fire caused by improper eating—heavy drinking, a love of hot and spicy food, overindulgence in rich and fatty fare—stomach fire. Eating a lot of sweet, greasy, high-calorie food easily brings on stomach fire.
Symptoms: There are two kinds, deficiency and excess. Deficiency fire shows as a slight cough, a small appetite, constipation, abdominal distension, a red tongue, and a thin coating; excess fire shows as upper abdominal discomfort, a dry and bitter mouth, and dry, hard stools.
Food remedy: Cook suitable amounts of short-grain rice and mung beans into congee and eat it. Mung beans are rich in nutrients and help to improve appetite, lower blood lipids, and reduce cholesterol. Mung bean congee in summer can clear stomach fire, but people with a deficient, cold constitution should not eat too much of it.
4. Drink Pear Water to Clear Liver Fire
In Chinese medicine, liver dryness with flaring fire is a problem in the regulation of qi and blood in the internal organs. An irrational diet and poor sleep overwork and exhaust the liver, causing congestion of the liver and pressure on the inferior vena cava, which makes liver fire rise.
Symptoms: Headache, dizziness, ringing in the ears, dry eyes, a bitter mouth and bad breath, and distending pain in both flanks.
Food remedy: Crush 10 grams of fritillaria bulb (chuanbei) into powder; peel and cut two pears into pieces; add a suitable amount of rock sugar and water, stew, and take. Eating pears regularly protects the liver, eases cirrhosis, aids digestion, strengthens the spleen, and nourishes yin. Drinking pear water can, moreover, clear liver fire.
5. Eat Pork Kidney to Clear Kidney Fire
Generally one does not speak of the kidneys having excess fire; their flaring fire usually arises from deficiency, which is what we usually call the stirring of ministerial fire. In addition, when there are too many toxins in the body that cannot be expelled and they accumulate inside, this too affects kidney function.
Symptoms: Dizziness and blurred vision, ringing in the ears or deafness, aching and weak lower back and spine, tidal fever and night sweats, and restless heat in the “five hearts” (the palms, the soles, and the chest).
Food remedy: Put two pork kidneys and 15 grams each of goji berries and cornus fruit into a clay pot and cook until the kidneys are done; eat the kidneys and drink the soup. Pork kidney tonifies the kidneys and strengthens the body, and eating it can clear kidney fire, but it should not be eaten over long periods, because it is high in fat and extremely high in cholesterol.
In addition, heavy sweating in summer easily depletes the body's fluids. You can prepare more slightly sour fruits for your family, such as tomatoes, hawthorn, and kiwi fruit, which restrain sweating and dispel dampness and help generate fluids, quench thirst, strengthen the spleen, and aid digestion.