When I first start working with patients we often have to change the mindset about eating. One of the better ways I can do that is to start with elevating the idea that cooking spices are part of a daily health routine.
While most of us grasp that if we eat McDonald’s and pizza and pancakes every day, our health is going to be compromised. Most people understand the need to “eat healthy” and often dread it. But eating healthy is something vastly different than probably what first comes to mind.
Long gone are the days when we didn’t need to pay attention to what we eat. The world has changed and we are more vulnerable than before due to the toxins and viral explosion we face on an everyday basis.
It starts with why? The wrong foods break down our health, cause inflammation which constricts blood flow, harms our tissues, and causes weight gain, all of which makes us susceptible to disease.
Healthy foods reverse that effect.
So here’s the mindset shift: Every time we eat we have the opportunity to treat and make a difference in our bodies. We don’t have to “pop pills” three times a day, we can eat good foods instead. We start to think of food as medicine. If you want to be healthy and live a long life then let’s bring in more fruits, veggies, herbs, and cooking spices!
Just by getting better with adding the right cooking spices, you turn eating healthy into a daily routine that is tasty and energizing.
What cooking spices should I use?
There are simply too many to mention. So today I want to target three of my absolutely go-to cooking spices that will pay big dividends on your health: turmeric, garlic, and ginger because each helps to reverse chronic inflammation that is often at the root of my patients’ health problems. All herbs and spices are anti-inflammatory and anti-pathogenic i.e., kills bugs).
An added benefit: I have a recipe from Anthony William (known as the Medical Medium if he is new to you) for a juice with these three superfoods at the end of this blog, which will make it so easy for you to get these cooking spices into your daily diet, even as you experiment with adding them to your meals. So let’s dive in.
Chronic inflammation a root cause of illness?
Chronic inflammation can lead to heart disease, diabetes, arthritis, and joint pain. Getting to its root causes is the only way to successfully cure it. The root cause of pain could be due to an injury to a given body part or tissue (perhaps something like structural back pain from an injury or oeven an internal injury like a gallstone stuck in the duct, for example). But if not, then the cause is viral, and we must dig deeper to get the source of the pain and understand how it all works.
The inflammation itself is not the source, it’s the result. Here is why my work with my patients is different than those who are not restorative physicians. The root cause is connected to viruses and heavy metals and other contributing factors that cause inflammation that occurs in conditions like heart disease, diabetes, arthritis, and joint pain.
Controlling it is crucial to restoring your body to its intended healthy state. Tumeric, garlic, and ginger make a powerful team to kick-starting this process.
As his informative post on Medical Medium says, Turmeric is great for anything in the body that’s inflamed and causing pain, from nerves to joints to the brain. Turmeric is the ultimate antidote.
Garlic is a potent cooking spice (that’s great in so many recipes!) but it is also one of the world’s oldest medicines in building immunity to a variety of illnesses and diseases.
“Ginger is known to greatly aid in digestion and assimilation and is widely regarded to help prevent colds, flu, motion sickness, and vertigo,” this article states. “Ginger can also help to alleviate menstrual cramps, nausea, heartburn, migraines, sore throats, exhaustion, fatigue, and constipation and it is great in providing relief from the stomach flu and food poisoning. Ginger also contains potent anti-inflammatory compounds called gingerols and is a powerful painkiller.”
So let’s turn cooking spices into medicine in the easiest way possible:
- Make a simple Pomodoro sauce using nothing but tomatoes, garlic, and onion simmering in a pan for 45 minutes. Bake an eggplant as your “pasta” and have a wonderful vegetarian spaghetti dinner.
- Add turmeric to brown rice and vegetable stock to make a rice pilaf that has a zesty flavor and cheery yellow color.
- Grate fresh ginger into vegetable stir fry to freshen the flavor and pump up your health and wonderful for muscle spasms and cramps
And even if you don’t like to cook, here’s the promised juice recipe that combines the power of all three in one zesty drink.
Turmeric-Ginger Shots Recipe
“A go-to option for the first sign of a cold, these shots will help your body fight back against anything that tries to come against it,” writes Anthony William.
Ingredients:
- 4 inches turmeric
- 4 inches fresh ginger
- 2 oranges
- 4 garlic cloves
Directions:
One at a time, run each ingredient through the juicer, keeping the juices separate. Combine 1 teaspoon turmeric juice, 1 teaspoon ginger juice, 1/4 teaspoon garlic juice, and 1/4 cup of orange juice in a small glass. Stir to combine and drink immediately.
Note: the amount of ingredients necessary will vary greatly based on the juicer that is used.
Makes 2 to 4 servings
