by Song Mei
The heat is already in the air, and I know I will need professional help to make it through Beijing's summer of swelter. For the past month, I've been looking for a doctor to help me get through this season. One fact cheers me: though El Nino is doing its worst to the planet these days, Beijing's summers will never reach the level of India's heat in May. Rainy days will keep Beijing wetter and more comfortable.My search takes me to 63-year-old Chinese medicine expert Zhao Hongbin. One minute after he takes my pulse, he tells me my weakness is in my spleen and blood. He was correctly describes every symptom I have and writes me a prescription.
Now I am following his advice every day and I feel obliged to share this with you. Maybe it will help you beat the summer heat, too.
According to Doctor Zhao, every person needs the protection of oneself his summer recipe. The ingredients are easy to get, and the preparation just as simple. According to Chinese medicine, hot weather may increase your body's inner heat, so you should eat food to counteract this.
The principle of keeping healthy in hot weather is to eat fewer oily foods and more "quality-cool" food. Foods recommended by Doctor Zhao: green bean, lily, white sugar, cucumber, spinach, cabbage, green bean sprouts, celery, carrot, bamboo shoots, hare meat, duck meat, sheep liver, milk, egg and fruit.
Eating cucumber is the best and the easiest to get summer food. It contains five times the vitamin C of watermelon. You can eat it raw, or make a salad, fry it or make cucumber soup. But please note that people whose stomach and spleen are weak can't eat too much cucumber.
Cucumber also has other effects. The thin cellulose it contains can stimulate the movement of stomach and thus help digestion. It can reduce cholesterol and prevent arteriosclerosis. It can also restrain sugar from transforming into fat, to help you keep fit.
And, cucumber is a good beauty aid. Putting some cucumber juice on your face once every week can prevent wrinkles.
Bitter gourd is a popular vegetable in Beijing. It tastes very bitter, but reduces heat and whets the appetite. Placing it in salty water for 20 minutes before cooking and frying it with chilies can reduce the bitterness. Usually it is chopped in thin slices for serving.
Popular bitter gourd dishes served in restaurant are "La Rou Ku Gua" (Bitter Gourd Fried with Cured Meat or Bacon), and "Jian Jiao Ku Gua" (Bitter Gourd with Hot Chili).
Wintermelon(dong gua)is another good choice. It tastes a little sweet and is tender. Wintermelon soup or a fried dish of the fruit is very nourishing for the spleen. In a restaurant, you can order "Su Shao Dong Gua" (Stewed Wintermelon) or "Xia Mi Dong Gua"(Wintermelon Boiled with Dried, Shelled Shrimp).Other tips from the experts:
Drink fruit juice: Most fruit juice is good for fighting the ravages of hot weather. For example, watermelon juice, tomato juice, sugarcane juice and water chestnut juice. A mixture of tomato juice with watermelon juice is even better.
Congee: Any kind of congee every day is good for keeping healthy, but especially rice congee with mung beans, which can significantly reduce your inner heat.
Water and tea. Adding salt to any kind of water or tea helps in the summertime. Chrysanthemum tea, lotus root tea and mung bean tea with white sugar are always good.
Secrets of Good Health
1. Be happy and calm. Try not to be angry. Bad-tempered people are much more liable to get
sick.
2. Make sure you have enough sleep. Napping is extremely important in summer, since nights are shorter.
3. Don't be exposed to sunshine for long periods of time. If you must be out in the sun, be aware of the dangers -- dehydration, heatstroke, sunburn -- and take precautions: drink plenty of water, rest when you can, use lots of sunblock.
4. Don't run your air-conditioner at too low a setting. Keeping your home too cold will make you catch a cold because of the big difference between the indoor and outdoor temperatures.
Simple Homemade Summer Drinks and Food
1.Mung Bean Tea
Ingredients: mung beans, small red beans
Preparation: Wash the beans clean first and put in a pot. Put in some
water(according to how much you want to drink). Boil until the beans are thoroughly
cooked. While boiling, you can add in a little cold water to make the color redder. You
can eat the beans as well as drink the tea. Function: Both mung beans and
small red beans are heat-reducing, detoxicating and diuretic. Drinking it regularly in
summer can prevent and treat heatstroke and dysentery.
2.Watermelon and Tomato Juice
Ingredients: watermelon, tomato
Preparation: Get the pulp of a watermelon; remove melon seed. Extract
juice by machine or by mashing through a clean gauze. Set juice aside. Dip the tomato in
hot water and take out very quickly. Peel off the skin. Extract juice by machine or by
mashing through a clean gauze. Mix the juices together.
Function:
Both juices are heat-reducing and detoxicating. The mixture of the two kinds can increase
more than double its effect. Any amount is acceptable. It can also cure summer cold and
fever.
3. Honey Cucumber
Ingredients: cucumber, honey, water
Preparation: Wash the cucumber. Remove the pulp. Cut into strips. Put
into a pot and add some water. Heat until boiling. Quickly remove the water from the heat
and add honey (as much as you like). Return to heat, stir until boiling and remove
quickly.
Function: Cucumber is heat-reducing and detoxicating. Honey is nutritious
for the stomach. Eating the two together can help treat children's fever and diarrhea.
If you want more information about Doctor Zhao, you'll get the chance. He will give a one-month long lecture in English in Hong Kong. His first lecture on Chinese food treatment will be broadcast live by Hong Kong Phoenix Star TV on July 27. You can reach him in end August by calling him .. Doctor Zhao has been researching Chinese food treatment for 15 years. Before that he specialized in acupuncture in Beijing Hospital. He began studying traditional Chinese medicine with his father at a very young age, and is also a university graduate of western medical science.