Healing with Food Update

Energy Tonic Soup (Congee)

Accompanying recipe: Congee (Energy Tonic Soup)

Here's a recipe that boosts energy and is excellent for just about whatever ails you. Congee is a perennial Chinese medicinal dish. Gruel is an apt description, but don't let that put you off! It’s similar to the traditional British convalescent food, barley water; and atole the thin South America corn gruel. Kicharee is the Indian equivalent which includes equal portions of rice and dahl.

Congee is a strengthening porridge concocted to support a specific health issue. According to Chinese medicine, long slow cooking balances the yin and yang of each ingredient, making it highly medicinal and easy to assimilate. Additionally, foods prepared slowly and with care, often convey superior energy to the same ingredients quickly cooked.  Imagine the flavor and digestibility differences between, for example, naturally leavened bread and a pancake; a pit roasted barbeque to a grilled pork chop).

Ingredients are chosen for their specific medicinal properties. The chicken and bone, for example, builds strength and are especially good for wasting illnessess and injuries. The bay, ginger and cumin all boost flavor and aid digestion plus each offers other medicinal properties. See my New Whole Foods Encyclopedia for the medicinal properties of our foods.

May you be well nourished!

Rebecca Wood