Supermarket Herbalism
Day 2: Ginger tea recipe and the basics
Before getting to our ginger tea recipe with lemon and honey, there's a really important point to understand.
When you look in herb books and look up ginger you might find something like this written:
GINGER (Zingiber officinale) possesses strong antibacterial activity against several food bourse pathogens such as E. coli and salmonella, it is the choice herb for treating colds and flus, it reduces and eliminates diarrhea, relieves pain, stimulates immune activity, reduces inflammation, has clinical uses for burns, and has been found effective in the treatment of cataracts, heart disease, migraines, stroke, bursitis, fatigue, coughs, fever, kidney stones, sciatica, tendonitis, viral infections, indigestion, and dizziness….
WHEW!!!! Now I am dizzy!!!!
Now, this is all useful information, but all this will do is have you close the book and say to yourself, “WOW! Ginger sure is a cool plant. I am not sure how to use it, but boy is it powerful!.”
This is precisely what I DON’T want you to think.
The authors of the books HAVE TO list all this information. They figure if they pack their books with lots of words, you’ll buy it over the book that doesn’t use quite as many. It’s a great reference, but lacks a little on the instructional side of things.
For now, let’s just pretend that the only thing you have ever read about ginger is that it is an immune system stimulant that is extremely helpful when you have a cold or the flu.
In fact, ALL THE PLANTS WE USE IN THIS COURSE HAVE LOTS AND LOTS OF USES. However, we’re going to focus on one for two recipes. I want to keep it simple.
Even if you are the thorough type of person who wants to know it all now, it's wise to keep it simple at this point. As you gain more interest and have some more time, you can research other ways to use the plants in this course.
When you read about all those uses for ginger, it’s not like you are going to use the same recipe (such as the ginger tea recipe I will give you in this lesson) or the same home remedy method for each health situation. For example, the tea recipe below would not be how I use ginger for the treatment of cataracts.
This is where I think people get stuck. You see all these uses for ginger and no clear way to access the plant for your ailment.
AHA! Now you see why I created LearningHerbs.com, The Herbal Medicine Making Kit.
I don’t know if you know my personal story. To make a long one short, I will just tell you that I was interested in herbs for about 6 years before someone FINALLY showed me how simple it was to make an herbal remedy. I had ALL the books and read about all the cool things the herbs could do, but there was still this wall between me and accessing the herbs.
I don’t want your story to be like mine, so let’s get to that ginger tea recipe.
Ginger, Lemon, Honey Tea
What about the lemon and the honey?
Well, lemon is quite a powerful plant. For now, I’ll tell you that it is high in vitamin C and contains antioxidants, natural compounds that help protect us from the harmful effects of free radicals. They cause cell damage and can impair your immune system. There’s lots more to lemon, but that’s pretty handy information, isn’t it!?!?! By the way, that’s for real lemon, not Sprite. :)
Honey is a botanical medicine. Were the bees not the original herbalists? Honey is basically the nectar of plant flowers. They contain the essence of the wilds plants that it is gathered from. Honey is so useful that we are using it for three of our lesson days. For now, we are using it for it’s immune enhancing qualities including the fact that it fights bacteria and viruses.
I’m not sick!
I know. Let’s pretend you are sick. We’ll make this ginger tea recipe. Then, next time you are, you’ll know what to do.
- Boil 3 cups of water in a saucepan.
- While that’s happening, grate (preferred) or thinly slice up a two-inch piece of ginger root.
- When the water comes to a boil, turn it down to a simmer.
- Add the ginger.
- Let it simmer for 15 minutes.
- Turn it off and add the juice of half a lemon.
- Add 2 big tablespoons of honey and mix it all up.
- Strain the tea into a cup and enjoy.
You may need to adjust the amount of honey to your taste. You can even add more lemon if you want. Heck, you can even add more ginger if you like it really strong.
When you need more, heat it back up and strain more out. Leaving the ginger in allows it to get even stronger.
This is the tea I make when I feel a cold coming on. It is also the tea I make when I have the cold. Not only does it actually help me fight the cold, it also provides relief. It also tastes great.
Please read my Eight Simple Secrets to Treating a Cold Naturally to see how I treat a cold in a holistic way.
Thanks for having tea with me.
We’ll go more into cold relief that isn’t mentioned on the web site on the last day of the course.
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