Amazing Food – The Gift of Nature
Coordinating Diet and Nature
by Shiuan Gee
In our healthy life, the only thing more important than food is happiness. There is an old Chinese saying: “people regard food as their god.” From this, we can see that the matter of food just is “To be or not to be.” But the important questions are: “How can we coordinate our diet with nature? How do we include natural food in our daily life?”
We know that humans have had to hunt-and-gather or grow their own food for thousands or even millions of years. Today we can eat any sort of food anytime and anywhere. You may ask, “why do we need you to teach us how to eat?”
I am not a food teacher. I am just a food experiencer. I would like to share my 20 years of experience with you.
I think food not only gives us nutrition we need to support our life. It also can clean our body and bring out poisons, foods like seaweed, green tea, mung bean, wood ear fungus. When we are sick, food also can be the medicine to cure us.
In general, all kinds of natural food is good. But the important thing is that we should eat the right food at the right time. That means we should make an effort to coordinate our diet with nature. The foods that are most beneficial in nature follows the changing of the seasons. In other words, during certain seasons, eat certain foods.
First, we should know the properties of each food, hot (not spicy) or cold. In the cold season of winter, we eat hot food; in the hot season of summer, we eat cold food. In the spring and autumn, we should eat foods with warm properties.
Second, we should know our own bodies. Every human being is made up of the same molecules as the natural world, but at the same time, everybody is different. So the hot person should eat cold food, and the cold person takes hot food. For example, most women have cold stomachs. They should drink more hot coffee, hot tea, and hot soups. And along with vegetables, they also should eat some beef and lamb.
Third, when we are sick, we should especially eat certain foods to help us regain wellness. Traditional Chinese medicine call it “Shi Liao” or “Diet Therapy.” Of course, people with different illnesses should have different foods. I will write about this topic in another article.
To be in harmony with nature, taking action is worth a thousand words. Let us start to eat natural food. And always remember: the dietary cure is better than the medicinal cure.
Tip, the food’s properties:
1. Hot food:
Meat & fish: Beef, pork, liver, egg, milk, belt fish, yellow eel, carp, croaker.
Grain: wheat, soybean, black sweet rice, peanuts.
Vegetable: Chinese chive, ginger, green scallions, red tea, pumpkin, chili, garlic, black paper, cilantro; potato, onion.
Fruit: Cherry, Litchi, orange, papaya, date, mongo, chestnut, longan pulp.
2. Cold food:
Meat: duck, rabbit,
Fish: black fish, crab, jelly fish, conch, mussel, seaweed.
Grain: rice, mung bean,
Vegetable: tomato, Chinese cabbage, spinach, green cabbage, celery,
bitter melon, rape, bamboo shoots, cucumber, radish, olive,
bean sprouts, winter melon.
Fruit: water melon, banana, apple, pear, honey melon, grapefruit, grape, kiwi.
3. Warm food:
Meat: lamb, chicken, deer, goat milk,
Fish & seafood: catfish, silver carp, shrimp, clam.
Grain: corn, millet, red bean, water lily seeds, lotus seeds, sweet rice.
Vegetable: cauliflower, mushrooms, cooked lotus, cabbage, carrot, broccoli.
Stren beans
Fruit: pineapple, fig, medlar.
Shiuan Gee
Shiuan Gee, Author, Former Journalist and Editor of “Health and Life” Chinese Newspaper. Book: Philosophy Prose Collection “Thoughts on Life”; Documentary literature: “The Night of New Orleans”. Nonfiction: The Report of the Mainland China Intellectuals’ Sex Life. Novel：“The little Sparrow Flew away”. Also as an Amateur Health food cooking chef and Gourmet, she is writing a Dietotherapy book: “Amazing Food—Health Diet 101”, “How to get Benefits from Your Daily Diet?”