A Comprehensive Analysis of the World's First Tonic – Medicinal Porridge Therapy: Mechanisms for Disease Prevention and Health Enhancement, Seasonal Selection Principles, and Summer Heat Prevention Strategies

Why is medicinal porridge called "the best tonic in the world"? In the 21st century, with its continuous economic development and increasingly rich material culture, one of the hot topics of concern is how to achieve health and longevity. There are many methods. Here I am reminded of a poem by the famous poet Lu You: "Everyone in the world learns to live long, but they do not know that longevity is right in front of them. I have obtained the simple method of Wanqiu, which is to eat porridge to become an immortal." Eating porridge can make people live long and "become an immortal", which shows how beneficial porridge is to human health and longevity. Porridge has a history of thousands of years in my country. As early as the Book of Zhou, there is a written record that "the Yellow Emperor first cooked grains into porridge". With the development of medicine, the use of medicine and rice and grains to cook porridge (medicinal porridge) to treat diseases has long been accepted by people and has become a dietary therapy method that combines medicine and food. Why can cooking medicinal porridge become a good dietary therapy method? This is because medicinal porridge has the following effects: (1) Disease prevention. Medicinal porridge can supplement the substances needed by the human body, improve the body's immunity, and enhance the ability to resist disease. For example, mung bean porridge can prevent heatstroke, cornmeal porridge can prevent cardiovascular disease, and lychee porridge can prevent bad breath. These are good examples. (2) Strengthening the body. The main ingredient of porridge, japonica rice, has the function of strengthening the spleen and stomach and nourishing the middle qi. Therefore, it is called "the first nourishing thing in the world". The Chinese medicines commonly used in medicinal porridge include Chinese yam, wolfberry, he shou wu, walnut kernels, black sesame, ginseng, astragalus, cistanche, jujube, and atractylodes. Pharmacological experiments have confirmed that they have anti-aging effects. When the two are cooked together into porridge, their effects complement each other. (3) Treating chronic diseases and conditioning after illness. Patients with chronic diseases are weak and have low resistance to disease. Long-term use of drugs will harm the body, and the side effects of drugs will increase over time. At this time, if medicinal porridge is used for conditioning, it can not only strengthen the body and improve the resistance to disease, but also reduce the side effects of drugs such as gastrointestinal reactions. Medicinal porridge is more suitable for conditioning in the later stage of disease and after illness. Because at this time, the body's pathogenic factors have been eliminated, but the vital energy has not been restored, or the vital energy has just been restored but is not yet vigorous, or the remaining pathogenic factors have not been cleared and the body's vital energy has been damaged. The body's digestive and absorption capacity has decreased, and the body's functions have declined. At this time, by slowly conditioning the body with medicinal porridge, the gastrointestinal function can be adjusted, the vital energy restored, the remaining pathogenic factors eliminated, and the body's vital energy supported, allowing the body to recover quickly. For example, commonly used porridges include astragalus porridge, beef tripe porridge, sand ginseng porridge, and Chinese yam and foxnut porridge. (4) It has an auxiliary therapeutic effect on acute diseases. When treating some acute diseases with symptomatic drugs, according to the different physical conditions, the severity of the pathogenic factors, and the person's mental and physical condition, corresponding medicinal porridges can be used to achieve a synergistic effect. For example, when you have a cold, you can take ginger, scallion, and fermented soybean porridge to help sweat and relieve the exterior; when you have a fever, you can take gypsum porridge to help reduce the fever; when you have hepatitis and jaundice, you can take artemisia capillaris porridge to help reduce jaundice; when you have acute enteritis or dysentery, you can take purslane porridge and wild amaranth porridge to help reduce inflammation and stop diarrhea. These medicinal porridges all have significant auxiliary therapeutic effects. Beauty-enhancing medicinal porridges not only promote gastrointestinal health and prevent and treat diseases, but also offer certain beauty-enhancing effects after a period of consumption. For example, for premature graying or excessive hair loss, one can consume Polygonum multiflorum porridge or black sesame porridge; for a rapid increase in melasma, one can consume duckweed porridge; for facial acne, one can consume loquat lung-clearing porridge; and for preventing obesity, one can consume lotus leaf porridge, etc. There are many varieties of medicinal porridges. The herbs used in the porridge can be single or compound; they can be plant-based or animal-based; some are for disease prevention and treatment, while others are for health maintenance and longevity. So, how should we choose medicinal porridges? Here are some basic principles. Generally speaking, the selection of medicinal porridge should be guided by the basic theories of Traditional Chinese Medicine, based on syndrome differentiation and treatment, and should be purposefully chosen according to individual constitution, type of disease, geographical environment, season, and climate. For example, people with Yang deficiency can choose porridge to invigorate Yang, such as aconite porridge, mutton porridge, deer kidney porridge, walnut porridge, and rooster porridge; people with Yin deficiency can choose porridge to nourish Yin, such as bird's nest porridge, lily bulb and sand ginseng porridge, ophiopogon japonicus porridge, cordyceps porridge, white fungus porridge, and polygonatum odoratum porridge; people with Qi deficiency can choose porridge to replenish Qi, such as ginseng porridge, ginseng and poria porridge, atractylodes macrocephala and pork stomach porridge, astragalus porridge, ginseng, astragalus and white lotus porridge, and he shou wu porridge; children with weak spleen and stomach function can choose porridge to strengthen the spleen and stomach, such as yam porridge, poria porridge, hawthorn porridge, codonopsis and tangerine peel porridge, and areca nut porridge. Seasonal health-preserving porridges can also be chosen according to the season. For example, in spring when the weather changes from cold to warm, you can choose porridges that replenish Yang energy, such as astragalus porridge, ginseng and cimicifuga porridge, and scallion porridge; in summer when the weather is hot and humid, you can choose porridges that cool and relieve heat, such as lotus leaf porridge, mung bean porridge, fresh reed rhizome and coix seed porridge, porridge that clears heat and removes dampness, and winter melon, coix seed, and mung bean porridge; in autumn when the weather is dry, you can choose porridges that nourish Yin and moisten dryness, such as white fungus porridge, lily bulb porridge, snow pear porridge, sugarcane porridge, and sand ginseng porridge; in winter when the weather is cold, you can choose porridges that warm and replenish Yang energy, such as mutton porridge, dog meat porridge, cistanche porridge, sparrow porridge, and deer antler porridge. The choice of medicinal porridge for different illnesses should be made under the guidance of a doctor, and should not be chosen arbitrarily.

How to prevent "fire" in the hot summer? In the hot summer, if you don't pay attention to health preservation, it is easy to "get hot", so you should pay special attention to preventing "fire". First, prevent "external fire", that is, the high temperature in nature. The preventive measures are to avoid direct exposure to the sun as much as possible, and wear a sun hat when going out or working; at the same time, keep the indoor environment quiet and hygienic, pay attention to ventilation and cooling, so as to prevent external fire from invading the body. Second, prevent "internal fire", that is, internal heat caused by the imbalance of yin and yang in the human body. There are several types: (1) Heart fire. Heart fire is divided into deficiency and excess. Deficiency fire is mainly manifested as low fever, night sweats, palpitations, irritability, insomnia, forgetfulness, dry mouth, and red tongue tip. People with deficiency fire can often drink lotus seed rice porridge, or drink tea made with raw rehmannia and ophiopogon japonicus; excess fire is mainly manifested as recurrent oral ulcers, dry mouth, dark urine, irritability, and red tongue tip. People with excess fire can use Daochi San or Niuhuang Qingwei Wan to reduce fire. (2) Lung fire. Dry cough with little or no phlegm, sometimes with a small amount of blood in the phlegm, night sweats, hot palms and soles, insomnia, flushed cheeks, dry mouth and tongue, hoarseness, and red and tender tongue. Those with lung fire can cook porridge with appropriate amounts of red dates and rice, or drink tea made with sand ginseng and ophiopogon japonicus. (3) Stomach fire. Stomach fire is also divided into deficiency and excess. Excess fire manifests as excessive hunger, upper abdominal discomfort, bitter taste in the mouth, dry mouth, and hard stools. Those with excess stomach fire can drink tea made with gardenia and light bamboo leaves; deficiency fire manifests as mild cough, small appetite, constipation, abdominal distension, red tongue with little coating, and can eat some pear juice, sugarcane juice, honey, etc. which have yin-nourishing effects. (4) Liver fire. It often manifests as high blood pressure, severe headache, dizziness, tinnitus, dry eyes, bitter taste in the mouth, bad breath, irritability, distending pain in the ribs, restlessness, and red tongue edges, and can take Gentianae Radix et Rhizoma Decoction or pills. Those with "internal heat" should, in addition to medication, drink plenty of water to clear heat and reduce fire to regulate body temperature, eat more fruits to fight inflammation and relieve summer heat, maintain a cheerful mood, avoid being impatient or irritable, suppress anger and calm down, so as to achieve the effect of "a calm mind naturally cools down" and prevent "internal heat" from arising on its own.