Diet is seen as a form of medicine in many different models of medicine. Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) is no different, dietary advice is one component of Chinese medicine, the others being acupuncture, herbs and massage.

Good health in TCM relates to how energy flows in your body. In a healthy person there is an abundance of energy ‘qi’ which flows freely throughout the body. There are several different types of qi. The first of which is our ‘Pre-birth Qi’. This is the innate energy we are born with and is stored in the Kidneys – this is the energy that allows us to draw our first breath and in western terms can be equated to your constitution. However, this type of qi is finite and cannot be recharged, therefore once it has run out you have no backup. It is therefore advisable not to tap into this type of energy unless absolutely necessary.

The energy we should rely on a day-to-day basis is known as ‘Post-birth Qi’. This energy is readily available and easily replenished – it is derived from air, food, water and sleep. Post-birth Qi should be thought of as a renewable electricity supply, and Pre-birth Qi as the back up generator that kicks into action whenever there is a fuel shortage.

Food

It is vital to eat a good diet in order to maintain a good flow of energy in the body. The saying ‘we are what we eat’ could not be more accurate. If you eat well, your energy will be abundant and the chances are you will be healthy. If you eat badly, your energy will be low and your body will try and make up the deficit in energy by tapping into your reserves (Pre-birth Qi); this is fine whilst young, but if you over use this type of energy by the time you hit middle age the chances are you will be beginning to feel less than healthy.

Food is big business – there are readily available ingredients everywhere and thousands of fantastic recipes, so it seems difficult these days to have a truly ‘bad’ diet. However, it is important to remember that essentially food is energy. You should think before eating ‘what does my body need in order to feel well at this precise moment in time?’ It is vital to provide your body with enough nutrients in order for it to perform all the tasks you ask of it, and to carry out any repairs that may be necessary.

Eating a well balanced, fresh, varied diet is a relatively uncomplicated way to ensure better health and more energy. For example, If you eat chicken, potatoes, cabbage, peas and carrots, followed by yoghurt and fruit your body will be provided with rich levels of protein, iron, carbohydrate, vitamin A, calcium and Vitamin C and various minerals.

Eating an unvaried diet is going to provide a limited amounts of nutrients. For example, If you eat a chicken burger and chips followed by chocolate your body will be provided with limited protein and iron, and plentiful amounts of bad carbohydrates, sugar, caffeine and free radicals from fried food. This is a very crude example – but you get the picture.

The Stomach

According to TCM individual foods can have a beneficial effect on different organs. As the Stomach plays a central role in the body because it takes in the food, breaks it down in to energy that the body can use and sends it out to the other organs, it is of benefit to incorporate foods that traditionally nourish the Stomach into your diet.
These include:

Vegetables

Carrots, Leeks, Pumpkin, Onions, Turnips, Marrow, Sweet potato, Spring onion

Meat/Fish

Chicken, Turkey, Beef/lamb broth, Cod, Haddock, Plaice

Flavourings

Ginger*, Cinnamon, Nutmeg, Honey*, Barley malt* * in moderation

You do not need to eat these foods exclusively, but try to incorporate them into your diet as much as possible.

Foods to Avoid

As there are foods that benefit the Stomach, there are foods that are detrimental to the Stomach. These include:

• Too much salad, raw fruit and vegetables
  (they are too cold for the Stomach if eaten in excess)
• Milk and cheese (these are cold in nature and cause the production of phlegm, which hinders the Stomach function)
• Uncooked grains (these are very difficult to break down and drain the Stomach energy)
• Sugar (the Stomach benefits from a little sweetness as it actually helps digestion, but too much will deplete Stomach energy)
• Alcohol (again, a glass of red wine is fine, it is actually a blood tonic. However, alcohol is essentially sugar, therefore in large (more than 2 glasses) amounts will drain the Stomach energy and is also toxic to the liver)

How and when to eat

According to TCM, when and how you eat is as important as what you eat. You may be eating the best food in the world, but if you are eating it at the wrong time of day, in the wrong fashion, your body will be unable to benefit fully from the food, and it may in fact weaken the digestive system.

How to eat

It may be helpful to understand the function of the Stomach from a TCM point of view in order to make sure you eat in the most effective way – the Stomach can be seen as a large cauldron, heated by a small flame, into which we throw ingredients. It takes these ingredients, cooks them to the consistency of a soup then extracts the energy and sends this energy out to the rest of the body.

However, the Stomach also has several other functions as well as digesting food:

• It sends energy to the head to aid thinking
• It is the organ associated with the emotion of worry
• It supplies muscles with energy to run/walk etc
• It provides the sense of taste
• It makes blood

Therefore, imagine you are eating a meal in a typical working environment: You grab your sandwich and rush back to your desk to eat it, whilst flicking through your emails and working out how you are going to achieve your deadline by the end of the day.

• Firstly, when you do other things whilst eating you don’t tend to chew your food thoroughly (ideally each mouthful would be chewed at least 30 times). This results in large chunks of food ending up in the Stomach. As the Stomach needs to break food down to the consistency of soup in order to extract the energy, not chewing obliges the Stomach to work much harder.
• If you start thinking whilst eating your Stomach will have to divert energy from digesting food to your brain to help you to think (obviously your mind does not have to be blank whilst eating! However, trying to workout your next presentation/job interview etc will put stress on the digestive system).
• If you then decide to get up and walk around, your Stomach will have to divert more energy to your muscles to enable your legs to work.

• If you start to worry about work, even more energy gets diverted away from the job in hand.  

In the end the Stomach will not have enough energy to digest the food and you do not get the full benefit from having eaten. Added to this, the Stomach likes to fill up and then empty. If it is unable to empty due to lack of energy it has to carry the food around – this causes the Stomach to become weaker, thus further impairing its ability to do its job.

There are some basic ground rules for eating according to TCM dietary therapy which will help your body get the most out of the food you are eating:

• Chew your food at least 30 times. Digestion begins in the mouth. If you are under pressure at mealtime, simply chew, and let the chewing relax you. Thorough chewing turns grains and other complex carbohydrates into satisfying sugars and makes oils, proteins and minerals available for maximum absorption. Whole vegetable foods, especially whole grains, must be mixed with saliva and chewed until liquid to release their full nutritional value. Without adequate chewing you will feel bloated, muzzy headed, gassy and be undernourished.
• Try counting the number of times you chew each mouthful. The average person probably chews anywhere between 5 – 10 times per mouthful. You should aim for about 20 – 30! Put your knife and fork down between bites.
• Set aside time for meals. It doesn’t have to be an hour, 15 minutes is enough, but during that time you must do nothing but eat – concentrate on the flavour and texture of your food. You will feel less hungry if you do this.
• Avoid talking about emotionally charged subjects. When you are tense your whole body tenses up – including your stomach – which impedes digestion.
• Avoid eating when too tired, too hot or too cold, worried, angry, standing or before bathing as these activities make the food difficult to digest.
• Relax after eating if possible as this helps your body digest food.
• Try to choose the majority of your foods from local growers. Most areas in the UK now provide organic box schemes which deliver fresh fruit and vegetables from farmers in your area.
• Liquids and foods should be neither too hot nor too cold.
• Eat fresh, preferably organic food.
• Avoid using a microwave to cook food. Microwaved food is considered to be devoid of energetic benefit.
• Try to eat according to the seasons. In Spring you can see how the energy moves upwards at this time – green, sprouting, above ground vegetables are best. In summer the energy moves to the surface – spices, flowers, leaves and the wide range of summer produce are best at this time. In the Autumn the energy moves downwards again – root vegetables should be the staple at this time. In the Winter energy moves inwards – grains, seeds and nuts are most suited to this time.
• Avoid foods that cool the digestive ‘flame’ e.g. chilled, iced, frozen foods and liquids. All foods should be room temperature or cooked.
• Avoid too much raw food e.g. fruit and salad. Seasonal summer foods are the exception to this rule. In winter all foods should be cooked.
• Avoid greasy, fatty or very spicy foods e.g. deep fried foods, dairy produce, and too much red or fatty meat, as these are very draining for the Stomach.

When to eat

In TCM there is a concept of a body clock and this is used to identify the best time of day to eat. The strongest time for the Stomach is from 7.00– 11.00am, and the weakest time is from 7.00-11.00pm. Therefore the proverb “Eat breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince, and dinner like a pauper” holds true in TCM too!

Eating Schedule

Breakfast should be eaten between 7.00-11.00a.m. It should ideally be quite simple and warm in temperature, for example oat or rice porridge, as these foods strengthen the Stomach energy.

Lunch should be around noon or shortly after. Try to leave 4 hours between breakfast and lunch. Ideally lunch is a bigger meal than supper. It is to fuel you through the rest of your day.

Supper should be the smallest meal of the day (remember food is energy and at the end of the day your need for energy is minimal as you are about to go to bed). It should be food that is easily digested such as soup, steamed vegetables or stir-fry.

It should be eaten at least four hours after lunch and preferably before 7pm, as after this time the Stomach energy is at its weakest. These days, with long working hours, this is not always possible therefore if you are not able to eat by 7pm try to eat at least 2 hours before going to bed.

Another reason for not eating late is because between 11pm and 3am the Liver and Gall Bladder are strongest and it is when they perform their tasks most efficiently. They are responsible for clearing toxins from the body and blood and their effectiveness can be hindered when late meals are eaten as it overloads the system.

One indication that the Liver has not had the opportunity to complete the necessary purification is when you wake feeling tired and heavy and your mind is ‘fuzzy’. This tends to reflect either habitual or recent overeating, consumption of too many animal products (which are difficult to digest), alcohol, processed foods and/or eating late at night.

(A perfect way to start and finish the day and help the system to cleanse itself is to have a cup of hot water with half a squeezed lemon in place of a cup of coffee/tea/hot chocolate.)

Suggested diet

Breakfast

Rice or oat porridge with berries and a spoon of nut butter.

Lunch

Something hot like pasta/baked potato/soup/casserole plus a big salad with lemon juice and olive oil dressing (but only in the summer months preferably! If you would like to eat salad in the winter eat it at lunch time and not the evening, when the Stomach is too weak to deal with the cold energy).

Supper

Have a smaller portion than lunch, made up of: 70% cooked vegetables, 30% chicken/fish/tofu. No salad.

How to supplement your energy!

Another source of nourishment we take into the body is breath. Breathing takes energy from the air into the lungs, which then distribute it throughout the body. Everybody knows that without air we would die – however, not everybody realises how much you can increase your energy levels by simply breathing effectively. Many people are in the habit of shallow breathing where you can hardly see the chest move – this is not an effective way of providing your body with energy!

Throughout the day put aside a few moments to take 20 slow, deep breaths. i.e. right down to your Stomach (do not take short shallow breaths or you will hyperventilate which will make you feel faint). By setting aside this time hopefully, you will get into the habit of ‘nutritious’ breathing all the time.

A good diet is not rocket science, I am sure nothing you have read here is 100% new to you. However, please do not underestimate how following these simple rules can really support good health. I hope you find this reminder helpful.

Bon appetite!