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Ayurvedic Detox Tea for Colds and Flu

When fighting a cold or the flu ramp up your Agni internal fire by drinking a quart a day of Dr. Wickermasinghe’s Ayurvedic Detox Tea for Colds and Flu. 

Yes, the flu and colds are caused by viruses. But nursing is a vital part of medicine. Staying warm, pushing hot fluids, resting, are big pieces of the healing puzzle with flu and colds.

If you nurse well, you will heal more quickly, and it will help prevent secondary infections, like bronchitis and sinus infection. You may heal more quickly if combined with antiviral and immune boosting herbs.  Your symptoms may also be more tolerable

 

Ayurvedic Detox Tea for Colds and Flu Works by Ramping Up Agni

Sri Lankan style Ayurvedic Detox Tea for Colds and Flu is a combination of pungent and bitter kitchen spices common in South Asian cooking. Ayurvedic Detox Tea for Colds and Flu works by ramping up your body’s Agni, that internal metabolic fire which is the source life energy. It also has a cleansing, detoxifying affect on the body’s channels, called shrotas in Ayurveda

 

Agni is the root of the immune system. Strong Agni gives you good resistance to infection by foreign pathogens. Strong Agni helps you fight respiratory and other kinds of pathogens off once you are infected with them. Read more about Agni here.

 

For example, people who die from influenza typically die from secondary bacterial infections. If you do manage to contract influenza, you are much more likely to recover quickly and without secondary bacterial infection if you have strong Agni.

 

Kitchen Medicine to Balance Bitter Cold Anti-Viral Herbs

 

One of the most overused herbs is Echinacea. Echinacea, and also Chinese Herbs for Colds and Flu are mostly, just like antibiotics, very hard on the microbiome. Because they are very bitter and cold they weaken Agni. But sometimes we must use them. This is why we can protect the microbiome from the side effects of Bitter Antiviral, Antibacterial herbs, by drinking lots of Ayurvedic Detox Tea for Colds and Flu when taking strong herbs that fight infection.

 

 

Effect on Vata and Kapha Doshas

Strongly pacifies both Vata and Kapha because it ramps up Agni fire.

 

Vata and Kapha dominant types, especially Vata-Kapha or Kapha-Vata, tend to have weaker Agni under normal conditions. They are cold just as wind and water are. Add to this that Vata and Kapha are elevated from Late Autumn to Early Spring for everyone because of climate and long nights. In tropical zones, like Sri Lanka and South India Ayurvedic Detox Tea for Colds and Flu is taken during the rainy season, and the cold season that follows the rains.

 

Vata and Kapha types must take special care to keep their Agni strong from Autumn to Early Spring. If not they will easily succumb to Common Cold, Flu, Ear Infection, Sinus Infection, and Bronchitis. Children are in the Kapha phase of life. That is why their newly formed bodies are so full of fluids. It is why they are so susceptible to ear infections and why they get sick easily.

Colds are by definition elevated Kapha–characterized by phelgm and runny liquids.  See Common Cold in Ayurveda. So a basic Kitchen Medicine for Colds and Flu is my Ayurvedic Detox Tea for Colds and Flu.

 

Nip Your Cold or Flu in the Bud with Ayurvedic Detox Tea for Colds and Flu

 

Drink as much Ayurvedic Detox Tea for Colds and Flu as feels good, as soon as you feel symptoms. For me its either sneezing and a stuffy nose, followed by a feeling of chill, or its the sudden onset of a sore throat, also with chill and an aversion to wind, with sometimes with cough.  Over the course of the first day of fighting off a cold I might drink as much as 3 quarts of my Ayurvedic Detox Tea for Colds and Flu. Expect to urinate a lot.

 

Drink you tea and get back into bed. Stay at home and stay warm. Don’t go outside. Don’t exercise. Go to bed as early as you can. Take Chinese Herbs like Yin Qiao San or Gui Zhi Tang as needed. If you follow common sense Grandmother’s advice you will get well quickly, and then you can quickly get back to work and exercise. Your cold will not lag for weeks.

 

Prevent Secondary Infections like Bronchitis and Sinusitis

 

Even if you don’t get a chance to nip your cold or flu in the bud, you will still get better more quickly, and help to prevent secondary infections in the sinus, throat or lungs if you drink large amounts of Ayurvedic Detox Tea for Colds and Flu as soon as you can.

 

Lower Fever, Boost Immune System, Fight Bacterial Infection

And the nice thing about Ayurvedic Detox Tea for Colds and Flu is that the spices in this tea don’t just stimulate Agni, but also have other medicinal benefits. Coriander Seed for example helps to lower fever. Tulsi Holy Basil is has anti-bacterial properties. Black Cumin seeds is for the immune system. Ginger, Long Pepper, Cumin, Fennel, and Ajwain all help promote good digestion, so are especially good if you have gut symptoms.

 

Chinese Herbs to Take With Tea for Colds and Flu

Chinese Herbal Medicine excels at the treatment of infectious disease. My Ayurvedic Detox Tea for Colds and Flu is Kitchen Medicine, very important. Along with proper rest and staying warm it is the mainstay of nursing therapy. I like to combine more aggressive anti-viral therapy with my Ayurvedic Detox Tea for Colds and Flu, when appropriate. Choice of herbal medicines is based on symptoms patterns. See this article.

List of Symptoms for Using  Ayurvedic Detox Tea for Colds and Flu

This is a list of symptoms associated with colds and flu that I recommend Ayurvedic Detox Tea as kitchen medicine for:

  • chills
  • run down
  • fatigue
  • feeling cold
  • aversion to wind
  • mild cough with phlegm
  • stuffy nose
  • runny nose
  • easy to expel mucus,
  • low to medium fever
  • mild sore throat
  • fatigue

 

Ayurvedic Tea for Colds and Flu Recipe

Ingredients

6 cups water

Coriander Seed 3 tbsp
Fresh Sliced Ginger Root 5 medium slices
Dried Ginger Powder 1-2 tsp
Green Cardamom Seed or Pods 1 tbsp
Fenugreek Seed 1 tbsp
Cumin Seed 2 tsp
Black Cumin 3 tsp (get at Indian, MidEastern market or Amazon) if not avail use more plain cumin
Fennel Seed 2 tsp
Black Peppercorns, 1-2 tbsp, (more for Kapha type or if lots of runny nose, less or none for Pitta type)
Cinnamon Stick or Cassia, 1-2  4″ pieces
Clove 6
Long Pepper,(Pippili) if available, 4 pieces (I have seen for sale at the Chinese market in the Indonesian spice section…also Amazon.com and Indian grocer)
Holy Basil 2 tbsp (grow in your garden and dry for winter or get at Indian grocers in the body-care section as a powder, also at health food stores in tea bags, also Amazon.)

Directions

Bring spices and water to a boil. Simmer for around 40 minutes.

If desired, and I do recommend this for Pitta-Vatta and Vatta-Pitta types, add about 1 cup of goat’s, cow, coconut, soy, or nut milk and simmer another 5 minutes.

Sweeten to taste with Raw Coconut Sugar or not at all. You can also cook with licorice root, dates, raisons, or dried apricots for sweetness.

Drink a lot of this through the day as soon as you start to feel sick. If you sweat, change clothes so you don’t get a chill.

Stay indoors. Eat light food like toast or rice soup. Rest, rest, rest!

Try to use whole spice rather than powder. If you use whole spice you get a clear liquid; if you use powder you can get a muddy broth.

Samahan

If you are too busy to make the above, there is a product that is very popular in Sri Lanka that is now available on line.  It is similar to the above recipe, but I warn you, it is very hot. It either has chile in it or a very high percentage of Black Pepper and Ginger…

If you are a Pitta dominant you must mix it with some kind of milk. You might still get some burning sensations in the lower GI, and use with care if you have a tendency to hemorrhoids.

 

copyright eyton shalom, oct 2012, san diego, ca all rights reserved, use with permission.

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