These cold mornings have me dreaming of warm soup for dinner. Most of us naturally go to warm foods over the winter months, but did you know its actually fantastic for your gut and overall health?
According to Chinese medicine, your gut requires your food to be at body temperature before it begins breaking it down, absorbing and passing your food through the shoot. Therefore, more energy is used to warm up the food before the digestion process really begins. This makes digestion more work for the body and can cause gut irritability, particularly for those of us with sensitive digestion. So warm, moderately spicy food supports that digestive fire.
Eating raw food over time, for us sensitive folks, can in fact weaken our digestive system causing bloating, gassiness and poor absorption of foods. This can cause an energy depletion in the body, especially for reproductive organs.
If we're not digesting our food optimally, then we're sure not absorbing our food optimally. Cooking your vegetables over a low to medium heat helps to breakdown the tough fibres that can trap some important nutrients that wouldn't otherwise be available to the body. While you lose on some live enzymes and energy from cooking, you get access to some other nutrients and absorb them much easier than raw.
So in short, enjoy all those warming, nutrient-dense dishes while the cold months are around us. Your gut will thank you!
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