
Basil's warm and spicy aroma adds a passionate flare to any dish, bringing the heat of the Mediterranean sun to your table. Its bright green color and vigorous flavor is unmistakable in pesto. It adds verve to a home-made tomato sauce, and is a perky...
Caffeine shifts awareness from the heart chakra to the third eye. New trades routes brought caffeinated beverages to Europe creating an 'Age of Enlightenment' and ending the middle ages. Ayurveda comes from an older time where the mind was not separate...
In the Middle Ages, caraway seeds were served with a bit of sugar as a digestive after a big meal, much the way sugar coated fennel is eaten after a meal in India.
Love for cardamom resonates through history - for instance, ancient Egyptians chewed cardamom to whiten their teeth and sweeten their breath. Cardamom helps take the edge off of caffeine in the famous drink Turkish coffee. Cardamom is a member of the...
Romance may be sealed with a box of chocolates, but passion for chocolate is as eternal as true love. Long before John Cadbury invented the chocolate bar, native meso-american peoples brewed chocolate with medicinal herbs. Chocolate has been used as...
Coffee as a SacramentWhat are your rituals around coffee? Coffee has become a sacrament in our culture. A client reports, "The only time my husband and I relax together is over coffee." My response, "If your marriage is dependent...
Daikon is native to southeast and east Asia. From white to purple to green to pink, Daikon comes in several varieties. It's also known as white radish, winter radish, long white radish, oriental radish, and mooli. In Japan, many types of pickles are...
Raw garlic's benefits are many. A spicy root, garlic is known for clearing, which flushes everything out of your body. One student writes, "At first taste it was like a bee stinging my tongue.... my whole body got very warm."Clears...
Green Tea is a preparation using minimally processed leaves from the camellia sinensis plant. This is the same plant used in normal black tea. Black tea leaves, however, are more processed.
Also known as devil's dung, stinking gum, food of the gods, and giant fennel, hing has a varied and suprising diversity of uses. Along the Tex-Mex border hing was used for wolf bait. The odor attracts wolves. In Jamaica, hing is used to protect the...
Millet is drier than other grains. It's astringency can help bind diarrhea. It is warmer than other grains, stimulating good digestion and agni. Due to astringency, millet may feel like sandpaper if the tissues of the digestive tract are irritated or...
Like all roots cooked onion brings a grounding feel. Yellow onions are the standard onion in American grocery store shelves. White onions tend to be sweeter and crunchier. Red...
Rosmarinus, is from the latin "dew" (ros) and "sea" (marinus), and means "dew of the sea". Rosemary grows in arid Mediterranean conditions and, as its name implies, can survive on the humidity carried by the sea breeze.
Culinary sage, although a diaphoretic, has an anhidrotic action - it prevents excessive sweating. This is useful in night sweats of all kinds - from chronic febrile conditions to menopausal syndrome. Culinary sage stimulates the pituitary adrenal...
Thyme tea has been used to stop gastric fermentation. It may be mixed with honey for sore throats. It's diaphoretic properties make it useful to sweat out a fever.
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Founder of Joyful Belly Ayurveda, John Immel, answers the question ‘What is Ayurveda?’