Food: Your Best Defense for the Common Cold
Unfortunately, no matter how well you take care of yourself, you still inevitably come down with a cold or the flu. Even if you do all the right things such as eating a nutritious diet, exercising on a regular and getting plenty of sleep, illness can still get you.
If you do catch a cold you are always told to make up a pot of chicken soup. Studies have proven that chicken soup is indeed effective at fighting the physical aches and pains of the common cold. Bear in mind, however, you should eat small quantities of chicken soup, but as often as possible, to reap the beneficial results for your health.
It has been shown that chicken soup works to break up the congestion in the nose by thwarting the flow of the secretions from the nose. The white blood cells that come out in droves due to a sore throat and a head cold can be inhibited by chicken soup, which decreases the inflammation in the head as well as the creation of phlegm.
There is an amino acid in chicken, which is known as cysteine, and this is released when the soup is added to broth to make a soup. Once the cysteine is released in the making of the soup it becomes very much like a popular drug called acetylcysteine that is prescribed by physicians to patients who are suffering from bronchititis.
The mucus in the lungs is thinned out and this helps to release much of the congestion and the cough. The vapors from the hot chicken soup are one of the best antidotes for “cleaning house” when it comes to the common cold. Hot, spicy foods are excellent for kick starting the immune system and flushing out impurities so add some items such as onions, garlic, cayenne pepper or even jalapeno peppers to your chicken soup to facilitate faster healing.
Another excellent food remedy for congestion is garlic. At the very first sign of a cold starting consume several cloves of fresh garlic as it can help to encourage your immune system to get into gear and it helps to rid the body of congestion. Garlic is a very powerful food that has within it a special substance that is excellent at killing a virus known as the human rhino virus, which is to blame for many head colds as well as parainfluenza 3, which is a virus that causes a person to become sick with the flu. But the benefits of garlic when a person is sick do not end there. Garlic helps to encourage watery fluids building up in the lungs, throat and mouth to leave the body as soon as possible. The mucus that is characteristic of a cold is thinned out thanks to the presence of garlic and it is gotten rid of as swiftly as possible. Garlic also has the ability to fight inflammation, which makes it an excellent food to have on hand all of the time.
There is no cure for the common cold or flu but doing the right things can help to minimize it’s uncomfortable effects.
Scott Meyers is a staff writer for It’s Entirely Natural, a resource for helping you achieve a naturally healthy body, mind, and spirit. You may contact our writers through the web site. Follow this link for more informaton on Food Cures.
Tags: chicken soup, cold, Food Cures, garlic
