09 Oct Warming Pumpkin Spice Smoothie
The weather is quickly changing, bringing in cooler temperatures and dampness.
It’s the kind of cold that chills you to you to the bone. In other provinces, snow is already covering the grounds, making it feel like winter is here early.
As the temperature drops, you may find that foods that you craved through the summer months are less appealing. You may find that in place of smoothies, you want oatmeal and in place of raw veggies, you want sweet potatoes and squash.
We are lucky because the changing seasons naturally shift our local foods to warming foods, which support the Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) perspective on diet.
TCM explains that each food has its own energetic property of yin or yang.
These properties can influence our energetic balance and influence health and disease. Medical conditions are due to an imbalance between yin and yang.
Cold conditions include fatigue, low mood, cough and cold symptoms with a clear discharge. Hot conditions include heart disease, diabetes, inflammation, fever and infections with yellow or green discharge.
Knowing what foods and spices have warming properties means that you don’t have to give up smoothies for 8 months of the year.
Instead, you can swap out your current ingredients and for some of these:
Cayenne pepper, ginger, cinnamon, horse radish, lamb, cherries, coconut, lemon, raspberries, pumpkin seeds, chestnuts, walnuts onions and garlic.
Not sure where to start? Try this warming Pumpkin smoothie:
Ingredients:
1/2 cup organic pumpkin purée
2 cups coconut milk (or milk of choice)
1 and 1/2 tsp ceylon cinnamon
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp allspice
1/4 tsp fresh ginger juice (or graded)
1 healing tbsp collagen
Blend together in a high powered bender and enjoy!!
In addition to warming smoothies, you may also find that you are craving warm drinks, broths, stews, soups and root veggie purées, these will surely warm your core and your soul.
No Comments