Garlic Soup for colds

One of my all time favorite soup recipes for breaking and or reducing a cold duration is a combonation of:
Chicken broth, egg and Garlic.  I went ahead and added to the mix, Rosemary and Thyme.

Thyme is great for fighting infections, strengthening the respiratory tract (Bronchial Dilator), is an expectorant and decongestant for your chest and is an  anti: biotic, septic, bacterial, fungal, spasmodic and more.

Rosemary, one of my faves, has some of the same values as Thyme, but Rosemary also helps stimulate the blood flow through the heart, is a relaxant to the nervous system and (the purpose of using it in this soup) a recouperation herb, from illness.  It helps to restore your immune system and as an antioxidant helps prevent free radical cell damage.

Garlic has powerful researched and documented antibiotic and antibacterial values and another fav of mine to use for colds, flu etc... Garlic is just great in general.

One egg has 13 essential nutrients, including riboflavins for cell energy, selenium, which acts as an antioxidant to prevent the breakdown of tissues, iron which helps in the production of red blood cells and transporting of oxygen and more.  A good sight to look at for egg nutrition is http://www.incredibleegg.org/ .

For the soup, I use one can of chicken broth, one sliced/pressed garlic clove, a couple of pinches of both Thyme and Rosemary and one egg.

I usually let the broth boil, add the egg, reduce heat, add the herbs, let it steep for at least 10 minutes and serve. 

It's actually pretty tasty and I always add a bit more rosemary because I love the flavor and the aroma.

As a mom, it tears me up when one of my girls is sick.  Today it would be my 12 year old who is not feeling so hot at all.  Headache, fever, stomach ache, sinus congestion, cough, phlegm etc.

So, Mom put together an herbal tea concoction just for her.  For her headache - Feverfew; Fever - Yarrow; Stomach ache  & sinus congestion - Plantain. For her cough and any respiratory, plus phlegm, I added a cherry bark cough syrup I made, for flavor and herbal contents of Thyme, Marshmallow and Peppermint oil extract, all in a cup of hot water.

It's now 3:30 p.m. and she was only awake for maybe an hour between 1 and 2 p.m., drank the whole cup of tea, ate just a bit of chicken noodle soup and is now sawing logs on the couch.

The cherry bark is slightly sedative and helps the body 'rest', which aides in it's self-healing.

It blesses me to know that God knew what he was doing when he created the 'Plants of the Earth' and that he gave me the insight in to their value and worth. 

It blesses me even more that I can give this to my children.

update:  I'm happy to say that my daughter woke up a couple of hours after this post, no fever and hungry.  I fed her the 'garlic' soup I cooked up for her (which we took out the eggs and poured the, now, 'herbal' chicken broth in to a cup of soup, chicken noodle soup she had left over from earlier (and had poured most of the broth out (we put it in the dog's food, the cat ate it ... go figure).  A couple of hours later, still no fever and her appetite increasing, now wanting more 'solid' foods.  It's now 1:18 a.m. and she is 'finally' going back to sleep after hours of 'disney' shows (which I have to admit, I'm addicted to as much as she is ... but only when she's home ... really)

Between the herbal tea and syrup, the soup, plenty of rest and lots of TLC, she's doing so much better.  Still a bit weak, physically,  but another day of rest and more of Mama's Teas and she'll be as good as new for school first thing Monday morning ... :)

I'm going to add Astragalus to the tea blend, as it helps aide in recuperation from illness.

Freedom To Choose

FREEDOM to CHOOSE!!

So just how tired of Pharmaceutical, lab made ‘drugs’ are you?  How serious are you about the consideration of ‘natural’ ‘alternative’ routes to ease, heal, or fight off an array of ailments? 

I’m not a doctor and I don’t have a degree in Alternative Medicine (yet), but I do know one thing … The older I get, the more ‘wisdom’ I assume I’ve gained, the more I have began to undercover and understand how many of our lab produced pharmacy ‘drugs’ were derived from an ‘herb’, the more and more I steer clear of prescription or over the counter (OTC) aides and run to my herbal cabinet instead. 

I recently read that up until World War II the actual herbal plants were used in ingredients for medications. Due to herb shortages in Europe, synthetically made ‘herbal’ ingredients to replace the actual herb plant, were created, as we know them today, in our own lab/pharmacy based medications.

Therefore, in my infinite assumed wisdom and common sense, I conclude in my own mind, that, while I do believe Pharmaceuticals have “a” place in our health care, Pharmaceuticals are not all conclusive and the most beneficial and safest alternative for my body, reducing side effects from any other component imbedded in to any lab produced ‘drug’, would be to use actual herbal plants to tackle an ailment that does not absolutely require a pharmaceutical prescription or OTC ‘drug’.

I want to start writing articles for you to bring you valuable information about the world of ‘herbs’.  It’s a ‘big, vast’ world, so vast it would take more than a single lifetime, I believe, to know it all. 

However, I need some help in getting things started here.  I have worked with several herbs in the past couple of years, yet to sit down and just start ‘writing’ about one or a few even, is not as easy as it would seem.

I don’t want my articles to be ‘medical format’, a.k.a. bore you tears.  Though, while I want them to be ‘informative’, my heart is ‘connect’ and ‘reach out’ to others individually, as well as on a ‘whole’.  I want this to be more personal.  To do that, I need ‘your’ help.  I am asking others to throw out some issues/ailments they may be dealing with or know someone who is so I can have a more personalized focal topic to address.

I know this will be a ton of fun and my ‘goal’ is to inform, not diagnose, not heal (I’m not a dr) for others’ benefit and bring them another alternative to consider. 

So, if you’d like to participate to help me get past my ‘own’ psychological writer’s ‘block’ … send me a message, tell me your story and I’ll write about the herbs that are documented to assist in whatever is ailing you or someone you know!

Have a Healthy Day!

Cherie’

Note: All information provided to me will remain strictly confidential in regards to ‘names’, ‘locations’ etc … the main content will resolve around the ‘ailment and the herbal alternative to that ailment. Your personal information will not be a part of the content, unless you authorize me to do so.