Eliminate summer heat and dampness by eating the "Eight Treasures" foods during the dog days of summer.

The "dog days of summer" often leave people with no appetite. Eating right in the summer can boost your appetite and help prevent the heat; eating wrong can leave you more lethargic and is bad for your health. In fact, the principle of summer diet is to "lightly nourish," focusing on strengthening the spleen, expelling summer heat, and resolving dampness. Here we recommend the "Eight Treasures" of food, which are perfect for light nourishment during the "dog days."

1. Cucumber

The most significant impact of summer on the human body is summer heat and dampness. When summer heat and dampness invade the body, they can cause pores to open, excessive sweating, leading to a deficiency of Qi (vital energy). They can also disrupt the functions of the spleen and stomach, causing indigestion. Consuming appropriate amounts of "cooling" vegetables helps promote the production of body fluids to quench thirst, relieve irritability and summer heat, clear heat, and purge toxins while promoting bowel movements. Cucumber is a prime example of a cooling vegetable. It has a high water content and is characterized by being high in potassium and low in sodium, making it suitable for replenishing water and lost inorganic salts after heavy sweating in the summer.

2. Carp

The summer climate is warm and humid. Drinking some carp soup can help expel dampness, stimulate the appetite, and promote urination to reduce swelling. From a nutritional perspective, carp is rich in high-quality protein, minerals, and vitamins, which are easily digested and absorbed. It is suitable for all people, including children, pregnant women, and the elderly.

Homemade Stewed Carp

3. Wood Ear Mushroom

Wood ear mushroom is sweet in taste and neutral in nature, and it affects the stomach and large intestine meridians. It has the effects of replenishing Qi, moistening the lungs, nourishing the brain, promoting agility, and cooling the blood. It is known as a "scavenger for blood vessels." Eating more black wood ear mushrooms in the summer is beneficial for detoxification and bowel movements on one hand, and for cooling the blood and increasing appetite on the other.

4. Duck

Among the four seasons, duck is especially suitable for consumption in the summer. As the saying goes, "To prevent a 'bitter summer,' eat more duck." Duck meat is rich in nutrients that the body urgently needs in the summer, such as protein, and it can also help prevent diseases. It is particularly beneficial for people with internal heat, as well as for those who are weak in constitution, have poor appetite, have a fever, suffer from constipation, or have edema.

5. Job's Tears

Job's Tears are a great food for removing internal dampness and toxins and also have anti-cancer properties. During the height of summer, when it is often rainy and the air is humid and sticky, many people suffer from "summer heat damage." Eating Job's Tears porridge at this time can treat dampness arthralgia, benefit the intestines, reduce edema, and strengthen the spleen and stomach.

Red Bean and Job's Tears Sweet Soup

6. Mung Bean Porridge

Mung beans are praised as "a fine food among foods, a life-saving grain." In the scorching summer, mung bean porridge is a favorite cooling porridge for the common people. Mung beans are both a food and a medicine, used to clear heat and detoxify, relieve summer heat, and promote urination, treating summer heat-related vexation and thirst, edema, and more. However, it should be noted that mung beans are a "cooling" food-medicine. Those with a weak or cold constitution or a weak spleen and stomach may experience abdominal pain and diarrhea from overconsumption. Those with a Yin deficiency should also avoid drinking large amounts, as it can lead to an excess of "false fire," causing symptoms like sores at the corners of the mouth and swollen gums.

7. Watermelon

There is an old Chinese proverb: "Eat watermelon on a hot day, and you won't need to see a doctor." Watermelon is cold in nature, sweet in taste, and affects the heart, stomach, and bladder meridians. It has the functions of clearing summer heat, promoting the production of body fluids to quench thirst, and promoting urination to relieve vexation. Regular consumption of watermelon can clear "fire" and reduce heat.

8. Sour Plum Drink

The ingredients for sour plum drink are dark plum, hawthorn, osmanthus, licorice, and rock sugar. The "Compendium of Materia Medica" states: "Unripe plums are harvested when half-yellow and smoked to become dark plums." This drink aids digestion, harmonizes the middle, promotes the flow of Qi to dispel stasis, generates fluids to quench thirst, astringes the lung Qi, relieves vexation, and calms the spirit. Regular consumption can prevent and cure diseases, strengthen the body, and is a rare health drink for the hot summer.

Sour Plum Drink (Blender Version)