Gastric health is vital for everyone, requiring consistent care—particularly in dietary habits. Improper food choices can easily cause stomach discomfort or even gastric disorders. This leads to questions: What foods benefit stomach health in spring? How should one nurture stomach health during spring? Here are detailed recommendations:
What Foods Benefit Stomach Health in Spring?
1. Spinach
Spinach is also beneficial for gastrointestinal health. Consuming spinach can moisturize dryness, nourish the liver, and relieve constipation. The Compendium of Materia Medica records spinach as follows: "It benefits the five viscera, unblocks the intestines and stomach, and alleviates alcohol toxicity." Eating spinach helps stimulate gastric and pancreatic secretion, boost appetite, and promote digestion.
2. Sweet Potatoes
Sweet potatoes have a neutral nature and can tonify the spleen and boost qi. The Compendium of Materia Medica records their ability to "tonify the middle, warm the stomach, and nourish the five viscera."
3. Pumpkin
Pumpkin aids detoxification and protects stomach health.As recorded in the Compendium of Materia Medica, "Pumpkin is warm in nature, sweet in taste, and enters the spleen and stomach meridians." It fortifies the middle energizer, boosts qi, reduces inflammation, kills bacteria, and alleviates pain.
The pectin in pumpkin can "adsorb" bacteria and toxic substances, thereby aiding detoxification. Pectin also helps protect the stomach, preventing irritation and reducing the risk of gastric ulcers.
4. Carrots
Carrots are a healthy food. In traditional Chinese medicine, they are believed to "regulate qi, strengthen the middle energizer, benefit the spleen and diaphragm, moisten the intestines and stomach, and calm the five viscera."
Additionally, carrots are rich in vitamin A, which supports vision health, boosts immunity, and helps prevent respiratory illnesses. Since the carotene in carrots is fat-soluble, stewing them with meat enhances their nutritional benefits.
5. Cabbage
Cabbage has a sweet, neutral taste and is non-toxic. It benefits the stomach and the second meridian.Known as the "stomach vegetable," cabbage contains vitamin K1 and vitamin U. Consuming cabbage helps prevent gastric ulcers by repairing and protecting the gastric mucosa, keeping stomach cells active and vigorous, and reducing the risk of gastric diseases. For patients with gastric or duodenal ulcers, cabbage can aid recovery.
How to Nourish Your Stomach in Spring?
1. Drink More Congee
Consuming congee is a traditional Chinese health practice that greatly benefits the stomach.
Prepare porridge using 15g cassia seeds, 15g white chrysanthemum flowers, 60g japonica rice, and rock sugar to taste.
Alternatively, combine white-fleshed sweet potatoes and mustard greens with japonica rice for porridge, which also nourishes the stomach.
2. Drink soups frequently
Legume soups are ideal. Mung beans have cooling properties and clear heat.
Mung beans can also be combined with mint to make mung bean mint soup, with pumpkin to make mung bean pumpkin soup, with coix seeds to make mung bean coix seed soup, or with honeysuckle to make mung bean honeysuckle soup.
Additionally, boiling 100g each of watermelon rind and peanuts with 50g each of malt and coix seeds into a broth provides excellent heat-clearing and stomach-nourishing benefits.
3. Moderately consume sour foods
Sour foods not only promote saliva production, quench thirst, and aid digestion but also kill bacteria and prevent illness. They can eliminate bacteria in vegetables, helping prevent intestinal infections.
Another major benefit of sour foods is enhancing nutrient absorption. Examples like tomatoes, lemons, strawberries, black plums, grapes, pineapples, and mangoes can be used for juices, fruit salads, or incorporated into dishes.