Tonics

Tonics

If deep belief were the secret ingredient to effective health tonics, I would never ever get sick. I believe in and love them all with a fervency that surprises even me.

My first idol was garlic. What’s not to love, I thought? There’s garlic bread, spaghetti with clams and garlic; it just makes everything better. The only small problem was that to make me better, it had to be consumed raw. I was living in Oakland, CA. Trying to stave off a cold, I ate seven raw cloves of garlic. Having temporarily lost my sense of smell, I couldn’t understand why no one sat near me on BART as I traveled to my piano lesson in San Francisco. Only when my teacher’s roommate staggered into my Scarlotti lesson crying, “What is that awful smell?” that I got the message.

I was also an early passenger on the echinacea train. I took it whenever I started to sneeze, took it all through the inevitably ensuing cold, all the while swearing that but for my little nasty droplets in tea, I would have suffered much more. My friends found this hilarious, evidence of my wild loyalty, and rarely challenged my chop-logic.

My husband, having to endure the sickbed, with its stacks of books, newspapers, knitting, leaky writing implements and other amusements, was more skeptical. He pointed to widely publicized studies. He pointed to the wastebasket brimming over with lozenge wrappers and used tissues. He finally prevailed.

By that time, I’d made friends with a young woman from Mexico who’d studied music in Moscow. She swore that she’d survived the Russian winter by drinking her special Mexican lemonade. To make it, you scrub two lemons, chop them into pieces, throw them into a blender with two cups of water and sugar to taste-- seeds, skin and all. The resulting drink is bracing, astringently sinus clearing, in my experience, but only for a few minutes. For me the effects were too short lived; I’d have to drink it nonstop. My teeth would decay and fall out with all that acid and sugar.

Unbowed, I moved my faith to zinc and astragalus, both in pill form, which isn’t as fun as making evil smelling brews. I’m now growing the latter in my herb garden, but can’t bear harvesting it to boil the root.

Something I do harvest-- in fact have to finish picking today--is my little crop of sandia berries, grown on the shisandra Chinensis vine we planted a couple of years ago. They are very sour, purportedly full of antioxidants, and can be made into a Tang-like drink if you add enough honey and water. I haven’t noticed any bursts of well-being, but I also haven’t been that consistent.

My most recent tonic is actually a soup. Its comforting, medicinal ingredients are garlic, chicken broth, dried, and reconstituted shitake mushrooms. Add onions, finely chopped lacinato or Italian kale, peeled and diced burdock root, peeled, diced dandelion root. Simmer the above for about 30 minutes, till the rooty bits are tender, add a teaspoon of Thai Tom Yum paste (a hot and sour soup base available at Asian grocery stores) and a tablespoon of honey. It’s really good and good for you.

The Apaches would ride days in search of dandelion, which they considered the king of medicinal plants. The leaves, picked before the flowers bloom, are excellent for the liver. Burdock root has also been used for everything from impotence to colds. There is something hugely satisfying about digging up these roots and using them, rather than just getting rid of an annoying weed that sheep can’t graze. Some plants are our friends! Even if they are, on the surface at least, inconvenient. There is also something satisfying about digging up for free what other health conscious citizens buy for $9/pound at the coop.

Speaking of digging deeper, the efficacy of this soup might have something to do with my having discovered naps, and the wisdom of sleeping when tired. This, coupled with assiduous hand washing, might even protect me (and anyone who’ll listen) from all sorts of viral menace.

Meanwhile, I’m going to look into elderberry.