Why the Chinese Don't Count Calories (24 page)

The idea of a stomach which is too hot may be a bit of a mind leap, but traditional Chinese medicine sees the climatic conditions as major causes of illness and believes that they can attack both from outside (as when bad weather causes someone to catch cold) or within. In fact, traditional Chinese medicine totally vindicates our grandmothers who always told us to wrap up warmly. Too much wind and cold, they believed, could cause sneezing and spluttering, and too much heat could result in a fainting fit. They weren’t aware, though, that wind and cold, heat and even dryness and dampness could actually be within the body – because our culture does not view man as an integral part of the larger order of things.

The Five Climatic Conditions in the body damage each other or transform into each other all the time. Take fever, the most tangible excess-heat condition: a person with a fever may be alternatively hot, shivering and cold. Too much
wind
in the body can be serious and manifests itself in symptoms that move around, such as dizziness, convulsions and spasms. The climatic conditions can also attack particular organs. The stomach is especially vulnerable to
fire
, and because
fire
moves quickly and burns out it has a tendency to turn to the next climatic condition in the cycle:
dampness
.

The tendency of excess
fire
to turn to
dampness
explains why we need to go easy on the salad. Damp, which is associated with the
earth
element, and therefore the stomach, is lingering and hard to shift. So, every time we eat a salad, we create excess
stomach fire
, which can prevent the spleen/stomach from doing their important jobs of digesting food and distributing nutrients. Continued consumption of raw food will gradually damage the stomach
qi
and make it unable to balance its own climate and prevent its associated element, dampness, from becoming too strong. As dampness gets out of balance,
wind
, the climatic condition that tones the spleen/stomach, attacks the body to try to remedy the situation, resulting in bloating and other uncomfortable if not embarrassing digestive upsets. Traditional Chinese medicine also sees eczema and arthritis as
wind
-related conditions, thus making the link between these chronic conditions and poor diet.

In China, there has never been any doubt that if a person is overweight then it is a manifestation of some deeper problem, almost universally involving dampness which has invaded their weak spleen/stomach. A weak stomach also becomes vulnerable to cold, the antithesis of heat, because in the
yin/yang
scheme of things these two phenomena easily transform into the other. So, a stomach that has been under attack by
fire
for some time may eventually become a
cold
stomach.

Dampness
in the spleen/stomach can lead to the whole body becoming too damp and dampness blocks the flow of
qi
, leading to lack of energy or listlessness. People with a damp constitution often have a glossy tongue, sweaty palms, and a lot of what is known in traditional Chinese medicine as phlegm, an internal condition that can lead to high blood pressure and aching joints.

Whereas
wind
in the body tends to move upwards,
dampness
moves down. And the problems it causes can be heavy and painful, as when rheumatoid arthritis gets into the joints. Dampness can team up with heat or cold. People with a
cold
,
damp
constitution tend to suffer from abdominal swelling and diarrhoea, where as those with a
hot
,
damp
constitution have difficulty urinating and are often constipated. In extreme conditions the dampness might swing from hot to cold, and a manifestation of this effect might be irritable bowel syndrome.

In the West we usually deal with damp-related problems with a dieter’s regime that almost invariably involves calorie reduction and lots of salad and raw vegetables. If the weight does shift, it may well do so at a cost. Because this regime exacerbates the problem the dampness may transform to dryness, which is why long-term dieters may suffer from poor skin, thinning hair, cracked lips, dry mouths and constipation. An undernourished body is a weak body, with damaged
qi
. Diets can therefore leave you lacking in energy and subject to attack from within or without at any time.

Dealing with ‘dampness’

For many people, learning the secrets of the Chinese diet and changing their eating habits accordingly is enough to start to shift their dampness and rebalance the body. But Chinese food therapists have particular recommendations for dampness-related obesity which do not involve complicated diet sheets or punishing regimes. Instead, they suggest eating more of certain foods that will address the particular problem. In particular, aduki beans, which are neutral in their
yin
and
yang
and their heating and cooling energies as well as being a natural diuretic, can help restore the balance in a damp body. These small red pulses are often added to
zhou
or, for a total weight loss formula, boiled with Chinese red dates to form a medicinal food that helps to strengthen the spleen/stomach. Garlic promotes the circulation of
qi
, which can help overweight people feel more energetic. So, if you are not yet a fan of
zhou
, you can use it in your cooking. Soya beans and beancurd are recommended for all overweight people, whether their weight problem is due to damp heat or damp cold, because they strengthen the spleen and help it to deal with the problem.

Cold
,
damp
types need to warm their bodies to expel the excess water which may be making them feel bloated or suffer from diarrhoea. Chinese dietary therapy recommends several ingredients to help dispel cold from the stomach: dried ginger, cinnamon and dried orange peel. Cinnamon and ginger can be ground into a powder and used in cooking or taken in a tea, and will relieve abdominal swelling. Dried ginger is more effective than fresh for this purpose. Orange peel can be used in stews and soups or powdered for use in cooking or teas. It will also relieve other congestion or indigestion.

Other cures treat the
hot
,
damp
types, aiming to cool the body gently and naturally so that the dampness blocking the system can escape. Certain cooling foods can do this because they are known to work on the meridian lines (the channels that carry
qi
in the body) of the spleen and/or stomach and often the heart (the source of
fire
) as well. These include green tea, the cucumber look-alike
ku gua
(or bitter melon, taken in soup or tea) and mung beans or beansprouts (cooked, not raw). Millet porridge also has cooling properties, which is why it is preferred to the more common rice variety by those who want to keep their external body in shape as well as their internal.

Liang cai suggestions

Not all cooling foods work gently to restore the balance in the body. In fact many need to be treated with caution as they worsen the situation. As much as you may crave them after a rich meal, the worst thing you can do is bombard a hot stomach with ice cold drinks or ice-cream. These unnaturally cold foods will only cause further damage to the affected organs and the whole body.

In modern Western society we quite happily put substances into our body at temperatures that our exteriors cannot tolerate. There is no place in the Chinese diet for iced drinks or frozen delicacies or for piping hot meals and beverages. There are no microwaves or hot plates to reheat food or keep it bubbling. Wok-fried or simmered dishes are placed on the table and gradually shared among the diners. By the time a small piece of food has been selected with a pair of chopsticks it is never too hot for the mouth or tongue, and so will not cause any damage to the body’s equilibrium.

The formal Chinese tea-making process involves several changes of water and plenty of standing time. The resulting beverage is always served in cups without a handle so that the drinker can feel when it’s ready; when it is cold enough to pick up, it is cool enough to drink. Even the famous Chinese
huang jiu
, a yellow wine made from sorghum (a type of grain), is served lightly warmed.

If you have relied on salad lunches, and possibly salad suppers, to keep your weight under control, you may be panicking at this stage. ‘What
can
I eat when I want a light meal then?’ I hope you have picked up some ideas throughout the book, but there is also the whole
liang cai
cold dish concept where vegetables are lightly blanched or steamed and mixed with a little sesame oil, salt or soy sauce, and perhaps a splash of vinegar.

Don’t be dismayed to find that all those years of rabbit food and diet drinks have been doing you more harm than good. Young people, with their abundance of
fire
, can get away with eating more raw foods, and a salad, particularly one well dressed and with a flavour balance, will have done you more good than crisps or confectionery. Every individual has a different constitution, and individual constitutions vary according to the time of year, stage of life and even mental state. When you are fit and your
qi
is strong you will be able to cope with extremes. But if your tolerance for physically hot or cold food is low, it is likely that your constitution is already damaged and you need to be careful.

Seek a true balance in your diet with plenty of neutral foods – fruits, nuts and seeds, pulses (especially aduki beans), beancurd as well as rice and other grain foods. Drink beverages warm or at room temperature, and lightly cook your vegetables with plenty of interesting seasonings. The tenth secret of the Chinese diet should encourage you to throw away your diet books and forget about weight loss programmes. Try, instead, to keep your body in harmony with the natural world, and do not subject it to extremes.

eleven
Use food to keep you fit

‘
Yao bu bu ru shi bu
’ (‘Medicine will not do you as much good as food. ’)

It was during a discussion with a market trader that I got my first inkling of the widespread use of home cures among the Chinese people. Every time I saw this particular woman she was very concerned to see that Sam, aged two, insisted on throwing off every article of clothing that he could work his fingers round. On Xiao Ding’s instruction, I was trying to buy rock-sugar, or
bing tang
as it is known in Mandarin, but was failing miserably to explain what I wanted – both
bing
and
tang
are very common sounds in Chinese and I was having my usual problem with the tones. (I subsequently found out that I may have been inadvertently asking for ‘iced soup’ by mistake), and as I got more and more desperate, the crowd around me got bigger and bigger. Eventually, despairing of making myself clear through the spoken word, I tried another tack and reached into my shopping bag: ‘It’s to go with these pears,’ I said.

‘Oh,’ she cried, ‘you mean
bing tang
! (‘Wasn’t that what I said?’) Your baby has a cough, hasn’t he? I told you he needed to wear more clothes. ’ She was right on both counts. In our first year in China, I was regularly in and out of the International Medical Clinic with our third son, often to no avail. Then Xiao Ding started to suggest a few home cures, medicinal recipes that were common knowledge among the Chinese.

‘For a cough,’ she said, ‘stew hard pears with rock-sugar and drink the juice. For diarrhoea, mix two eggs with water and minced ginger, steam it until it sets and top with sesame oil. For constipation, boil up sweet potato slices and drink the water. For a summer cold, drink tomato and watermelon juice and for a winter cold make a green tea with ginger and brown sugar. If in doubt, of course,’ she added finally, ‘eat
zhou
. ’