We've been sniffling, sneezing and coughing our way through this week and getting very little sleep. Garlic, ginger, parsley, lemon, sage and onions have featured heavily to help combat ills. Not a lot of people know that onions are good for the lungs...both strengthening and cleansing. it's a combination of the sulphur and all those volatile oils (the ones that make you cry). Making up an onion and garlic syrup is a good way to take it. It's a good base for tailoring it to your needs. Add chopped thyme if you have a chesty phlegmy cough or sage if you have a sore throat. A tablespoon of fresh herb finely chopped and layered up with the onions, garlic and sugar should do the trick. If you don't have those herbs in the garden just buy them at the supermarket. No one need know!
Thankfully appetites have not been lost and we are all craving foods which help fight infections. Curries with ginger and garlic, pasta with garlic, lemon and parsley and sage and onion dumplings have all been consumed.
We've been keeping warm by layering up and sitting in front of coal fires. Duvets and hot water bottles may also be featuring highly. Anything too cerebral is being spurned for trashy novels and staring into space and the spurt of creative thinking I had at the beginning of the year has gone on hold as tiredness robs me of more brain cells. It will all pass though and we will emerge from our funk to be greeted by a dirty and untidy house and a never ending To Do list.
(Oh, and on never ending rainy days a cup of uplifting, citrus lemonbalm tea brings in a bit of sunshine. Sometimes though i simply sprinkle some rose petals in with my black tea as it brews).
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