With winter just around the corner, most people are dreading the advent of cold season. Aside from staying warm and dry, there’s not much you can do to dodge it; once it starts, it can sneak in anywhere, and nothing’s more miserable than a fall or winter cold.
Fortunately, there’s no shortage of helpful home remedies for dealing with nasty cold symptoms. Honey is a cheap and easy way of treating coughs, and it can be infused with all sorts of things for extra flavor or for added health benefits. Here’s a simple recipe for ginger-infused honey, perfect for cold season.
Ginger-Infused Honey Recipe
Ingredients
- 2 cups of honey (preferably local, organic honey)
- 2 inches fresh grated ginger root
Instructions
For this recipe, you’ll need a few things: a double boiler or a heat-safe bowl and a heavy pot; a candy thermometer; and sterilized containers with lids, such as mason jars.
Peel and grate the ginger root, using a fine rasp.
Fill the bottom of the double boiler with water, and place the honey in the upper part of the double boiler. (If you are using a large pot and heat-safe bowl, place the honey in the bowl and fill the pot with water, then place the bowl in the water.)
Add the ginger to the honey while bringing the water to a rolling boil. Use the candy thermometer to monitor the temperature of the honey; you want to keep it at 185 degrees for about 10 minutes, then remove it from the heat and let it cool for another ten minutes.
Strain out the ginger and pour the honey into your sterilized containers. You can eat the honey-glazed shredded ginger; it’s great for upset stomachs, and tastes lovely in stir-fries.
How It Works
Honey is a great home remedy for cold symptoms. A 2007 study in the journal Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine found that honey, when taken by the tablespoon, actually rivalled most commercial cough syrups in terms of effectiveness in easing coughs(1). “Parents rated honey post favorably for symptomatic relief of their child’s nocturnal cough and sleep difficulty due to upper respiratory tract infection,” the study concluded. “Honey may be a preferable treatment for the cough and sleep difficulty associated with childhood upper respiratory tract infection.”
“The anti-inflammatory properties of ginger have been known and valued for centuries,” one study writes(2). Ginger works by suppressing inflammation on a systemic level, making it ideal for treating throat inflammations associated with the common cold. Unlike over the counter anti-inflammatory drugs like Ibuprofen, ginger has no side effects and is safe to ingest even in large quantities.
When combined together, ginger and honey make an ideal home remedy for treating cold symptoms.
sources:
[1]https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18056558
[2]https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16117603