Flu-Fighting Ginger Tea

For the past month I've listened to everyone in my office cough, sneeze and blow their noses. I stood my ground and proudly represented the "healthy few" with the aid of my echinacea tinctures, plenty of sleep and my good friend the neti pot. However, last Monday I finally succumbed and came down with one helluva head cold. My sinuses were totally blocked and my head was pounding with the pressure.

It was time to take action, and I remembered reading about Stephen Bunner's immune-boosting, sinus-clearing ginger tea in the Mother Earth News article Homemade Herbal Medicines for Common Ailments. The recipe below is a variation of Stephen's recipe.

Ingredients

2 pieces ginger rhizome

1/2 lemon

1 tbsp honey

2 c. hot water

sprinkle of cayenne pepper.

Put the ginger root through a juicer to extract the pure essence. If you don't have a juicer, cut the ginger into disks and simmer in 2 cups water for 15 minutes to make ginger tea. Remove from heat and strain out the ginger bits. 

When juiced, the 2 pieces of ginger root made almost exactly 1 oz. of pure ginger essence. This is wonderfully spicy stuff, so use with caution. 

Pour hot water over the ginger juice, then add fresh lemon juice, however much cayenne pepper you can stand, and a spoonful of honey. You can really feel this spicy tea working on your sinuses; it tingles up in your nose like wasabi. Because ginger is such a fantastic digestive aid, this ginger tea would also make a great after-dinner drink.