You are used to getting your Chinese herbs from us in tea form but did you know there are many herbs which can be used as food. One of my favorite ways of incorporating healing herbs into my life is by cooking with them. This simple recipe for steamed chicken includes red dates known as da zao in Chinese and long prized as a blood tonic that calms the mind and aids sleep. Other herbs in this recipe are lily buds known as jin zhen cai which are known as a brain tonic and for their anxiety-relieving properties and cloud mushrooms translated in Chinese as yun zhi and renowned as a tonic that boosts immunity.

Skinless, boneless chicken cut into 1″ pieces (I like thighs best)

2 tbsp rice wine

2 tbsp soy sauce

1 tsp sesame oil

2 tsp cornflour

Large piece of ginger, finely chopped

A handful of Chinese Red Date (Jujube)

A handful of Dried Chinese Cloud Mushrooms

A handful of Dried Lily Flowers

Chopped green onions.

Mix the rice wine, soy sauce, sesame oil, ginger and cornflour and marinate the Chicken pieces in this mixture for at least an hour. Meanwhile soak the cloud mushrooms and lily buds in warm water for an hour. The mushrooms will puff up to several times their normal size. Then rinse the fungus and trim the stem which is hard and woody. Halve the red dates and remove the pit.

Put the chicken on a plate that will fit inside a bamboo steamer. Pour the marinade over the top and scatter the cloud ears, red dates and lily buds over the top of the chicken. Put the plate inside a steamer for about 15-20 minutes or until the chicken is thoroughly cooked through.5 minutes before the end of cooking toss in some chopped green onions.

Serve with rice.

Kathryn, one of our lovely YinOva patients was reading our book Making Babies: A Proven 3-Month Program for Maximum Fertility when she had a thought. She facebooked me to suggest that we start collecting fertility-friendly recipes and publishing them here on the blog. I loved the idea and thought her first two recipe suggestions were great. I’m growing cucumbers in my garden so her creamy cucumber soup sounds wonderful and her second recipe for a spicy lentil soup is a fabulous hot weather idea.

These recipes are inspired by our book and nourishing for people who are trying to conceive but they’re also just lovely summer fare. Enjoy!

Thanks, Kathryn, for your contribution. I hope you’ll write more recipes and share them with the YinOva community and for anyone else out there who wants to join in I say, feel free….email me, comment or facebook me and I’ll put your recipes on the YinOva blog.

K’s Creamy Cucumber Soup

2 medium onions, roughly chopped
2 T. butter
4 cucumbers, peeled, seeded & chopped
4 oz. fresh goat cheese
sea salt
white pepper

Saute onions with butter and 1 tsp salt until soft (“sweated”) but not browned. Add cucumbers and cook until tender. Remove from heat and puree in a blender with the chevre (a VitaMix is ideal for this, but a food processor or a blender works fine). Add salt and white pepper to taste. Chill in the fridge. Serve cold or room temperature.

Kathryn emailed me to add that she often chops mint and sprinkles it on this soup.

K’s Super-Delicious Red Lentil Soup

1 T. olive oil
1 inch fresh ginger, peeled & sliced
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 stalks lemongrass, bruised and cut into 3 inch lengths
1 medium red onion, finely chopped
1/2 or 1 jalapeno pepper, seeded and finely chopped (optional)
1 can light coconut milk
1 c. red split lentils
4 c. water
1 t. sea salt, or more to taste
1 large handful cilantro, finely chopped (I love cilantro, so I tend to go heavy handed with it, but some people hate it)
4 fresh scallions, finely chopped
2 c. fresh baby spinach
½ lime, juiced (about 1 or 2 tablespoons)

Saute ginger, garlic, lemongrass, onion, and optional jalapeno in olive oil, until fragrant (leave the ginger & lemongrass large enough so that you can remove the pieces from the soup later). Add water, coconut milk, red lentils and salt. Cook until lentils are tender, about 40 minutes. Remove lemongrass & ginger pieces. Add cilantro, scallions, spinach and cook until spinach is wilted (but don’t overcook!). Add salt and lime juice to taste. Yummy!

We love the Union Square Farmer’s Market and think you will too! If you make it to our beautiful, new, spacious offices on a market day (Monday, Wednesday, Friday & Saturday) be sure to give yourself extra time to stop there.

It runs all year round and has lovely, fresh produce  grown here in the tri-state area. Ask when you are in the office and we can direct you to the one near us or if you live in the 5 boroughs check here for a farmers market closer to home.

This weather makes it pretty hard for even the perkiest among us to maintain our energy. Many or our patients are telling us that they are hankering for second and third cups of tea or coffee in this weather and we understand.

At times that’s a manageable quick fix but here’s something that may be a little more long lasting (and may also help you get through the gray days of winter): a little extra B complex vitamin. B vitamins are essential for metabolic function – we can’t make energy without them. And they are water soluble, so what your body doesn’t need it will excrete through your urine (often making it bright yellow). Here’s a brand we like.

Mung Beans are prized throughout Asia for their nutritional and medicinal benefits. It’s worth having some of these small green beans on hand because, unlike other beans, they don’t need any soaking making them particularly handy when you need to whip up a healthy meal, quickly, from the contents of your store cupboard.

In Ayurveda, Mung beans are popular because they are tridoshic – meaning they can be eaten to balance all three dosha’s, Vata, Pita and Kapha. In Chinese medicine they are called lu dou (literally green bean) and are prized for their ability to cool an overheated system making them a great summer meal.

From a nutritional point of view they are high in dietary fiber and protein as well as being a good source of vitamin C, vitamin K, riboflavin, folate, copper, manganese, thiamin, niacin, vitamin B6, pantothenic acid, iron, magnesium, phosphorus and potassium.  Tiny green nutritional powerhouses!

Mung Bean Dahl

Ingredients
2 tbsps olive oil
1 Onion diced fine
2 Carrots, diced
2 Celery Stalks, diced
3 Cloves Garlic chopped
1 Jalapeno pepper, chopped
1 tbsp curry powder
2 tbsps finely chopped fresh ginger
1 tsp Cumin Seed
1 tsp Turmeric
1/2 tsp ground black pepper
1 large fresh tomato, chopped
1 cup mung beans
5 cups veggie stock
1 teaspoon salt

Pour 1 1/2 tbsp olive oil into a 4qt pot and saute the onions over a low flame until transparent. Add the carrots. celery and garlic and put a lid on the pot to sweat the vegetables over a low heat for 5 minutes. Take the lid of the pan and add the jalapeno and the ginger and sauté uncovered for 5 minutes.

In other small skillet pour 1/2 tbsp of olive oil and heat. Add cumin seeds and toast for 1 minute, then add the turmeric, curry powder and pepper and stir for another 30 seconds. Add these spices to the vegetables and then add the chopped tomato and stir. Cook until mushy.

Wash the mung beans and add them along with the vegetable stock. Bring to a boil. Turn to a low boil and cook until the beans are soft and broken up (this depends on how old the beans are, mine took 40 minutes). Add salt and cook for a further 5 minutes and serve with brown rice and cilantro sprinkled on the top.

I cooked some of this yesterday and served it over barley, which in Chinese medicine clears damp, making it a great grain for a humid day. A bit of yogurt mixed with mint was a refreshing finishing touch.

In our book Making Babies: A Proven 3-Month Program for Maximum Fertility Dr. David and I discuss the alarming fact that male sperm counts have halved since our grandfather’s generation. My patients are shocked when I tell them this and their next question is usually, “why?”. I always answer that it’s hard to lay the blame on one thing, but that our generation has been exposed to the kind of chemical cocktail that would have been inconceivable in our grandparent’s time.

So it was with some interest that I read a new report, authored by Professor Richard Sharpe, a reproductive biologist of the Medical Research Council in the UK, linking the use of chemicals found in food, cosmetics and cleaning products to an increased risk of birth defects, testicular cancer and infertility among unborn boys. You can read about this report on the BBC website here or download a PDF of the actual report here. Professor Sharpe, a reproductive biologist, discusses the threat to baby boys of chemicals that block the action of the male sex hormone testosterone, or mimic the female sex hormone estrogen, which can “feminize” male infants whilst still in the womb. He points out that chemicals that are harmless on their own may be having a cumulative effect that is more sinister.

There is no doubt that male reproductive health is deteriorating – more male babies are being born with birth defects effecting their penises, testicular cancer is on the rise and sperm counts are dropping. Collectively these symptoms are known as Testicular Dysgenesis Syndrome, which is a term used to describe the disruption of testosterone in boys. The report examines animal studies that link testosterone-disrupting chemicals to de-masculinization in wildlife.

So what can we do? It would seem that pregnant women are mostly at risk in weeks 8 – 10 of their pregnancies but it makes sense to avoid environmental toxins throughout pregnancy and if possible in the period before conception. As Dr. Sharpe told the Daily Mail. “You can’t do anything about chemicals in the environment but you can control what you expose a baby to through your lifestyle choices. Because we don’t know the complete list of chemicals that may be hormone disrupters, and we don’t know how they interact, we can’t point a finger at an individual chemical. The message is to avoid them, just as you should avoid alcohol and drugs.”

So at the YinOva Center here is the advice we give out Moms-to-be

• Avoid processed foods where possible. That means limiting foods that have been made in a factory.
• Eat as much organic food as your budget will allow. Patients often tell me that the cost of eating organic is what puts them off and I understand this from my own experience. In this YinOva blog entry from last year, I described how, in my own family, we cut down on food wastage in order to be able to afford to eat better quality food.
• Switch your deodorant to one that is made from natural ingredients. After trying quite a few natural deodorants, with mixed results, we decided we really like this one which you can get on Amazon – Alvera Aloe Based Roll-On Deodorant.
• Use natural soaps and cosmetic products. Tom’s of Maine is a great brand as is Kiss My Face. When I was looking for a good natural toothpaste I tried many brands and settled on the Triple Action Aloe Vera Toothpaste by Kiss My Face for it’s minty taste and clean feel.
• Each American family uses about 40lbs of toxic cleaning products every year. This site has some good advice about making your own non-toxic cleaning kit. In my own house I’ve been impressed with how much cleaning can be accomplished with vinegar, baking soda and lemon juice.
• Don’t panic! I know how overwhelming information like this can be and really all we can do is our best. There is no need to obsessively avoid every chemical out there. Just cut down the chemical load you are exposed to.