Chicken Soup

Well it's here. Cold and flu season. I've already had 3 kids out sick in my class an my little guy is all snotty. I hate watching my kids be sick with a cold since it's a virus and there's not really anything I can do about it except treat the symptoms and wait until their little bodies fight off the bug. So I always try to feed them "power food" which may or may not really work, but I figure pumping them full of vitamins and minerals and whatever else is in Kale and blueberries and all those other good things can't hurt. Then there's the treating the symptoms part. Let me preface everything I'm going to say next with this statement: I am not opposed to traditional medicines. I'm not advocating not getting vaccines or not going to a doctor, I'm just looking a greener way to make my kids feel better when they have the sniffles. OK, now THAT's cleared up! The reason I'm looking for something other than Dimatapp is that I work hard to monitor what my kids eat on a daily basis, trying to avoid putting chemicals in their bodies so it seems a like I should continue along that path when they're sick. I've tried using Similasan's Cold and Mucus Relief which I *think* does pretty well. It's available at Giant Eagle, which is convenient, and is 100% natural, whatever that means. It uses homeopathic ingredients which aren't supposed to have side effects (I'll be honest, I kind of like the "may cause drowsiness" side effect) and doesn't have any dyes or alcohol or HFCS (I'm not really even sure if other drugs do, but it seems like it's in everything!). As an adult, I've taken it too and I think it does pretty well, but since I've been nursing or pregnant for what seems like the past 7 year straight, I don't usually take medicines until my symptoms are REALLY bad. I liked Halls Breezers, since they're medicine free, but they have a lot of dyes in them, but no HFCS. And this is going to sound REALLY hippie, but I herbal tea works best for my sore throat. It's the warm water, not the herbal stuff, but I don't want to drink cup after cup of caffeinated tea in the evening. So along those lines, I'm including a recipe for the most holistic cold remedy of all: Chicken Noodle soup. Since I don't eat chicken, it's really more of a vegetable soup, but you can always add shredded chicken to it if you want (I do this for those in my family that do eat meat.) It's from The Vegetarian Mother's Cookbook by Cathe Olson. I LOVE this cookbook because she always adds ingredients just for the nutritional boost, which is especially great when you're battling the a bug.
Miso-Noodle Soup
51/2 C water
2 TBSP Chopped wakame (it's a sea vegetable that can be found dried by the Asian food)
1 carrot, thinly sliced
1 clove garlic, minced
3 green onions, thinly sliced
1 c chopped kale, cabbage, watercress, or other green
1/2 cup snow or snap peas (you need to use fresh. Frozen ones just get nasty in the soup!)
1/2 cup small uncooked pasta noodles (we use ABC noodles)
8 oz tofu, diced (or chicken)
2 TBSP miso (we use Hatcho Miso, which is strongly flavored. I've also used white miso which is much milder)
soy sauce to taste

Place water and wakame in medium-sized pan. Cover and bring to a boil over high heat. Add remaining ingredients and simmer uncovered 10 minutes, or until pasta is just cooked. Remove from heat, stir in miso (you need to take a little liquid from the pan, and mix it with the miso in a small bowl to form a paste, about the consistency of ketchup and THEN add it to the soup. Otherwise you'll end up with chunks of miso in the soup). Season with soy sauce if desired.

I love this recipe because it's fast and is uses wakame and miso as well as dark leafy greens, all of which give a great nutritional boost (I've already talked about the wonders of kale, but miso has 8 amino acids and is a good source of veggie protein as well as live enzymes which aid digestion. Wakame is high in protein, iron, calcium, vitamins and trace minerals.)

Stay healthy!