Immunity Super Soup....

The crisp cool air, the bulky sweaters and thick scarves, hot coffee and of course, hot soup!  Winter is here and I hear all around me of people getting that almost inevitable cold or flu.  Yuck, I hate getting sick, and I am going to try super hard to avoid this....!  {Good luck to me!} I could eat soup everyday, I enjoy making home-made soup so why not indulge in this everyday?!?!?!  Soup can be very healthy especially if you prepare it yourself, you can control what goes in, and let me tell you, all it takes it a whole lotta love and wholesome goodness to make good soup...   

I LOVE Dr. Oz, how could you not!  He is adorable, and knowledgeable!  I caught this great episode, as a working mom I don't get to watch regularly, and it was about your immune system and doing healthy natural things to keep your body fighting those nasty germs!   Chef Ming Tsai, also adorable, made this soup on the show and talked about all the great ingredients and how they help your body fight off the germs and claimed he hasn't been sick in a really long time!  I bought into it and had to make this soup, I love soup and spicy soup is the BOMB!  Yummy! 

A quote from Ming that I also fell in love with, "Food is the best medicine...." Amen.

Here is the link to Dr. Oz but I will share with you here as well, I added chopped fresh parsley because I love it! 

1 jalapeno (with seeds)

1 tbs grape seed oil (I didn't have this so I used coconut oil)

1 tbs minced ginger

1 tbs minced garlic (I love garlic and added more!)

2 bunches of scallions

1 lb of shitakes

black pepper

put it all in a pot and cook it down for 2-3 minutes, moving it around with a spoon.

2 qts of low sodium chicken stock or chicken broth (best choice is stock...)

2 lemons juiced

2 tbs brewed soy sauce

2 carrots shredded

1 block of silken tofu (I tried both silken and firm, I preferred the silken!)

black pepper

Add lemon zest and scallions to garnish! Enjoy! {I couldn't wait, and left this out!}

Do you have any cold remedies or ways you keep your family healthy during the fall/winter months when everyone else is sick spreading their germs EVERYWHERE!?  Some other natural cold remedies we will be trying this year….thanks to the Dr. Oz show…

-Bilberry extract to help fight a cold

-garlic foot rub: minced garlic + olive oil, another fighter

-cough syrup: 1 tbs apple cider vinegar, 1 tbs honey, 1/4 tsp ground ginger, 1/4 tsp cayenne pepper

-Congestion: pineapple

-Sore throat: colloidal silver spray (kills bacteria)

-Headache: Capsaicin spray, 2 sprays in each nostril

And of course good old home-made chicken noodle soup can help those days you or your family members are under the weather.....!  And its great for the soul.  Why not send some soup to a neighbor or an elderly person you know as an act of kindness this winter..........

Wishing you a healthy winter,

~annette