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2003-09-05 - 9:57 a.m.

Kitchen Remedies

You’re wrong if you think kitchen remedies are ways to salvage lumpy gravy, mend salty soup or soften hard-as-a-rock brown sugar. Kitchen remedies are those concoctions your grandmother used to cure what ailed her…and anyone else allowing her to administer treatment.

In today’s world those potions of vegetables and herbs and spices are referred to as—don’t let granny hear this--alternative medicine. Or sometimes the ayurvedic way. Ayurveda means "the science of life,” and is the traditional hindu system of medicine.

Hey, don’t ask me, I’m just telling a story about how some folks beat the medical system out of high-dollar care by treating themselves with stuff stashed in their kitchen cabinets.

In recent months I’ve had trouble sleeping. Tossing. Turning. Brief hours of sleep. Long hours of being irritable and unfocused during the day. I’m rarely ill, and I avoid doctors and prescription meds whenever possible, so when a friend suggested finding a natural sleep aid (another offered to smack me upside the head with a two by four) I went searching for a cure for insomnia. I found two treatments: take plenty of curd and massage it on my head, and if that doesn’t work—I could gently massage the soles of my feet with sesame oil.

I don’t think so. Maybe the two by four!

Still, I found some remarkable elixirs made from kitchen ingredients alleged to cure almost any ache or pain. Garlic seems to be the main medicinal herb, listed in cures for backache to warts.

• Backache: Two or three cloves of garlic should be taken every morning. Also, an oil prepared from garlic and rubbed on the back will relieve an aching back.

• Earache: Use three drops of garlic oil in your affected ear.

• A recipe for cold and flu: Six cloves garlic cut and sautéed in oil. Add a quart of beef stock, bring to a boil, lower heat. Separate two eggs and add whites to the hot liquid, stirring rapidly. Mix yolks with two tablespoons vinegar and then pour them in.

• Asthma: Make a garlic tincture by placing three or four peeled buds in brandy. Steep this in a dark closet for two weeks. Use several drops several times a day.

• Got warts? Try taping a slice of garlic to the wart.

New studies are showing virgin coconut oil may rival garlic oil as a natural antibiotic. Gawd knows it would smell better.

Aloe vera, well known for soothing sunburn, can also be used to treat hemorrhoids. No more running to the pharmacy in a blizzard for Preparation H! However, you down a cup of aloe vera juice three times daily; you do not apply it to the affected area.

For relief of stomach complaints, cramps, vomiting and nervous disorders, add one-half teaspoon basil to a cup of hot water. Worried about the hickey on your neck? Take care of it by coating the area liberally with lotion. Rub the back of a cold spoon vigorously on the area, changing out spoon for new, cold ones every 10 minutes. Time recommended for this treatment is 45-60 minutes.

Tired of struggling with diet plans? Try these remedies for overeating and obesity:

• Consume a cup of warm water with half a squeezed lemon and a pinch of baking soda.

• Roast one teaspoon fennel and one teaspoon coriander seeds with a pinch of salt.

• Mix lime juice with honey and water. Drink one glass every morning.

• Mix three teaspoons lime juice, one-fourth teaspoon black pepper, one teaspoon honey and one cup water. Drink a glass a day for three months.

• Mix one teaspoon lime juice with one cup water and drink each morning.

• Eat a tomato before breakfast

Want more sure cure kitchen remedies? Click here.

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