Some thoughts on dietary therapy.

[Guest guest]

Distance learning course arrived, and it's been quite educational so

far. A few things I would like to ask the instructors about, but very

useful.

 

Firstly, there is the concept of qi and wei.

" Highly nutritious foods are those which have more wei than qi. All

foods are a combination of qi and wei. In this context, qi means the

light, airy, aromatic and yang part of a food. Whereas, wei,

literally meaning taste, refers to a food's heavier, more

substantial, more nourishing, yin aspects. " (The Tao of Healthy

Eating, Bob Flaws, p. 17-18)

 

However, to make things more complicated, foods that are high in wei,

while more nutritious, are also more difficult to digest. This has to

do with the Chinese view of how food is processed by the body. I'll

try to post something on that later.

 

An important note: Some popular ideas attributed to Chinese

dietotherapy, are actually Japanese Macrobiotic innovations. For

instance, in Chinese dietotherapy, no distinction is made about

method of cooking, only about temperature of food. That the method of

cooking can further effect the energetics of diet is a Macrobiotic

idea. This is not to say that this idea is wrong or useless;

Macrobiotics were originally developed as a fusion of TCM dietary

therapy, and western ideas of nutrition. However, it is important to

remember the source of ones information, because macrobiotics and TCM

dietotherapy differ on certain key points.

 

PS: I found the " classic " I was looking for, (I suppose not a classic

like the Nei Jing, but hopefully educational) and fortunately there

seems to be an English translation. No idea as to the quality of the

translation as I currently am awaiting it via interlibrary loan.

 

In case anyone is interested, the Chinese text is Yin-shan Zheng-yao

(Principles of Correct Diet??) by Hu Sihui written around 1330. The

English translation is by Paul D. Buell and Eugene N. Anderson, and

is called _Soup for the Qan: Chinese dietary medicine of the Mongol

era as seen in Hu Szu-Hui's Yin-shan cheng-yao: introduction,

translation, commentary and Chinese text_ (whew)

 

Mbanu