Kitchen Medicine...Part II

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VITAMIN C SOLUTION: 1 teaspoon powdered vitamin C (used to prevent browning in frozen fruits) in a cup of hibiscus and mint or peppermint tea or hot lemonade. Sip the drink cold if you're feverish.

TO CLEAR A STUFFY HEAD: Hot onion soup, bouillon with kelp (see ALLERGIES) or mint drink: 1 teaspoon sassafras, 1 teaspoon hyssop, juice of half a lemon, 2 cups boiling water and 4 drops mint essence with honey.

Apply hot wet packs to forehead and cheekbones. Gargle with hot salt water and use a weak, sterile salt solution as nose drops. Lightly pound the top of your head with your knuckles. At night, sleep on alternate sides and you'll at least have one clear nostril at a time for breathing.

HOT FEELING IN MOUTH AND THROAT: Sip ice-cold apricot or tomato juice or a cold lemon and honey drink. Gargle with half a teaspoon of vinegar in a glass of cold water.

RUNNY NOSE: See ALLERGIES. Take 1,000 milligrams of vitamin C four times daily. Blot the nose or blow it gently so as not to force infection into the ears.

SWOLLEN GLANDS AT ANGLE OF JAW: Eat chicken gizzards simmered until very tender in water to cover along with a bay leaf, a stalk of celery (sliced), 3 or 4 peppercorns and a pinch of tarragon.

Gently massage camphorated oil into the glands, wrap the throat with an old fuzzy sock or piece of flannel and stay out of the wind.

SORE THROAT: Pour a cupful of boiling water over 1 tablespoon of whole cloves, steep the mixture covered for 15 minutes and sip this tea frequently to allay pain. Or keep a whole clove or two in your mouth and bite down on them once in a while to release the numbing juice.

Gargle with 1/2 teaspoon salt in 1 cup hot water, or 1 teaspoon dried sage leaves steeped in 1 cup hot water and 1 teaspoon vinegar.

Take 100 milligrams of pantothenic acid—a B vitamin—daily and eat additional sources of the acid such as liver, kidney, rice polish, food yeast, wheat germ, soybeans, peanuts and egg yolks. As a happy by-product of adding these to your diet you may find that your corns, calluses and bunions bother you much less and that you look and feel younger.

Try this "fountain of youth" recipe for calf's liver teriyaki: Wipe slices of liver and cut them in inch-wide strips. Dredge the pieces in rice bran, rice polish or brown-rice flour and brown them in sesame oil. Sprinkle the slices well with teriyaki sauce and a pinch of sweet basil and cook them covered over low heat just until no redness is left in their centers. (Long or fast cooking toughens liver.)

EARACHE: Apply a hot, dry towel or a half-filled hot water bottle wrapped in cloth. If pain persists, warm olive or saffron oil (wrist-test it for comfortable temperature) can be dropped into the ear with a medicine dropper and a hot, dry pack applied. Sharp pains in the ear can be countered by brief application of a cold, moist pack.

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