Cold busting home remedy – v.2

garlic, ginger

Super simple cold busting drink recipe

In my post from 2017, I wrote about my recipe to bust colds. I still stand by my fiery adult ginger & garlic brew and kiddie friendly garlic lemonade, they are delicious ‘opera’ on an incredibly effective cold busting theme. Yet here we are at the cusp of Autumn 2021 after 18 months of Covid-19 lockdowns and the cold bugs are doing the rounds aplenty.

Variations on a garlic theme

This short but sweet time, I am excited to share with you my VARIATIONS to warm the cockles, delight the tastebuds and get rid of that cold. Let’s agree right here and now that ginger, garlic and boiling water are base ingredients for this spiced brew. Ginger chopped into matchsticks, garlic cloves sliced into a fan so each one stays together; mine are promptly pushed into a thermos jug and topped up with boiling water, left to infuse for a good ten minutes before pouring. I like to refill the jug as needed and the spice mix inside stays powerful all day. I love how the spiciness builds up over time. One of my best mugs to pour is first thing in the morning, the brew made the night before.

  • Simply spicy: Add 2 black peppercorns
  • Warming spice: 2 black peppercorns, 1 clove & 1 split black cardamom pod – my personal favourite
  • Sweet: 1 cinnamon stick
  • Aromatic: 2 split green cardamoms, grated nutmeg

As you can see, there is nothing ground breaking here, but super tasty and simple happily go hand in hand. There may be other spice combinations you’d like to try. I’d love to hear how you get on! Do share your spicy experiments with me. Got a feeling star anise could go very well here, as could chilli, Szechuan peppercorns……