Is it necessary to peel ginger before eating it?

Ginger peel is by no means something dispensable. It is a traditional Chinese medicine in its own right. Whether to eat it peeled or with the peel depends on the specific situation. 

 

Traditional Chinese medicine believes that fresh ginger is pungent in taste and warm in nature, with effects of dispelling cold and releasing the exterior, reducing counterflow and stopping vomiting, detoxifying and stopping diarrhea, resolving phlegm and stopping cough; while ginger peel is pungent in taste and cool in nature, with effects of promoting urination and reducing swelling. Therefore, there is a saying: "keeping the ginger peel makes it cool, removing the ginger peel makes it warm".

In this sense, the skin and flesh of a plant are a pair of yin and yang.

 

Once you understand this principle, you will naturally know when to eat with the skin and when to eat without it.

Ginger peeling

• Spleen and stomach deficiency：Vomiting, stomach pain, etc.
• Eat cold foods such as bitter melon, celery, crab, etc.
• Colds and flu

Ginger without peeling

• Ginger generally used for cooking (can maintain the balance of ginger's medicinal properties and also prevent internal heat)
• When edema
• Spleen and stomach damp-heat: symptoms include constipation, bad breath, etc.

 

Understood when to use ginger peel and when not to, but there's another question: are there any considerations for eating ginger in the summer?

 

4 tips for eating ginger:

1. Ginger is best eaten in the morning or at noon

Traditional Chinese medicine believes in the correspondence between heaven and humans; during the day when yang energy is vigorous, one should be more active, and taking warming and tonifying medicines can help promote the growth of yang energy.
 
When the yin energy gradually becomes strong at night, the yang energy needs to contract. At this time, consuming too much warm and hot food or supplements can affect sleep and the body's synthesis and metabolism, which is harmful to the body.
 
Therefore, usually, eating ginger during the day is beneficial, but it is not advisable to eat ginger at night.

 

2. Eating ginger is not necessarily better

People are prone to symptoms such as facial flushing, dry mouth, irritability, sore throat, and constipation, which are signs of heat syndrome. Ginger is a pungent and warm food, and according to the principle of "treating heat with cold," it should not be eaten in excess.

 

3. It is not suitable to use ginger for summer heat cold and wind heat cold

Ginger and brown sugar water is suitable for colds caused by wind-cold or chills and fever after getting caught in the rain. It should not be used for summer heat colds or wind-heat colds, and it is definitely not to be used to treat heatstroke.

 

4. Don't eat rotten ginger.

Rotten ginger produces a highly toxic organic compound called safrole, which can cause degeneration of liver cells and may induce cancer.
So, some people think rotten ginger can be eaten, believing "rotten ginger doesn't have a rotten taste," but this is actually incorrect.