CHAGA people! If it’s not on your radar yet, you’re in for a treat. Chaga, known as the “King of Medicinal Mushrooms” grows on birch trees and has been used for centuries in folk medicine for its exceptional health benefits. It’s finally worked its way into the western psyche and is the subject of promising cancer and HIV treatment research. There’s so much information available online about chaga and its benefits, that it’s a bit overwhelming to try sum it all up. So I won’t, I’m really just here to offer a recipe. But I will leave a few links at the bottom of this post in case your interest is piqued and you’d like to find out more.
I only learned about chaga a couple of months ago when a friend mentioned that he had drunk it all winter last year (Canadian winter, people) and never got sick. As it was close to Christmas time, I latched onto the idea of making a chaga tea mix for Christmas gifts. That sent me down the rabbit hole of chaga research and now I’m hooked. (Thanks Kier!)
Here’s a bullet point summary of the benefits of chaga:
- Boosts Immune System
- Is an extraordinarily powerful antioxidant
- Is a potent adaptogen
- Has anti-viral, anti-microbrial, and anti-inflammatory properties
- Has anti-tumor effects
- Whisk together all ingredients (except for fresh ginger and whole peppercorns) until uniform. Store in an airtight container. This is your tea mix! The stevia leaves add a bit of natural sweetness, but can easily be omitted and/or replaced by your preferred sweetener.
- To Brew: Add 1 to 2 tsp of powder per cup of boiling water and allow to steep/simmer for at least 15 minutes. To spice it up, add freshly grated ginger and a few whole peppercorns to the steeping liquid. Strain and enjoy.
=> I like to brew a couple of litres at a time and then keep the tea in the fridge. This makes it easy to quickly heat a single cup and minimizes clean up.
*Pictured here are chaga chunks. They have to be steeped for at least an hour. Grind those chunks into a powder and you can steep your tea for just 15 minutes.
A few resources for further exploration:
Four Sigmatic Mushroom Academy (Free!)
Chaga Mushroom: The Immune Boosting Super Food
10 Proven Benefits of Chaga
The Healing Powers of Chaga
delicious
Pidge!!! It's amazing to hear from you! I'm definitely going to check out Turkey Tail. Thank you so much for saying hello – I hope to bump into you on the interwebs again soon!
Stumbled across this post on Google+. Almost no one I've met even knows what Chaga is. Turkey Tail has pretty amazing curative powers as well.. A host of mushrooms have been proven to be excellent anti-cancer effective. I've been studying all these for years as well as a host of other herbs using PubMed and NCBIsources for my medical research on them. Incidentally… Whole Wheat Sourdough bread is one of the few available resources for proteolytic enzymes, with the exception of 2 or 3 fruits that can help ward of neural issues, such as Alzheimer's. My research library contains about 6K papers now. Excellent news on incredibly healthful foods that heal… (Pidge)
Jen! Amazing to hear from you! It's been forever! About as long as it's been since I posted on this thing. Haha. Congratulations on the 10 month old, I can't believe your oldest is already almost 3 and a half 🙂 Wonderful. Give my best to Cody and thank you so much for saying hello!
Lacey!! How are you? I went to make the yummy breakfast bars and realized I hadn't looked at your AMAZING blog in awhile. So glad to see you are still creating magic. Would love to catch up! Also, can't wait to try this tea. With a 3 1/3 year old and a 10 month old, it seems our house is always sick! Xo