Staying Well: 4. Raw Garlic

4. Raw Garlic

Garlic. Yum! Now, more than ever, it is important to include the bulb of this perennial culinary and medicinal plant in your diet. Roast it! Cook with it! Ferment it! But most of all, include some RAW garlic in your diet these days.

Here’s a little history of garlic, “the poor man’s penicillin”[M1] . (Not that I think you should be taking penicillin or any other antibiotic for a viral infection, but you get the inference. They may be useful or required should one come down with a secondary infection such as pneumonia, etc.) Garlic, aka Allium sativum in Latin, has been used therapeutically for thousands of years, to both guard against disease and to treat it. The first known references go as far back as about the sixth century BC! Garlic was used medicinally in Sumeria and ancient Egypt, ancient China and India, through the Renaissance…. ancient and modern medical texts cite the use of garlic for everything from increasing stamina (ancient Greece) to treating leprosy and parasites (ringworm and threadworm topically, pinworms internally), arthritis, chronic cough, asthma, hay fever, constipation, snake bites (!), earaches, goiter, candidiasis, bronchial or pulmonary infections, and infectious diseases (including tuberculosis and pertussis, aka Whooping Cough). The list goes on, and varies, depending upon where you look and with whom you talk. However, the “therapeutic properties of garlic” (a plant, an herb) are being studied in western medicine, so it’s not just history, folks.  

How can garlic help so many conditions? According to the Holistic Herbal[M2] , as a medicinal herb its properties are antiseptic, anti-microbial[M3] , diaphoretic (aid the skin in elimination of toxins and promote perspiration), cholagogue (stimulate and release bile from gall bladder and more), hypotensive, anti-spasmodic, alterative (blood cleansers), anthelmintic (destroy or expel worms from the digestive system), anti-catarrhal, carminative (support digestion), expectorant, pectoral (strengthen respiratory system), rubefacient (increase circulation in the skin), stimulant, tonic and vulnerary (applied externally and aid the body in healing cuts and wounds). Garlic helps with blood pressure and cardiovascular health, as well as digestive health. (So if you have any of these things are going on for you, eating garlic be an added bonus.) For this article, we are going to focus on garlic’s antiseptic and anti-microbial properties, as well as how it works with the respiratory system, on and through the lungs. As an anti-microbial, garlic is a quadruple crown: it is anti-bacterial, anti-fungal, anti-parasitic, and anti-viral. According to master herbalist Rosemary Gladstar, “Its volatile oil, mucilage and germanium make this one of the most effective anti-microbial plants available[M4] .” Can’t get much better than that!

When is garlic called for? Upper respiratory infections such as the common cold and chronic sinusitis as well as sore throats, and lower respiratory infections such as bronchial asthma, chronic bronchitis, as well as a dry, hacking cough. Use garlic for lower respiratory catarrh (mucous build up and inflammation) and influenza!

Here’s how we are going to use garlic prophylactically:

Eat raw garlic every day. When crushed, garlic releases allicin which is more powerfully antibiotic than penicillin and tetracycline. As it moves through the bloodstream, it disinfects all it encounters, and is excreted via the lungs, bowels, skin and urinary system[M5] .

How much is enough to stay well? Start with one clove of raw garlic per day for children 8 to 12, and 2 cloves per day for everyone older.  If you are not used to eating garlic this way, go “slow and steady”. Remember that garlic is effective for so many other systems besides what we are focusing on, the respiratory system. If you eat too much raw garlic, you may experience what is called “die off” in the digestive system or another system. Die off symptoms may include fatigue, headaches, muscle aches, joint pain, loose bowel movements or diarrhea, gas/bloating, nausea, and/or flu like symptoms. If this happens, back off for a few days, and then reintroduce garlic—less than the amount that caused the die off. Watch your body, listen to what it tells you about how much it can tolerate and slowly increase the amount you consume.

How best to consume?

Press a clove or two of raw garlic into your daily dose of stock or broth right before you drink it. Press garlic into every serving of soup or stew that you eat. Another wonderful hot tonic to add to your daily regime: hot water with a squeeze of lemon, a few pressed garlic cloves, and a pinch of cayenne.

What else can you do with garlic?

Cook with it, roast it, and ferment it! Just because you are eating raw garlic does not mean you should stop using it in cooking, etc.

Here’s an old time remedy should you get sick, especially with a respiratory infection or cough: a Garlic Poultice for the bottom of the feet.[M6]  It may be stinky, but it will be powerful!

Garlic Poultice for the Feet

Ingredients

Several heads of organic garlic

Special Equipment/Supplies

4 pieces of thin cloth, cut to the size of the foot

4-6 strips of cloth for tying

cutting board

sharp knife

lard, tallow, coconut oil, or other saturated fat

Instructions

Remove the skin from garlic cloves. Chop finely enough cloves to make a poultice about 1/4 inch thick to cover the bottom of each foot.

Spread the minced garlic evenly on piece of soft cloth that is big enough to cover the bottom of the foot you are making the poultices for, then place a second, thin piece of cloth that is the same size over the garlic. (It will be like a cloth sandwich with garlic filling.)

“…grease the bottoms of the feet with lard…or similar grease.” (Very important. If garlic is put directly on the bottom of the feet, the skin will burn or blister.)

Place the prepared poultice on the bottom of the feet, securing with strips of cloth. Put old socks on over the feet to keep the poultice in place overnight.

Remove carefully in the morning, and store for use in the evening. Garlic poultices may be used several times.

Stay well, all!

Here are some more resources for you:

Kerry Bone, The Ultimate Herbal Compendium

Tom Cowan, The Fourfold Path to Healing, “Infectious Disease”

David Hoffman, The Complete Illustrated Holistic Herbal,” Garlic”, “The Action of Herbs”, “The Respiratory System”, “Fighting off Invaders”

Bernard Jensen, Foods that Heal, “Garlic”

Richard Lucas, Nature’s Medicines, “The Bulb with Miracle Healing Powers”

Anne McIntyre, Flower Power: Flower Remedies for Healing Body and Soul through Herbalism, Homeopathy, Aromatherapy, and Flower Essences, “Garlic, The Flower of Power”

“Garlic: a review of potential therapeutic effects”, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4103721/

Please note: I am not an herbalist or a medical doctor. If you are sick, consult a licensed herbalist or other healing professional for more information.

 [M1]Rosemary Gladstar, Herbal Healing for Women, p. 29

Note: penicillin is anti-bacterial, not anti-viral.

 [M2]David Hoffman, The Complete Illustrated Holistic Herbal, p. 57.

 [M3]Anti-microbial plants focus on “surface immune activation”, that is, they help to resist pathogenic micro-organisms by stimulating the activity and generation of white blood cells. The Complete Illustrated Holistic Herbal, p. 17.

 [M4]Holistic Healing for Women, p. 29.

 [M5]Anne McIntyre, Flower Power, p. 54-56.

 [M6]Richard Lucas, Nature’s Remedies, “Garlic and Whooping Cough”, p. 49