Spring Kitchardi Cleanse
So springtime is a great time to detox and cleanse. “Spring cleaning” is for both our external and internal environs. Many of us can feel this intuitively and so many cultures have traditions based in fasting during this time. It’s balancing to cleanse the body because Springtime (kapha season) is naturally a time of accumulation. The only thing is that many of us also have lives that are not supportive of taking a few weeks off to cleanse. (If your life is conducive to that, then stop reading this and start looking for flights to India to do pancha karma for 3-4weeks!)
It can be really imbalancing to do a cleanse without giving yourself the appropriate container to do this work of releasing what no longer serves you. Your life has got to align with, and hopefully support, whatever you are trying to achieve within your body and mind; you are just a reflection of the energy in your life. This is why just eating organic won’t save someone with a high stress job and lack of emotional support from health issues. Your food is a big energy input, but so are your relationships, job, climate, stage of life, financial stability, etc.
So how are all of us going to cleanse without taking time off of our work and family responsibilities? My answer is kitchardi fasting. What is kitchardi? Well, it’s been called and ayurvedic “superfood” in the latest media push, and actually, I think it lives up to that name.
Kitchardi is a stew of mung bean, basmati rice, ghee and digestive spices. The completeness score (how complete a food is in all of the elements needed by the human body–vitamins, minerals, starches, fats and proteins) of the mung lentil alone is like 80/100 (this is super rare). The 20 missing elements (like vit ADE) are supplied by the other ingredients. So this means that kitchardi gives you everything your body needs without any other foods, and actually eating kitchardi is probably giving you more of the elements your regular diet is missing.
In ayurveda, mung is recognized for its detoxifying properties, while also being rejuvenative. This is really unique because most herbs and foods that detox strip down the body tissues instead of replenishing them. So this means I can eat kitchardi, cleanse my body (and mind) while not feeling like I’m going to faint or not have the energy to keep up with my family and business. In fact, I usually feel more energized, and eat less naturally because I feel so nourished.
How do you do it? Well, here’s how I do it and you can adapt for yourself:
- eat mung everyday, mostly in the form of different kitchardi variations
- cook mung with ghee and spices in every recipe
- eat fruits (at least thirty minutes away from other food) for snacks
- add various veggies to the mung dishes and eat some steamed and spiced veggies for alternate meals
- I still have chai and herbal teas and juice as I desire
- I don’t eat anything else (except my 3 pieces of chocolate a day)
Here’s a basic recipe for kitchardi from Pranaful Chef Meredith Klein. Get creative and search online for recipes, as mung is used in a lot of different ways all over India, China and SE Asia. Vietnamese mung pudding is one of my favorite dishes. I LOVE MUNG! (Can someone make me a T-shirt with that slogan already…:))
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Yum! I remember that Vietnamese sweet pudding recipe from CWB and totally forgot about it. Thanks for the reminder. I think The Spencers will be having that for breakfast tomorrow morning. Off to soak my mung now. Love love!
Funny, I have never thought of Spring as Kapha season. To me it is a time of high energy & growth. With the constant winds of Spring, I always feel a more Vata influence & Pitta when the Santa Anas heat things up! As an Aries, I am very energized & excited about this time, feeling very optimistic & frisky!
I had my annual physical yesterday, and had a high blood pressure reading for the first time in my life. They took it several times during my visit, but it was always high. I was so surprised & wonder how this can be? I have always lived a vegetarian & athletic lifestyle.
As for the cleansing, since the above ‘diet’ is my normal daily diet plus some other vegan foods, how will my body know it is supposed to go in cleansing mode?
Spring is wet and damp and when all the seeds sprout (creative aspect of kapha). So there is a freshness, much like the feeling early in the morning when everything is wet with dew and the day is omnipotential. That feeling of kapha, that anything can be created (as from a child or a new day), may be what you are connecting to.
High blood pressure is common in long term VP imbalance. I cover this in my Western medicine meets ayurveda workshop series, under cardiovascular disease. Western medicine paints the picture of high BP as one of indulgence and related to high cholesterol, bad diet, inactivity. This doesn’t fit the majority of clients I see with high BP. Essentially, with long term VP imbalance, the arteries become hard and dry. This diminishes their capacity to expand and accomodate changes in body water balance. Decreased elasticity in the arteries results in high BP. Ghee is good to nourish deeper tissues; and all VP reduction in your life will help as well.