Introduction: Traditional Chinese medicine tells us that if we have bad breath, we should seek treatment as soon as possible. Our modern lives are busy, and our irregular lifestyles can easily lead to various diseases. Professor Tan Jing, the director of the stomatology department at the First Affiliated Hospital of Hunan University of Chinese Medicine, says that in our daily lives, we often encounter a strange phenomenon: we don't feel sick, but our mouths have an unpleasant odor.
Bitter taste: This is often related to abnormal bile metabolism. Usually, a bitter taste reflects excessive heat in the liver and gallbladder or internal disturbance by phlegm-heat. In terms of diet, it's advisable to avoid spicy, fried, and grilled foods that are too hot in nature. One can consume more cooling soups such as wolfberry leaf and egg soup, chrysanthemum barley winter melon sugar water, fresh bamboo shoots stewed with lean meat, etc.
Sweet taste: Disruption of the digestive system function can cause abnormal secretion of various digestive enzymes, especially an increase in the content of amylase in saliva, which stimulates the taste buds on the tongue and causes a sweet taste in the mouth. In traditional Chinese medicine, a sweet taste is associated with heat in the spleen. A sweet taste reflects heat in the spleen, which can be either real heat or virtual heat. Those with real heat experience dry mouth and thirst, constipation, and yellow urine. Those with virtual heat may have reduced appetite and feel tired and weak. In terms of diet, those with real heat should avoid hot and spicy foods and can eat heat-clearing and fire-purgative foods such as tofu cabbage soup, kudzu carp soup, wild amaranth soup, etc. Those with virtual heat can consume lotus seed syrup, Huai mountain yam and lotus seeds stewed with duck, and Codonopsis pilosula Huai mountain yam stewed with snakehead fish, etc.
Sour taste: In traditional Chinese medicine, a sour taste is associated with weakness in the spleen and stomach or heat in the liver meridian. If there is heat in the liver meridian, one will experience a sour taste along with bitterness, fullness and pain in the chest and ribs, irritability, headaches, dizziness, yellow urine, and dry stools. In terms of diet, those with heat in the liver meridian should avoid spicy and fried foods that are too hot in nature and should instead consume cooling foods such as raw fish slices with wolfberry soup, chrysanthemum rice porridge, kelp bright pearl soup, etc. Those with insufficient spleen qi should consume spleen-nourishing and stomach-warming foods such as Codonopsis pilosula wolfberry Huai mountain yam stewed with black chicken, pepper stewed pig stomach, crucian carp glutinous rice porridge, etc.
Salty taste: In traditional Chinese medicine, a salty taste is caused by kidney fluid rising upward. Overwork, old age, and prolonged illness can all lead to kidney deficiency. In terms of diet, those with kidney yin deficiency should avoid spicy and hot yang-enhancing foods and should instead consume yin-nourishing and kidney-supplementing foods such as Huai mountain yam wolfberry stewed softshell turtle, Polygonatum multiflorum Huai mountain yam stewed hen, sea cucumber glutinous rice porridge, Huai mountain yam wolfberry stewed wild duck, etc. Those with kidney yang deficiency should avoid cold and raw kidney-damaging foods and should instead consume warming and kidney-strengthening foods such as deer antler gelatin ginger rice porridge, wolfberry chestnut stewed mutton, aconite stewed dog meat, deer antler slice stewed lean meat, etc.
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