The second wave of Covid is on and we need to be even more careful. Despite taking precautions, if you find yourself infected, don’t worry. Your body can easily fight the virus if you take the right kind of food and look after yourself. If you are Covid positive, then you should take food that will boost your immunity and help you overcome weakness. So here’s an essential list of food to eat during COVID:
1. Morning drink: First thing in the morning take a glass of lemon juice water, add a little turmeric (haldi), chia seeds, and a pinch of cinnamon. Drink this warm lemon juice water to feel fresh and energetic. Haldi and cinnamon are anti-viral in nature, lemon juice is known to boost immunity. This could become an excellent way to start your day. A tablespoon of honey and a few drops of ginger could be consumed at any time of day. This combination has excellent anti-viral properties—it is anti inflammatory and an anti-oxidant. So add this as the first item in your list of food to eat during COVID.
2. Breakfast: Next on our list of food to eat during COVID is poha, upma, idli, dosa or a variety of chapattis can be had for breakfast. A spoon of ghee also should be used; you could add it to the abovementioned dishes or also have it separately. Ghee gives you very good gut health, it prevents gases from being formed and also prevents acidity. Food gets digested easily. Due to the infection, the digestive system becomes very poor and it makes one feel uneasy, but if you add ghee you will feel comfortable and your digestion will be strong. Most important, have some herbal tea with your breakfast. Boil water with ginger, lemon grass, mint leaves, you could also add tulsi leaves, and boil it well. Strain it, add a little milk, add jaggery, and have this healthy drink.
3. Lunch: Should be easily digestible vegetarian food. It could be dal rice, it could be chapatti and vegetables, preferably green leafy vegetables like spinach. Have a glass of buttermilk also with lunch. Spinach has a lot of nitrates which produces nitric oxide which has anti-inflammatory properties that can stop the virus from spreading. Even pomegranate juice, beetroot juice, pineapple juice have nitrates and are good for health. So make sure to add these to your list of food to eat during COVID.
4. Evening snack: Dates, nuts, seeds must become part of your diet, and in the evening you can munch something light like puffed rice, pop corn, dry bhel, chana. These are excellent snacks but should be consumed in small quantities.
5. Dinner: Dinner should be light. It could be a khichdi or a very thin dal as a soup or any other soup like mixed vegetable soup or sweet corn soup or any other soup. This could be had with khakhra or chapatti or bhakri.
6. Before going to bed, have a small cup of warm milk with turmeric. Milk with turmeric is something we must eat during COVID. In Ayurveda, it is said that turmeric milk is ojas in nature, it gives you a good amount of energy, it relaxes you. It helps you sleep well, and if you sleep well all the hormones in your body are going to help you come back up to a high-immunity level. Foods like lemon juice, beet, honey, dates, they are all alkaline in nature, which is good for the body. Foods like garam masala, fried food, packed food, and there are many more are acidic in nature; the ratio of alkaline to acidic foods should be 2/3rd and 1/3 rd. Packaged, processed, and junk food should be avoided at all costs anyway.
So watch your diet, eat the right kind of food, boost your immunity and you will be back in good shape. Follow the list of food toe at during COVID to boost your immunity.