Can white sugar be added to traditional Chinese medicine?

Currently, Western medicine is the first choice of treatment when people suffer from diseases, but Western medicine is effective quickly but has side effects. This is also the main reason why traditional Chinese medicine is still popular among people. When using traditional Chinese medicine, drinking Chinese medicine is indispensable, but Chinese medicine is generally very bitter. So some patients will add some sugar when drinking Chinese medicine, is this really appropriate?

Generally, Chinese medicine practitioners will add licorice as a seasoning when prescribing Chinese medicine. But for some children, the sweetness of licorice alone is not enough to make them accept the pungent and bitter taste of traditional Chinese medicine. At this time, it is actually a good choice for parents to add some honey to the traditional Chinese medicine to make it taste better. The main components of honey are fructose and glucose, which are easily absorbed by children's stomachs. They are rich in nutrients and have medicinal value such as moistening the lungs and intestines. However, it should also be noted that the various trace elements in honey may change the efficacy of the medicine, so you need to follow the doctor's advice.

If white sugar is added to traditional Chinese medicine, that is another matter. Traditional Chinese medicine has four properties: cold, hot, warm, and cool, and five flavors: pungent, sweet, sour, bitter, and salty. Chinese medicines with different tastes have different medicinal effects. White sugar is hot in nature, so some Chinese herbal decoctions add white sugar, which will change the medicinal properties and affect the efficacy. Even if you add sugar to traditional Chinese medicine for flavoring, you should pay attention to the amount. It is unnecessary to make a bowl of traditional Chinese medicine too sweet.

Here are some tips to forget the pain:

First, pay attention to the temperature of the medicine. Relevant expert research has confirmed that the tongue is particularly sensitive to temperatures above 37°C. Therefore, the temperature of bitter decoctions should be kept between 15°C and 37°C.

Second, pay attention to the part where you hold and swallow the Chinese medicine. Human bitter taste receptors are mainly concentrated in the front half of the tongue, especially the tip of the tongue. Therefore, after the medicine enters the mouth, it is best to hold the medicine at the root of the tongue immediately and swallow it naturally. You can also use a spoon to directly send the medicine to the root of the tongue and swallow it naturally.

In fact, when taking traditional Chinese medicine, you should pay attention to some food taboos. For example, people now wonder whether you can add white sugar to traditional Chinese medicine. The answer is no, because white sugar will reduce the efficacy of the medicine. If you feel that drinking Chinese medicine is too bitter and painful, you might as well take a look at the tips I shared above to get rid of the bitterness!