Did you know that your kitchen may be full of great stuff that can help you feel good? Yes, that’s right, depending on what you’ve got on hand, there may be hidden health benefits in your spice rack! In addition to the honey and tea we recently posted about, spices come with their own amazing benefits.  As you know, we’re foodies over here at Modern Kids Design, so we enjoy adding flavor to our go-to meals and drinks. Recently we were talking about it and discovered there there are quite a few power-packing spices that we each regularly turn to for health and flavor. Here we will share a few benefits of some spices that really stand out and, in our next post, which we may add this week, we will share some recipes that we hope you enjoy as much as we do. 🙂

Cinnamon

Benefits: Cinnamon is a heart helper. It helps keeps your arteries working properly, assists in managing blood sugar levels, and may even help lower cholesterol.

Uses: Sprinkle some cinnamon on your morning oatmeal or add a dash to your favorite hot drink. Baked apples sprinkled with cinnamon make a healthy snack taste decadent. If you’re baking, add a dash of cinnamon to spice up your recipe. Cinnamon is delicious in pancakes, waffles, muffins, cupcakes, scones, and more.

Ginger

Benefits: Ginger can help ease nausea or even minor stomach upset and even help reduce muscle pain and minor soreness if that’s what you’re looking for. Ginger may also reduce inflammation.

Uses: You can buy ginger tea in tea bags, or make your own. Fresh ginger can be sliced and added to a yummy stir fry or used in a mulled beverage. Powdered ginger can be added to baked goods. Ginger candies make a nice, soothing afternoon treat and a ginger cookie pairs well with tea.

Cardamom

Benefits: Cardamom is ginger’s cousin and can help with many of the same stomach issues and digestive problems.

Uses: Cardamom is generally found in chai teas and many Indian dishes. It is also great mixed with ginger and cinnamon in baked goods.

Chili

Benefits: The capsaicin in chili is heart healthy and can help curb pain and ulcers.

Uses: Whether in a meat or veggie chili or added to your favorite stew, chili can pack a punch. It’s even found its way into chocolate! In our next post, we’ll feature a hot chocolate recipe that can be powered up with a pinch of cayenne.

Turmeric

Benefits: Turmeric has been shown to help reduce inflammation for those with arthritis.

Uses: Grab a curry powder or make your own featuring this yellow spice. Turmeric is common in Indian dishes and is also great in salads or on eggs!

Garlic

Benefits: First off, garlic isn’t a spice. It’s a vegetable. But it’s amazing benefits and the ease with which it can be added to recipes landed it on our list. Though garlic has not actually been shown to keep vampires at bay, it does have antifungal, antibacterial, and antiviral properties. That’s pretty magical.

Uses: Garlic is a great addition to roasts, sauces, and dips. Find a quick garlic recipe under the uses for oregano.

Oregano

Benefits: Oregano is an herb, but we wanted to include it because of its surprising health benefits. It may come as a surprise, but oregano has more antioxidants than blueberries. Plus, it also has antibacterial properties thanks to thymol and carvacrol.

Uses: A staple in Italian food, oregano is great on pizza, in savory red sauces, and in a rub on your favorite meat. For a quick oregano fix, mix some olive oil, oregano, crushed garlic (our next spice), and parmesan in a small dipping bowl and grab a hunk of bread to dip.

Needless to say, there are far more medicinal benefits than we can list here, but we hope it inspires you to look into it and see what you discover. We all have different needs and tastes but the interesting thing is some of the same spices can help different people with different health needs and objectives. One last thing for now, as we researched spices, we found this great recipe for mulling spices and wanted to share it as well.  Do you have any recipes that make use of some of these super spices? If so, we’d love to hear from you. Feel free to tell us what you think of the post and what you’d like to read about going forward at healthyliving@modernkidsdesign.com. Thanks for reading!