Immune boosting mushroom congee (Jook), rice porridge

Immune boosting Mushroom Congee (Jook), rice porridge. A healing food in Traditional Chinese Medicine, it is easy to digest, and often served to those who are weak or ill. 

Ingredients: 

1 cup Jasmine rice (rinsed with filtered water)

Handful of mixed mushrooms (fresh); your choice (I like maitake , black trumpet, clamshells)

Handful of shiitake mushrooms (dried)

Handful of Tremella frondosa an edible yellow fungus, Huang ar 黃耳 (dried) (optional)

8 cups of filtered water/ or vegetable stock

2 tsp salt (or to taste) 

2 tsp porcini mushroom powder

1 tsp cordyceps mushroom powder

1 tsp reishi mushroom powder

1 piece of aged citrus peel, 陳皮 (optional) 

3+ tbs unfiltered avocado oil (or any healthy cooking oil)

Tamari soy sauce to taste

1 tbs Sake( japanese rice wine)

Instructions: 

Soak the dried shiitake mushrooms and the yellow fungus (separately) with filtered water until they become soft.

Rinse the mushrooms/fungus, squeeze out the liquid, trim off any hard stems, slice the soaked shiitake mushrooms and cut the yellow fungus into pieces. 

Place the rice in the pot, add the soaked shiitake mushrooms and the yellow fungus on top

Add 8 cups of filtered water/ vegetable stock, porcini mushroom powder, reishi mushroom powder , cordyceps mushroom powder, salt, and aged citrus peels; simmer for about 1.5 hours or more, (stir occasionally to avoid the rice to stick at the bottom) the consistency should be thick like a soup 

Saute the mixed fresh mushroom in a pan (add cooking oil, and mushrooms; saute, add sake and soy sauce at last)

Add oil, to the congee stir well

Add the sauteed fresh mushrooms on top

Enjoy!

If you give this recipe a try, please tag me @eggplant_diary on Instagram, would love to see your creations :) Let's create and share!

*Adaptogens offer protection to us by maintaining optimal cellular function during stressful events. They can increase our energy and stamina, improve our abilities to carry out demanding activities and to enhance our capabilities to tolerate and recover from stressors.

Benefits of adaptogenic mushrooms:

Cordyceps: anti-inflammatory, immunomodulating, antioxidative, kidney protective and regenerative, lung regenerative (antiasthmatic), insulin and glucose-regulating (antidiabetic), anti-cancer, radiation and chemotherapy protective.

Reishi: oxygen free-radical scavenger, neuroprotective, cardiovascular tonic, cholesterol-lowering, immunomodulating, tumor protective, chemotherapy protective.
(Yance, 2013). The book of Adaptogens in Medical Herbalism
Reishi as a nervine to calm the “shen” spirit in Traditional Chinese Medicine, it can soothe insomnia, and anxiety. (The Herbairum,2020) Monographs,

https://herbarium.theherbalacademy.com/monographs/#/monograph/4078