Cooked vs. uncooked foods
First of all, Chinese medical teachings suggest that most people, most of the time, should mostly eat cooked food. Cooking is predigestion on the outside of the body to
make food more easily digestible on the inside. By cooking foods in a pot on the outside of the body one can initiate and facilitate the stomach’s decomposition and cooking in its pot on the inside of the body.
Chilled and uncooked foods require much more energy to transform them into warm soup within the pot of the stomach.
Since it takes energy or qi to create this warmth and transformation, the net profit from this transformation is less. On the other hand, if one eats cooked foods at room temperature at least or warm at best, less spleen qi is spent in the process of digestion. This means that the net profit of digestion, i.e., qi or energy, is greater.
Why cooked foods have better nutritional value
As you may have already thought, the idea that eating cooked food is more nutritious than uncooked food flies in the face of some current schools of Western nutritional belief. Because enzymes and vitamins are destroyed by cooking, some people think it is healthier to eat mostly raw, uncooked foods.
This makes apparent sense only as long as one confuses gross income with net profit When laboratory scientists measure the relative amounts of cooked and raw foods, they are not considering these nutrients' post-digestive absorption.
However here let’s be clear that what we are talking about cooking is primarily grains, beans, and meats. In Chinese medicine, we think that vegetables should only be lightly cooked, and fruits may be eaten uncooked if desired and one’s digestion is strong enough.
Nutrition absorption example
Let's say that a raw carrot has I00 units of a certain vitamin or nutrient and that a cooked carrot of the same size has only 80 units of that same nutrient. At first glance, it appears that eating the raw carrot is healthier since one would, theoretically, get more of that nutrient that way.
However, no one absorbs 100% of any available nutrient in a given food. Because the vitamins and enzymes of a carrot are largely locked in hard-to-digest cellulose packets, when one eats this raw carrot, they may actually only absorb 50% of the available nutrient The rest is excreted in the feces.
But when one eats the cooked carrot, because the cooking has already begun the breakdown of the cellulose wails, one may absorb 65% of the available nutrient. In this case, even though the cooked carrot had less of this nutrient to begin with net absorption is greater. The body's economy runs on net not gross nutrient value. It is as simple as that. [Of course, we are talking about light cooking and not reducing everything to an overcooked, lifeless mush.]
This is why soups and stews are so nourishing. These are the foods we feed infants and those who are recuperating from illness. The more a food is like 100° soup, the easier it is for the body to digest and absorb its nutrients.
The spleen and stomach expend less qi, and, therefore, the net gain in qi is greater. This is also why chewing food thoroughly be- fore swallowing is so important The more one chews, the more the food is macerated and mixed with liquids, in other words, the more it begins to look like soup or stew.
Chilled & cold foods & liquids
As a corollary of this, if you drink or eat chilled, cold, or frozen foods or drink iced liquids with our meals, you are only impeding the warm transformation of digestion.
Cold obviously negates heat, and water puts out fire.
This does not mean that such food and liquids are never digested, but it does mean that often they are not digested well. In Chinese medicine, if the spleen and stomach fail to adequately transport and transform foods and liquids, a sludge tends to accumulate just as ft might in an incompletely combusting automobile engine.
This sludge is called stagnant food and dampness and turbidity in Chinese medicine.
This sludge leads to problems maintaining a healthy weight or having vital energy.
And what of the Western habit of having a cold drink with our meal?
On the one hand, the coldness of chilled drinks damages the spleen, making it vacuous and weak; on the other hand, the stomach becomes hot and hyperactive trying to deal with this cold material it suddenly finds itself having to decompose and cook.
As much as the previous information may make it sound that way, please note that Chinese medicine is not saying that no one should ever eat or drink chilled, cold, iced, or frozen drinks or foods.
In general, Chinese medicine does not speak in such universal terms.
Everything in Chinese medicine depends on the individual's constitution and environment. Some people are born with very exuberant yang qi. Such people can eat and drink more chilled and frozen things and get away with it. Others have weaker spleens and stomachs which are more easily damaged by eating and drinking chilled and frozen foods and liquids.
Citations
Flaws, B. (1998). The Tao of Healthy Eating: Dietary Wisdom According to Chinese Medicine 2nd ed. (Directly quoted)
Zhang, Y. (2020). A Comprehensive Handbook of Traditional Chinese Medicine: Prevention & Natural Healing. (Referenced)
Zhang, Y. & Yao, Y. (2012). Your Guide to Health with Foods & Herbs: Using the Wisdom of Traditional Chinese Medicine. (Referenced)