Healing foods, cleansing the system

Grated cabbage salad

It might be just my impression but every country has there own particular digestive problem, judging by adverts on the television. In Italy it is definitely laxatives, in France it seems to be the liver and it Britain it used to be the stomach when I was growing up, there were so many adverts for Milk of magnesia and Alka seltzer.

My mum had a thing about cleansing the system as she put it. Her favourite way was to sip a glass of hot water. She also loved her greens which she said purified the blood. She never indulged in excess, just one square of chocolate or one biscuit with her tea. Unfortunately I'm more like my dad, a  bar of Cadbury's will disappear while no-one's looking. So today bearing in mind her sound advice we had a sort of detox today. I bought a cavolo cappuccio , white cabbage and made a salad with half of it.

Serves 2 as a meal or 4 as a side dish

Half a white cabbage, washed and sliced finely

One pear , peeled, cubed and sprinkled with lemon juice to stop it from going brown.

A handful of sultanas, rinsed 

A handful of walnuts

Gently mix all the ingredients together and dress with your favourite vinaigrette. A combination of olive oil, lemon juice or vinegar, a teaspoon of mustard and honey goes well with this.

You can also add two grated carrots to add some colour and replace the pear with a peeled and diced red apple.