If a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down, what does a spoonful of fire cider do?

Fire cider is a concoction of hot peppers, ginger, garlic and apple cider vinegar, and other stuff if you feel so inclined. It is a health tonic that can help boost immunity and improve circulation. As Jack Spirko put it, it’s a good example of the idea that food is medicine, and medicine is food.

I first learned about fire cider from my friend Russ, who made some based on a recipe he learned in an herbology class taught by Sam Coffman of The Human Path. Based on what he learned in class, he mixed a variety of hot peppers, garlic and ginger, along with borage and some other things. Then on The Survival Podcast, Kyle Christensen of Western Botanicals talked about his “super tonic” that he makes that helps to knock out stuff that is trying to make him sick. In his tonic he included horseradish, garlic, onions, ginger, and hot pepper (cayenne/habanero), and mixes it all in a blender with apple cider vinegar.

So I decided to give it a whirl.

My fire cider recipe:

• 1.5 oz cayenne
• 1.5 oz ancho
• 1.5 oz california pepper
• 1.5 oz crushed chipotle
• 1.5 oz ginger powder
• 1.5 oz garlic powder
• Half a head of peeled garlic cloves
• Golf ball sized ginger root, sliced
• Enough organic apple cider vinegar to fill quart jar.

I put all of the powdered herbs/peppers in a quart jar; added the garlic cloves and sliced ginger, and fill the jar up with vinegar and shake vigorously.

I then allowed the potion to sit for a few weeks to stew.

I’ve taken it a few times now. I spoon one or two teaspoons into a glass with water, EmergenC, and maybe some other herbal tinctures (particularly a cold and flu formula I made recently in class), mixed with at most a quarter cup of water. While it looked like it would probably be the foulest concoction ever, it was remarkably palatable, if rather spicy. (Tip: a milk chaser can help reduce the afterburn!).

A couple days ago I felt the sniffles coming on. I knocked back a serving before bed and the sniffles/sneezing magically disappeared. Was it the fire cider, the tinctures, or coincidence? I don’t know, but I’m not complaining!

So give it a whirl and add a little spice to your life!