Why You Really Feel Better After a Bowl of Chicken Soup
When you’re ill, often the only thing you feel like having is a big bowl of chicken soup. As soon as you bring the spoon to your mouth, you feel your body miraculously healing. Why is that?
The Healing Properties of Chicken Soup
Why do we feel better after eating chicken soup? Does chicken soup actually have healing properties, or is it all a placebo effect? We looked into it for you.
Warmth and Hydration
A good bowl of chicken soup contains salty broth, healthy vegetables and vermicelli, noodles or rice. The broth provides hydration and the warmth helps soothe a sore throat. The vegetables provide the necessary vitamins. The carbohydrates give the soup extra substance and are therefore a good source of energy. Good idea: colleague Sharon always cracks one or two eggs into the boiling broth—a delicious way to add some extra nutrients (before the vegetables go in). Sharon learned this so-called egg drop from colleague Delilah, in turn.
Healing
Studies show that breathing becomes easier during a cold after eating chicken soup. The warmth helps clear the airways by loosening mucus. According to this study, the aromas of chicken soup also contribute to this. Chicken soup loosens more mucus than drinking plain hot water. Especially if you also stir a generous spoonful of sambal into it (again: thank Sharon).
Clear airways and hydration are all well and good, but will I really get better from it? Research by American Dr. Stephen Rennard says that chicken soup contains substances that could reduce cold symptoms. Unfortunately, this research was never tested on sick people, so we cannot say with certainty what effect it has on humans.
Placebo and Your Mother
“There is no particular substance in chicken soup that makes you better. It is, however, a good way to get something down when you have little appetite,” Lolkje de Vries (then of the Netherlands Nutrition Centre) once explained. Believing that chicken soup makes you better creates a placebo effect. The conviction that chicken soup will make you better, combined with nostalgia for your mother’s chicken soup from the past, makes you feel better.
Ginger
Making Asian chicken soup? Research shows that ginger has anti-inflammatory properties—exactly what you need when you’re ill. It is also packed with antioxidants and may help with nausea. Do you have a stomach ache? Increase the amount of ginger, as it can also help reduce stomach pain.
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