Herbal Cough and Cold Remedies
The five easiest ones you can make with herbs you have in your kitchen
Last week I felt like doing nothing more than basking in the sunnnnn. It’s been so beautiful in London and everyone (including me!) has been walking around with their faces turned up to the sky. Unfortunately, while the spring sun has arrived, the winter colds are still here in full force. So many people are ill, especially the kiddos, so I thought I’d devote this letter to some at home herbal remedies you can try to kick those coughs, colds and fevers. I use all of these myself, and there are suggestions for adults and kids on this list.
I’ve found one of the biggest benefits to becoming a herbalist when the girls were still so tiny was being able to know what I could safely give them to help them get through coughs and colds, and also how to identify red flags so that I knew if I needed to get them to the doctor. My biggest advice on that front is to trust yourself – you know when something is not right with your child, and that is the most important thing, even if their temperature is in normal range, they are breathing normally, etc. If they are not behaving as you would expect and you feel something is wrong, it’s always better to be on the safe side and get them seen by a professional.
One caveat: these recommendations are for kids at toddler age and up to adulthood. My best recommendation for babies with cold symptoms is to breastfeed on demand (if you breastfeed), get in bed and do skin to skin, and get partners/family/friends to help with household tasks as much as possible so that you can lay in bed with them and rest. Herbal baths can be a good way to soothe babies with cold symptoms, you can make a strong infusion of herbs (I would recommend chamomile here as it’s gentle and soothing) and put that into their bath, then fill the bath from the tap, so you have a diluted herbal infusion to bathe them in.
Now, onto the herbs! I have purposefully focused this list on things that are easy to get hold of, many of them you will have in your kitchen cupboard at home.
1. Onion Syrup
Sounds gross, tastes great. This is a traditional home remedy which is easy to make with any sweetener you have on hand, you can use sugar or honey. Honey has added health benefits and studies have found it is effective in treating coughs especially if used within the first 3 days of symptoms. If you don’t have honey to hand you can use sugar. It doesn’t have the extra benefits of honey but it still coats the mucous membranes and has a soothing effect. Onions are antimicrobial, which means they help combat bacteria, and expectorant which means they thin mucous, allowing it to be coughed up. This is a great kids remedy as it tastes sweet, but it works for adults too.
Onion Throat Syrup Recipe
Ingedients:
- One onion
- A few spoonfuls of honey or sugar
Optional extras:
- Sprigs of thyme, rosemary or other aromatic herbs
Peel and roughly chop the onion. Crush/finely chop any aromatic herbs if you’re using.
Put approx. ¼ of the chopped onion into the jar, cover with ¼ of the aromatic herbs, and a tablespoon of honey or sugar.
Repeat with the next layer until you’ve filled the jar.
Using a spoon, crush the top layers down, so that the honey and onion mingle together.
Leave to infuse for 24 hours, up to 3 days. If you need to use it earlier, you can skim off spoonfuls as soon as you start to see liquid appearing at the top of the jar.
Once it’s infused, strain through a sieve into a clean jar, and store in the fridge for up to a month.
Take spoonfuls as often as needed to soothe coughs.
2. Elderberry and Rosehip Syrup
This might require forward planning, although you can get the ingredients dried. It’s great for kids as it tastes delicious. I always add rosehips to my elderberry syrup as they grow abundantly and they are high in vitamin C. Whenever I pick rosehips, I am almost always stopped by an elderly person who tells me they remember taking rosehip syrup as a child. Rosehips have 20x more Vitamin C than oranges and were recommended by the Ministry of Food as a daily supplement during WW2. A national week for collection of rosehips began, and boy scouts, girl guides, and other volunteer groups went out harvesting. In 1941, 200 tons of hips were harvested, and 600,000 bottles of rosehip syrup were commercially produced.
You can watch my video on how to make elderberry and rosehip syrup here
Elderberry and Rosehip Syrup Recipe
- Add dried or fresh elderberries to a pot along with any spices you’d like: ginger, cinnamon or star anise. (If using fresh elderberries be sure to strip stems off first.)
- Cover with water and simmer for 20mins.
- Meanwhile, sterilise your jars in the oven at 160 degrees C for ten minutes.
- Strain syrup through a muslin once it’s slightly cool.
- Measure out syrup and add half as much sugar in grams as mls of syrup (ie 250g sugar to 500ml syrup)
- Add lemon slices and simmer again for 20 min
- Remove lemon slices, cool and bottle
- Use a teaspoon when needed.
3. Mustard footbaths
One for the grownups! Mustard baths are a traditional cold remedy. They are also amazing for headaches; as a chronic headache sufferer I have used them a lot with great success. I was told about them by a herbal tutor of mine and I’m recommending them because they’ve worked so well for me (and also the rest of my herbal cohort – alas definitely not a double blind study, though I wish it was!).
Mustard Footbath Recipe
- Bucket or bowl large enough to fit your feet in
- Hot water
- Mustard seeds or powder
Fill the bowl with hot water. Make sure the water is not too hot as mustard can burn the skin. As long as you can comfortably put your elbow in that’s fine. It will feel hotter to the touch once you add the mustard. Add 2 teaspoons mustard powder or crushed mustard seeds, stir. Soak feet for 15 minutes, dry thoroughly, pop on a warm pair of thick socks, and go straight to bed. Sleep/sweat throughout the night and wake up the next day feeling refreshed!
4. Thyme Steams
Thyme is antimicrobial, antiseptic and expectorant. It has a specific affinity to the respiratory system and does everything from increasing cilia beating frequency in COPD patients to alleviating the severity of cold symptoms. Watch this video for more info about how to use thyme.
Thyme Steam Recipe
To make a steam, boil a big pot of water, add a handful of sprigs of thyme (if you don’t have it fresh you can use it dried, it will even work if it’s from one of those little spice pots in your cupboard), turn off the heat and let the thyme infuse for 15 minutes.
Thyme’s antimicrobial and antiseptic actions come from its high content of volatile oils, which will easily evaporate in steam, so it is essential that you keep the pot covered while brewing.
Once it’s infused, steam away! Keep a towel over yourself the whole time you’re doing to steam to avoid the volatile oils evaporating, breathe deeply and chill out for 10 -15 minutes. You can even skim off a mugful before you start the steam and drink this to ensure that you’re getting as much thyme as possible into your system.
You can use the infusion as a children’s bath, just pour it through a sieve into the bath. Make sure the temperature of the bath water is ok before you let the kids get in, and keep the doors and windows closed in the bathroom to allow the steam to build up in the room.
5. Garlic Oil
Garlic is an amazing cold remedy as it is immunomodulating and stimulates certain immune cells such as macrophages, lymphocytes and natural killer cells. Many of its beneficial effects are due to its high allicin content, which also gives it its sulfuric smell. Eating raw garlic is a great thing to do when you have a cold, but garlic’s beneficial compounds can also be absorbed through the skin. If you want to know more about why this is you can watch this video. I had a herbal tutor who would tape garlic cloves over her lymph nodes when she was ill and swore it was a miracle remedy for curing colds. If you don’t want to take it that far, garlic oil is an easy option, especially if you have kids who won’t take oral cold remedies.
Garlic Oil Recipe:
- Olive oil
- Garlic
Crush a few cloves of garlic and pop them in a jar, just covering them with olive oil. Allow to infuse for a few hours, or you can do much longer if you have time. Strain off the oil, and put in a fresh jar (remember to label!).
My favourite way to apply this is to warm the oil slightly (just pop the jar into a bowl of warm water) then massage onto feet, and put an old pair of warm socks over the top. This can be done throughout the day but it’s lovely before bed and if you have kids is a nice calming routine to help set them up for sleep.
I could go on and name so many more herbal remedies, but this is a good place to start especially if you’ve got a sick kid at home, or you’re a parent like me whose child insists on coughing directly into your face and wiping their nose on your clothes, or you just need a little something to get you over the illness hump.
Studies mentioned here if you’re interested: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5
Feel free to comment, email etc if you need clarification, or you can always book a free call with me and I can answer any further questions. Happy cold busting!