This article originally appeared as Using Warming, Cooling, or Neutral Food Energy to Promote Your Pet's Health and Nutrition on PetFoodDirect.com
Since the onset of my veterinary career, I’ve had a strong interest in how the foods our pets consume contribute to an overall state of wellness or illness. Learning how to apply this interest to my patients took many years of post-veterinary school practice, continuing education, and an ongoing belief in the inherent nutritional benefits of whole foods.
During veterinary school, students’ brains are heavily saturated with a variety of academic information. As graduation date nears, a general sense of insecurity develops about making the appropriate professional choices to best serve our patients. As a result, common sense notions about the value of looking more discerningly at the ingredients formulating a pet’s diet are often overlooked.
Pertaining to cats and dogs, veterinary students are taught from the seemingly exclusive practice of matching illness with an appropriate prescription canned or dry food aimed at controlling or resolving a particular condition. New veterinarians emerge into the vast abyss of a burgeoning career with little practical ability to discern "right from wrong" when making choices in recommending food for our patients.
Within the first few years of veterinary practice, I realized that I could help my patients eat in a more healthful way than the typical pet does. This stems, in part, from the foundations of my personal nutrition being whole-food based.
My education through the International Veterinary Acupuncture Society (IVAS) further exposed me to the role food energy plays in overall health. According to Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM, and its counterpart TCVM, where ‘V’ equals Veterinary), there are heating (Yang), cooling (Yin), and neutral food sources capable of creating a commensurate response in the body.
The examples I feel best clarify this phenomena pertain to extremes of the Yang and Yin spectrum. Cayenne (red) or chili pepper demonstrates its Yang properties by causing a warming sensation when consumed or coming in contact with the skin or mucous membranes. Conversely, cucumber personifies Yin qualities by creating a cooling and moistening effect.
Your pet’s health may benefit from the use of Chinese medicine food energy theory, but determining what combinations of warming, cooling, or neutral foods best serve your pet’s needs should be done by a veterinarian trained in and actively practicing this style of food therapy.
In working up my veterinary patients, I reference the food energy chart provided by the Chi Institute.
Warming (Yang) Foods
- Meat and Dairy - chicken, lamb, venison,
- Vegetable and Fruit - apricot, blackberry, cherry, ginger, papaya, peach, red/chili pepper, plum, pumpkin, squash
- Grain, Bean, and Other - oats, quinoa, white rice, pepper, nutmeg, tumeric
- Meat and Dairy - duck, egg, rabbit, most shellfish, turkey, yogurt
- Vegetable and Fruit - alfalfa, apple, banana, blueberry, broccoli, celery, cucumber, eggplant, kiwi, mango, mushroom, pear, persimmon, spinach, strawberry, tomato, watermelon
- Grain, Bean, and Other - barley, brown rice, buckwheat, most fish oil, flax (seed, oil), green tea, honey, millet, mint, soybean, tofu
- Meat and Dairy - beef, bison, catfish, mackerel, milk, pork, salmon, sardines, tripe, trout, tuna
- Vegetable and Fruit - asparagus, beet, cabbage, carrot, cauliflower, date, fig, lychee, pineapple, potato (white and sweet), radish, yam
- Grains, Beans, and Other - most beans, corn, peas (green)