Golden Milk and Its Benefits

Turmeric, also known as golden spice is an amazing ingredient used in many cuisines all over the world to boost their color and flavor. When added to curries, it imparts a wonderful, rich yellow color and a mouth-watering aroma. But, what most people don’t know is that turmeric has several medicinal and healing properties that help cure and prevent many diseases.

What makes turmeric an amazing medicinal spice is the presence of a bioactive component known as Curcumin that has powerful antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, anti-microbial and a whole lot of other health benefit properties. A great way to reap the benefits of turmeric is to drink turmeric milk, also known as Turmeric Golden milk.

What is Golden Milk?

Used for hundreds of years in Ayurvedic medicine, golden milk is a yellow colored beverage that uses turmeric and milk as the main ingredients. You can substitute milk with coconut, almond or cashew milk as well. In addition to these two ingredients, you can also add pepper, cinnamon, and ginger to increase the flavor of the beverage.

Just like turmeric tea, golden milk also offers you several health benefits such as reducing inflammation, increasing immunity, supporting weight loss, controlling cholesterol and blood sugar levels and protecting your heart.

Here’s a simple golden milk recipe that you can easily prepare at home every day:

The first step is to prepare a turmeric paste or golden paste, which can be stored in the refrigerator for about 2 weeks. Take about ½ cup of turmeric powder, 1 ½ teaspoon of black pepper, 5 tablespoons of virgin coconut oil and a cup of water. In a pot, add water, turmeric, and black pepper, and cook for about 10 minutes to form a thick paste. Remove from heat and mix in the virgin coconut oil with the help of a whisk. Transfer the paste to a glass jar and store in the refrigerator. Use this turmeric paste whenever you need to prepare golden milk. Once the turmeric golden paste is ready, now it’s time to make golden milk.

Take one teaspoon of Golden paste and add this to about 300 ml of Cow’s milk/coconut milk/ almond milk. You can add a pinch of Cinnamon powder and little Vanilla essence. Little honey can be added to the golden milk as per your taste. Take the milk and turmeric paste in a pot and gently heat it. Make sure not to boil the mixture. Use a whisk to incorporate the paste into the milk thoroughly. Now, add the rest of the ingredients, remove the drink from the stove and serve.

Black pepper is used while preparing golden milk because it helps increase the amount of curcumin absorbed by the body. According to a study, adding black pepper to turmeric increases the bioavailability of curcumin by about 2000%!

Adding virgin coconut oil to the golden milk recipe is helpful in boosting the healing power of turmeric. It also helps your body absorb curcumin in a more efficient way.

Benefits of turmeric with milk

The people of Okinawa, a Japanese island have one of the longest average lifespan in the world! Do you know why? Because they drink turmeric tea every day. Drinking turmeric milk aka turmeric latte every day is another way to enjoy all the amazing health benefits of turmeric. As per Ayurvedic medicine, golden milk is a healthy and delicious tonic that nourishes your body and mind, protecting it from various illnesses. Here are some of the health benefits of turmeric milk:

1. Golden Milk Helps Boost Your Immunity

If you want to have a strong and healthy immune system that can fight off all the disease-causing microbes, drinking golden milk daily can help. When you have a cold or flu, this drink is the ideal remedy that offers relief from the symptoms.Do you have a weak immune system that fails to keep away infectious diseases? Then make it a habit to drink turmeric milk in the morning on an empty stomach or just before you go to sleep at night.

Turmeric milk is an effective remedy for cold, cough and other respiratory tract infections. The antibacterial and antiviral properties of curcumin in turmeric helps prevent infections, while its anti-inflammatory property helps reduce inflammation and relieve the symptoms of cold. Drinking this golden curcumin milk increases the production of mucus, which helps get rid of the microbes that cause infection.

2. Stay Young and Gorgeous with Golden Milk

Of all the various therapeutic and health benefitting properties of curcumin, one that must be interesting to most people is its anti-aging effects. The drink bursts with antioxidants that help keep you young inside out.

Your skin is subjected to so much of stress and damage daily, whether it be the effects of the elements or the chemicals that you apply on your skin or the free radicals that cause oxidative stress to your skin cells. Free radical damage can lead to premature aging of the skin and the appearance of aging signs like wrinkles, dark spots, and fine lines.

Drinking golden milk regularly is a great way to slow down the aging process. The antioxidants in the beverage help to nullify the effects of the free radicals. It also helps protect your skin from the damaging effects of the Sun’s UV rays.

Studies confirm that turmeric is beneficial in reducing or preventing symptoms associated with age-related health problems such as Parkinson’s disease and Alzheimer’s disease.

3. Turmeric milk has potent anti-Inflammatory properties

Turmeric milk is an anti-inflammatory drink that is beneficial for people suffering from inflammatory conditions such as arthritis, joint pain, psoriasis, eczema, and tendonitis.

According to a report published in the journal “Advances in Pharmacological Sciences,” Curcumin in turmeric is capable of reducing the swelling and pain in joints, and therefore can be used for treating rheumatoid arthritis. The anti-inflammatory properties of turmeric also help ease digestion by soothing the digestive tract.

In addition to the goodness of turmeric, the other ingredients in golden milk, such as ginger, black pepper, coconut oil and cinnamon also exhibit anti-inflammatory properties, which add to the total healing effect.

4. Turmeric latte benefits cardiovascular health

Inactive lifestyle, unhealthy eating habits, high blood pressure, and cholesterol are some of the main factors that affect the health of your cardiovascular system. Luckily, these are factors that can be controlled too. An effective way to keep hypertension and high cholesterol at bay and boost your heart’s health is to take golden milk daily.

The curcumin in the drink offers cardio-protective properties. Studies suggest that it plays a major role in preventing various heart conditions including cardiac arrhythmia, cardiac hypertrophy, ischemia-reperfusion injury, congenital heart disease and chemotherapy-induced cardiotoxicity.

The anti-inflammatory effects of turmeric improve the health of your heart and prevent various heart diseases such as atherosclerosis, myocarditis and cardiac fibrosis. The high concentration of antioxidants in turmeric scavenges the free radicals and help prevent heart diseases.

Curcumin helps lower the levels of bad cholesterol (LDL) and increase the good cholesterol levels (HDL). It also improves the health of the blood vessels, allowing the blood to flow properly and thus maintaining healthy blood pressure levels. Another way in which turmeric lowers the blood pressure is by acting on the different enzymes that are responsible for controlling the blood pressure.

Turmeric also has the power to repair the tissues of the heart in people who’ve suffered heart attacks.

5. Turmeric Milk and its benefits to the Digestive System

Drinking turmeric milk daily is a great way to improve digestion and prevent various digestive disorders such as constipation, bloating and irritable bowel syndrome. Turmeric has carminative properties that help prevent bloating. The anti-inflammatory and anti-bacterial effects of curcumin prevents inflammation and bacterial infection in the digestive tract.

6. Golden Milk for Healthy Bones and Joints

Turmeric milk may help people suffering from various types of arthritis by reducing the pain and inflammation associated with the condition, as well as improving the functions of the joints.

The anti-inflammatory effects of curcumin reduce inflammation in individuals with osteoarthritis and prevent the progression of the condition. The intake of curcumin along with anti-arthritic drugs is found to increase the activity of these drugs.

Curcumin is also found to be a chondroprotective agent that protects the health of bones by preventing the loss of bone and cartilage. The intake of golden milk is found to be beneficial for healing bone fractures because Curcumin has the ability to stimulate the growth of bone forming cells or chondroblasts.

7. Golden Milk and Brain Health

Golden milk is a great remedy for maintaining proper health of the nervous system. Turmeric possesses neuroprotective effects, offering protection to the brain and improving its health. The spice not only helps boost your memory but is also beneficial in preventing memory loss.

The antioxidant, anti-inflammatory and neuroprotective effects of curcumin helps treat conditions like depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder, Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s disease and post-traumatic stress disorder.

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8. Drink Golden Milk for a Good Night’s Sleep

Drinking turmeric milk just before you go to bed helps you sleep well. In fact, turmeric milk is known to be a great remedy for people with insomnia. The beverage contains the amino acid tryptophan that helps increase the levels of serotonin in the brain. Serotonin is a neurotransmitter that is associated with improving your mood, relaxing your mind and helping you sleep better.

9. Golden milk weight loss

You must have read the benefits of this super spice ingredient curcumin. With its anti-inflammatory action, it reduces water retained in tissues which are associated with obesity. Turmeric also believed to accelerate metabolic activity in body and aids body burn fat faster. There is not much scientific evidence supporting the claim. Nevertheless, golden milk should aid your digestion and healthy being.

Golden latte recipe: Making golden milk latte is quite simple. You can simply replace coffee with turmeric powder to make golden latte. Turmeric root can be used in place of turmeric powder, though the colour could be little lighter. Boil milk / coconut milk, add grated turmeric root or turmeric powder. As the milk boils, add grated ginger. Continue boiling for a minute. Blend this to get extra froth.

Amazing, isn’t it? All the wonderful health-benefitting things a simple beverage can do for you!

So, are you ready to enjoy a healthy and disease-free life? Start your day with a cup of warm, delicious golden turmeric health drink and you’ll be sipping your way to youthfulness, strength, energy, health, and longevity.