Feeling sick? Try ginger

If someone told you that NASA astronauts took ginger into space to combat travel sickness, you might tell them to pull the other one. In fact, it's 100 per cent true: the knobbly brown rhizome is a champion at treating nausea of all kinds - even hangovers.

Trials at St Bartholomew's Hospital in London in 1990 found the herb to be more effective than conventional medicines in relieving feelings of sickness after operations. It is also effective for pregnant women with morning sickness that is notoriously hard to quell.

Biblical roots?
Ginger (Zingiber officinale) is a native of Asia and, since the earliest times it has been revered for its medicinal qualities by the leading traditional medical systems of those regions - Tibetan, Ayurvedic (from India) and Chinese. By the Middle Ages, its fame had spread to Europe: indeed its powers were so impressive that it was thought to come from the Garden of Eden.

If you've tasted ginger in any form, it will come as no surprise that practitioners of traditional medicine categorise it as a warming remedy. Various related plants in the same Zingiberaceae family are also used medicinally; the most valuable is turmeric, much used in Indian food and medicine, which has been shown to be helpful in digestive and liver problems.