When the weather turns cold, it's tempting to dive fork-first into rich, heavy comfort foods. Want of meals that are delicious and satisfying, it's more important than ever to make sure that what you're eating is also well-balanced and nutritious.

- Cold weather foods tend to be fattening. Think of the toasts, gravies, mashed potatoes, stuffings, meat, heavy breads and rich desserts of winter. They're a lot heavier than the grilled skinned chicken breasts, salads, fresh vegetables and fresh fruits of warm weather days.

- Food also has a thermal property. Ginger, garlic, most grains like wheat, jowar, bajra, sarson, pepper, mustard and many more have a warming effect on the body. Dates, honey and jaggery are sweetners that also have a warming effect on the body. All animal products are essentially warming.

- Take dry ginger and long pepper in equal quantity (100 gms each).

- Grind it to a fine powder

- Mix it with about 100 ml of pure jaggery powder (now available in the market).

- Store the resulting powder in an airtight bottle.

- Take half a teaspoon by slowly licking it. You can add a little honey to it to sweeten it and make it easier to eat it especially for kids.

- Mix a teapoonful of ginger juice with an equal quantity of lime juice.

- Add a pinch of salt and drink this mixture after meals twice a day, for seven days.

For Common Cough and Cold,

- Take the juice of 15 - 20 Basil leaves,

- Mix it with 1 tea spoon juice each of ginger and betel leaf,

- And add 1 tea spoon of jaggery powder.

- Take it twice a day for 5 days to contain your ailment completely and naturally.

Another cure for tooth-ache due to crevices in the teeth is to apply a little asafoetida mixed with a little salt and a small piece of ginger and insert it into the crevice. The ingredients can be also grinded or mashed together in a small container to get a paste for application.

For phlegm congestion, Mix together one glassful of the decoction made out of the leaves of fenugreek (Methi) leaves and one tea-spoon of the juice of ginger along with a little honey and drink it 2-3 times a day.

Mix up the juices of a few mint leaves, a small piece of ginger and a lime with a little black salt,and take it on an empty stomach.

That should provide an instant relief for the stomach-ache.

1. Take 225 grams of whole wheat grain and soak it over-night in water. Strain the wheat in the morning. Do not throw away the remaining water.

2. Finely grind it in the morning along with 3-4 peppercorns or 15 gms of green ginger.

3. Add the same to the leftover wheat-soaked water, stir it well, strain it, and drink it first thing in the mornings for 21 days to control diabetes.