And Dessert

Either French Apple Tart, shown earlier on the blog with home made ice cream and

Ultimate crème brûlée

Ingredients

• 2 cartons double cream, 1 large (284ml) plus 1 small (142ml)
• 100ml full-fat milk
• 1 vanilla pod
• 5 large egg yolks
• 50g golden caster sugar, plus extra for the topping

Method

1. Preheat the oven to fan 160C/conventional 180C/gas 4. Sit four 175ml ramekins in a deep roasting tin at least 7.5cm deep (or a large deep cake tin), one that will enable a baking tray to sit well above the ramekins when laid across the top of the tin. Pour the two cartons of cream into a medium pan with the milk. Lay the vanilla pod on a board and slice lengthways through the middle with a sharp knife to split it in two. Use the tip of the knife to scrape out all the tiny seeds into the cream mixture. Drop the vanilla pod in as well, and set aside.
2. Put the egg yolks and sugar in a mixing bowl and whisk for 1 minute with an electric hand whisk until paler in colour and a bit fluffy. Put the pan with the cream on a medium heat and bring almost to the boil. As soon as you see bubbles appear round the edge, take the pan off the heat.
3. Pour the hot cream into the beaten egg yolks, stirring with a wire whisk as you do so, and scraping out the seeds from the pan. Set a fine sieve over a large wide jug or bowl and pour the hot ixture through to strain it, encouraging any stray vanilla seeds through at the end. Using a big spoon, scoop off all the pale foam that is sitting on the top of the liquid (this will be several spoonfuls) and discard. Give the mixture a stir.
4. Pour in enough hot water (from the tap is fine) into the roasting tin to come about 1.5cm up the sides of the ramekins. Pour the hot cream into the ramekins so you fill them up right to the top – it’s easier to spoon in the last little bit. Put them in the oven and lay a baking sheet over the top of the tin so it sits well above the ramekins and completely covers them, but not the whole tin, leaving a small gap at one side to allow air to circulate. Bake for 30-35 minutes until the mixture is softly set. To check, gently sway the roasting tin and if the crème brûlées are ready, they will wobble a bit like a jelly in the middle. Don’t let them get too firm.
5. Lift the ramekins out of the roasting tin with oven gloves and set them on a wire rack to cool for a couple of minutes only, then put in the fridge to cool completely. This can be done overnight without affecting the texture.
6. When ready to serve, wipe round the top edge of the dishes, sprinkle 1½ tsp of caster sugar over each ramekin and spread it out with the back of a spoon to completely cover (Anne Willan’s tip for an even layer). Spray with a little water using a fine spray (the sort you buy in a craft shop) to just dampen the sugar – then use a blow torch to caramelise it. Hold the flame just above the sugar and keep moving it round and round until caramelised. Serve when the brûlée is firm, or within an hour or two.

Dinner Party

My "mum" and a friend are coming for dinner tomorrow.  Here is the menu -

Starters - Twice Baked Emmenthal Souffles

This was found in Olive magazine but not printed on the internet.  It is the signature dish of the Vetiver restaurant in Chewton Glen country house in the New Forest.

Main Course

Coq Au Vin - James Martin

http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/coqauvin_10455

Try James Martin's version of this French classic. Serve with olive oil mash or good bread.

Ingredients

• 25g/1oz butter
• 150g/5½oz shallots, peeled but left whole
• 5 garlic cloves, crushed
• 150g/5½oz streaky bacon, cut thickly
• sprig of fresh thyme or a good pinch of dried
• 350g/12½oz button mushrooms
• 500ml/16½fl oz good red wine
• 500ml/16½fl oz chicken stock
• 2 tbsp balsamic vinegar
• 1 free range chicken, cut into 8 serving pieces, on the bone but skin removed (or 6 chicken thighs)
• small bunch flatleaf parsley, chopped
• salt and crushed black pepper

Preparation method

1. Heat a thick-bottomed casserole dish on the stove, add almost all the butter (reserving a knob of the butter) and the shallots. Cook until just browned; then stir in the garlic. Add the bacon and thyme and cook for 2-3 minutes.
2. Add the mushrooms, turn up the heat and add the red wine, chicken stock and vinegar. Add the chicken pieces, bring the sauce to the boil and then simmer gently for about 25 minutes or until the chicken is tender and cooked through. For a thicker sauce, remove the chicken once it is cooked and keep warm. Cook the sauce over a high heat for a few minutes until the volume of liquid has reduced. Return the chicken back to the pan.
3. Add the parsley, together with the reserved knob of butter. Season with salt and freshly ground black pepper and serve with a dressed green salad and olive oil mash or crusty bread.
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2012/nov/19/angela-hartnett-potatoes-boulangere-cavalo-nero-recipes
   
   
   
   
   
   
   

   Angela Hartnett's potatoes boulangere. Photograph: Guardian
   Serves 4-6

   Potatoes boulangère

   4 large potatoes totalling 1kg in weight
   2 medium onions, sliced
   Chopped rosemary
   Chopped garlic
   Thyme, picked
   Chicken stock
   100g butter

   Melt a knob of butter in a large pan, add the sliced onions and saute until they turn a lovely golden brown.

   While they are cooking, peel and slice the potatoes thinly (ideally with a mandolin). Place them in a large oven-proof serving bowl lined with butter and add the picked thyme, chopped rosemary and sliced garlic. Season with salt and pepper.

   When the onions are ready add them to the potatoes and mix well. Pour over the chicken stock and a few small knobs of butter, then give it a shake so it spreads evenly around the potatoes.

   Place in the oven and cook at 180C / 350F / gas 4 for 20-30 minutes until golden brown and a knife goes through the potatoes evenly. If they look dry add a touch more stock. If they start to go too brown cover with foil and continue to cook.

   
   

   

   
   

   Broccoli and Green Beans
   
   Recipe courtesy Giada De Laurentiis
   
   Ingredients
   8 cups broccoli florets (about 1 1/2 pounds)
   1/2 pound green beans
   2 tablespoons cup extra-virgin olive oil
   2 cloves garlic, sliced thin
   1/2 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes, plus more if desired
   Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
   
   

   Directions
   In a large pot, bring 6 quarts of salted water to a boil. Have ready a large bowl of ice water. Place broccoli into pot and cook for 2 minutes. You just want to parboil the broccoli at this point since you will saute it later on. Using a spider strainer, remove broccoli from pot and shock it in a bowl of ice water. When broccoli is completely cool, place it in a colander and allow to drain. Refresh the bowl of ice water. Bring the water back to a boil. Add green beans and cook for 4 minutes. Like the broccoli, you just want to parboil the green beans. Remove green beans from pot with spider strainer and add to ice water. When green beans are completely cool, add them to the colander and allow to drain.
   
   In a large saute pan, heat olive oil. When almost smoking, add the garlic and saute for about 45 seconds. When the garlic starts to brown, remove immediately and discard. Overcooking the garlic will impart a very bitter taste to the dish. Add the red pepper flakes, broccoli and green beans to the pan and cook for 5 minutes. Season with salt and pepper. Serve immediately.
   
   Read more at: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/giada-de-laurentiis/broccoli-and-green-beans-recipe2/index.html?oc=linkback

   
   

   
   

   
   

Barking Blondes: Furkids

• By Joanne Good and Anna Webb
• Notebook
• Sunday, 30 June 2013 at 5:00 am

We both met whilst filming a BBC documentary about Furkids. This is a noun in the New Oxford Dictionary describing a child substitute that is an animal.

In our case our Furkids are our bull breeds Molly and Matilda. That’s not to say that we dress them in bonnets, push them in prams or have them christened. We do however, nurture, fret, worry and mother them. Like many doting parents, we have made allowances for them in our wills.

Most of this is done with a certain amount of self consciousness. In our book, Barking Blondes, we explain that we are free from child bearing stretch marks, having never felt the desire to give birth. The majority of women feel a strong need to procreate. We don’t.

Do we prefer dogs to children? This is the most asked question on the book tour.

Our response is always the same.

It’s not a competition. It was never “let’s forego kids and raise dogs”.

It was more a complete absence of maternal instinct.

We were very interested then to read this week of the latest bit of research that shows the bond between canines and their owners is more like that of an infant to its mother or father. Scientists in Austria have proved that dogs behave like children when left alone in an environment with a stranger. This mirrored a similar study conducted on children. Dogs, like children, were less likely to play, interact or relax without their ‘parent’ in the room. Yet both dogs and children were confident when their parent was present, proving the psychological “secure base effect”.

Other studies have shown that the happy hormone called Oxytocin is released in our brains when we’re stroking our own dog. Breast feeding mothers also experience a happy hormone boost. This is more proof to back up the Furkid theory. Thankfully Molly & Matilda were both weaned at eight weeks when they left their breeder.

Dogs and their humans have been forming strong bonds for over 30,000 years and during this evolution dogs have become extraordinarily intuitive. They’re born bilingual able to interpret our expressions and read our moods. Some say the bond between dogs and their owners is like an elastic band – a ‘telepathic connection’ that’s as strong as the umbilical cord.

One person who emailed our radio show confessed, having read the research, that after two failed IVF attempts she and her partner had adopted a whippet and now “our family is complete”. Well, we wish them luck because, unlike children, dogs don’t flee the nest to start out on their own or crash the car.

However, they will drain your bank account and cause deep worry as well as huge delight. Our two dogs bring decisions and life choices just like any child: healthcare, diet? What about extra-curricular hobbies? Days out? Dog-sitters? What friends should they meet and so on… the only difference is dogs are eternally grateful for whatever you provide. They’re as happy with a cardboard box for a bed if that’s their lot, they don’t demand expensive luxuries or the latest smart phone.

When your dog does well at training class or wins a rosette, there’s that pride swelling up like a parent’s on sports day! We trust our dogs with our deepest secrets and mourn for them often more than a distant great Aunt. We would choose scooping up poop over changing a nappy any day! Through our ‘girls’ we’ve displayed some nurturing and maternal instincts that continue to surprise us.

‘Barking Blondes’ by Anna Webb & Jo Good, published by Hamlyn, £12.99

www.octopusbooks.co.uk

The Barking Hour, every Thursday, BBC London 94.9FM

www.barkingblondes.net

How to leave behind The Cubicle Life! Fly!

Via elephant journalon Jun 30, 2013

We stare at screens, from within bubbles, for too much of this short, precious life.

Convertibles are much better. Still, the windshield makes for yet another screen mediating between our experience of the world, and the world.

Of course, motorcycle helmets do much the same thing. And, it could be argued, even sunglasses serve to distance us from what Pirsig describes, above.

That’s why I love to bicycle. It’s the closest we ever get to flying, Man of Steel-style.

Meditation for Forgiveness & Gratitude. ~ Jensy Scarola

Via elephant journalon Jun 27, 2013

photo: lifesheimagined.tumblr

“I believe that when you stop renewing and are no longer open to change and the possibilities that continually unfold, you stop being alive and are just getting through the years. Transformation doesn’t happen unless you’re willing: It’s your choice.”

~ Oprah Winfrey

Earlier this week, I did a guided meditation by don Miguel Ruiz, famed author of The Four Agreements. Prior to the meditation, he mentioned that he had added a Fifth Agreement to his life plan.

The Fifth Agreement states: “Be skeptical, but learn to listen.”

I remember when I was in the midst of fighting anorexia. Many family members, therapists, friends had urged me to start eating, get out of bed, and live. The truth was I saw no point. I was not truly listening to what they had to say about me (i.e., you are smart, pretty, funny, etc).

They were all happy and busy with their own lives, and I felt nothing. I felt that I added no value to the world around me. I was stuck. I was ungrateful for the gift of life. Slowly but surely, I started to become more willing to change my life. That happened only through learning to forgive myself for things that had happened in the past, forgiving others and expressing gratitude.

When my girls were born, I saw their joy for life, unconditional love, and smiles that filled a room.

When I started to adopt their attitudes about their young lives, mine started to shift. Have you ever noticed a baby’s willingness to try new things? They are little explorers getting into drawers, flipping light switches, trying new foods (Well, some! ha!), climbing stairs, learning to walk, learning to ride a bike, and the list goes on.

These lively young souls learn something new each day and take chances one small shift at a time.

Most of us, as adults, stop learning and end up getting in our own way! Most likely this is because we forgot to forgive ourselves (and others along the way), for our mistakes.

Here is a five minute meditation/reflection I do when I am feeling stuck, icky and fading into a bad mood: 

1. Go to a peaceful, serene spot that you feel most calm in. It must be quiet and free of clutter.

2. Close your eyes and get into a comfortable seated position. Take six deep breaths with a count of six seconds on the inhale through the nose and four seconds on the exhale out of the mouth. Deep breathing for a total of a minute should help you quiet the mind and calm the body.

3. Focus on who/what you need to forgive. It can be yourself or a loved one. It can be an event, argument, illness, loss, etc. Ask yourself: What is ailing you presently? What are you holding onto? What did that person say to you that you just can’t seem to get over/forgive? Send them love and compassion and most of all, forgiveness. They need your love more than anyone. Surrender it and watch it pass in front of you and out into the Universe. Be free.

4. Take a big deep breath. Six count inhale through the nose and 4 count exhale out of mouth. Let it go.

5. After you have completed the Forgiveness Meditation, let your mind take you to all the wonderful things you have right now in your life. Speak softly to yourself and reflect on the abundance you have in your life at this present moment. Make a mental list of all the things and people you are grateful for.

6. Take a big deep breath. Six count inhale through the nose and four count exhale out of mouth. Smile. Forgiveness and Gratitude unlock the door to a happier, healthy life. When you are stuck in resentment, depression and despair, you lose sight of the wonderful things around you and are not willing to listen, to change, to grow, to heal.

Keep practicing this simple meditation. Give yourself just five minutes of self-love a day.

Once you are free of resentment, you can unlock the power of gratitude. The willingness to listen to yourself and others becomes easier.

Now, your best self can shine forward and happiness arrives.

Jensy Scarola is a stay at home mom, blogger, writer and kids yoga instructor. She is the mother to her two greatest teachers of life and happily married to her high school soulmate. She was most recently the Executive Director for Fit & Healthy Schools, a non-profit organization fighting childhood obesity. She has since left that career in order to find her calling as an author, but keeps that passion in mind as she teaches young children yoga. Check out Jensy’s blog, where she shares her tips, struggles, triumphs, spirituality and motivating tools for women and men in hopes to help others overcome their adversity; you can also find her on Facebook. In her spare time, Jensy loves to bake, do crafts with her kids, watch sappy romantic films, read, watch Oprah and Redskins Football.

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The Wonder of Walking. ~ Kim Stevens-Redstone

Via elephant journalon Jun 26, 2013

We should try to hold on to the wonder of each and every thing our body does.

Today, as I was running through the park and saying, “Good Morning” to everyone I passed, a song came into my head. If you were a child of the 1950s, ’60s or even ’70s, you may remember this song from the Cerebral Palsy telethons.

“Look at us, we’re walking,
Look at us, we’re talking,
We, who never walked or talked before.
Look at us, we’re laughing,
We’re happy and we’re laughing,
Thank you from our hearts forevermore…”

This song stuck with my family. I can remember my grandmother standing behind me, holding my hands and singing her own version of it to me as I learned to walk. It was just the one line, “Look at me, I’m walking. Look at me, I’m walking,” over and over and over. I, in turn sang it with her to all of my younger cousins and brother as they learned to walk.

It was a celebratory song: “Look at you! You’re walking! Isn’t it amazing? Look what your body can do! How awesome is this walking thing?!”

And it was filled with hope: “Wait ’til you see what else you can do! Your body will do so many phenomenal things! You will jump and run and dance and play and skip!”

Somewhere along the way, usually about one month into doing it, everyone starts to take this awesome walking thing for granted. No one celebrates it anymore. They move on to the next thing, holding our hands and saying, “Jump! Jump! Two feet! Jump!”  The wonder of walking is gone.

Each thing we can do is amazing. Just the fact that we are breathing is amazing. Our bodies are miracles of science. Our hearts beat, our lungs take in air, our legs propel us around.

Near the end of every yoga class, when everyone rolls onto their right side after savasana, I ask them to take a moment to simply be grateful for their body and their breath. I also do this to remind myself every day to be grateful, just grateful, for whatever my body can do today.

I am not concerned about what it can’t do, not judgmental about how it looks, just grateful.

These legs of mine, with their cellulite and stretch marks and spider veins are phenomenal works of art that carry me through this life. They are miraculous machines that get me from place to place.

This walking thing is awesome.

As I continued through the park with the song in my head, I flashed a huge smile at each person I passed.

“Look at us! We’re walking!”

Kim Redstone is a yoga teacher (RYT200), a poetess and blogger, who loves spreading the yoga, skipping, wrestling with muses, and daring The Elephant to bring it. You can follow her journey at on her blog.  

The Etymology of Chicken, Cock and Other Fowl Words

11:00 AM / JUNE 28, 2013 

/ POSTED BY Sam Dean

Food words have some seriously gnarly roots, but follow them far back enough, and you can see culinary history all tangled up in a few short syllables. Welcome to Eat Your Words


Buff Orpingtons! (Credit: Wikimedia)

Every animal we eat has a vocabulary of its own. For thousands of years, day in and day out, a large segment of humanity has been talking about these domesticated edibles, and it shows: every phase of a pig's life has a name, and every muscle on a cow. And we have a ton of words for chicken.

Etymologically, some of them are easy. "Rooster" was originally shorthand for "roosting bird," preferred by the Puritans to the double entendre of the more typical "cock." "Pullet," which specifically refers to a young hen, generally less than a year old, comes from the French for "young hen," poulette (a la today's Frenchpoulet). And a "capon" (a castrated rooster, for any non-poultry farmers out there) gets its name from a Latin word meaning the same (caponem), which itself is derived from a Proto-Indo-European root meaning "to cut off" (for obvious reasons).

The less technical the word, though, the murkier its origins generally get. Despite the fact that, in any kind of practical chicken-raising situation, the majority of the flock is female, the word "hen" started out as the feminine version of the Old English word for a rooster, hana. And hana itself came from West Germanic--the linguistic ancestor of the mumbly tongues now spoken from Belgium up to Denmark--which called the male chicken a khannjo: literally, "bird who sings for sunrise."

"Cock," on the other hand, has no clear provenance. Only the French, our erstwhile linguo-twins, have a similar word (coq), while pretty much every other European tongue uses some version of that old Germanic hana or the Latin gallus. But the OED speculates that it started out as an echoic word. Cocks go "cock-a-doodle doo," after all, and tend to cluck incessantly.

Which, finally, brings us to the main dish: "chicken." The word was originally ciccen in Old English (a language that, like Italian, turned its Cs into CHs when they came before an I), but back then, it was just the plural of "chick," and only referred to group of the baby birds. The -en plural is mostly dead in English, and has been for hundreds of years, but we still have words like "oxen," "children," and "brethren" to remind us of the loosey goosey olden days. By the 19th century, though, the word had become what we know today, and became the standard name for the bird, no matter the sex or age, dead or alive.

It's unclear why, exactly, "chicken" replaced "fowl" (ultimately from the Old Germanic for "fly," fluglo) as the generic term for the common clucker, but by 1908, the Westminster Gazette asserted that it was "a disastrous betrayal of middle-class origin to speak of a 'chicken' as a 'fowl'. Whatever the age of the bird, the word must always be chicken."

Read More http://www.bonappetit.com/blogsandforums/blogs/badaily/2013/06/etymology-of-chicken-word-definition.html#ixzz2XXOwIiXS

For sale: a reproduction of the Gutenberg Press

A very interesting item has been listed for sale on AbeBooks.com – a fully functioning reproduction of the Gutenberg Press.  You can put a piece of history in your living room and print your own books. It’s one third scale of the original and hand-built from oak, and the seller reports that it is more than 138 years old.

It measures about 3 ½ feet high x 3″ feet wide and weighs approximately 150 lbs. It comes with a 1/3 scale magnesium stereotype plate of a 1611 King James Bible page, featuring the Ten Commandments, Exodus 20.

Johann Gutenberg’s press and his movable type revolutionised the world and paved the way for the first form of mass communication.

The price is about £4,370 ($6,500).

7 Reasons to Try This Position in Bed.

Via Dr. John Douillard, DCon Jun 26, 2013

Have you ever wondered to what extent the two sides of your body mirror each other?

It is very common for me to have a patient tell me that they have all their issues on just one side of the body. A pain in the left foot, a bad left hip, a bad left shoulder, left-sided abdominal pain, a pain in the neck on the right side; why?

Why do rashes choose the left or right side of the body?

Why does the acuity of the eyes differ so greatly from one to the other?

Why do we get pains often on just one side of the body?

According to Ayurveda, the left side of the body is completely different than the right side, and, while I know it sounds strange, emphasizing the left side for rest and sleep offers some time tested wisdom for very real health and longevity benefits.

Join me as we investigate this old Ayurvedic concept and see if it still holds water today.

The Lymph Drains toward the Left

Interestingly, the left side of the body is the dominant lymphatic side. The majority of the body’s lymph fluid drains into the thoracic duct, located on the left side. Along the way, lymph fluid carrying proteins, glucose and other metabolites and waste products is purified by lymph nodes and is then drained into the left side of the heart.

Because of this, it is common in Ayurveda to deduce that left side ailments may be due to chronic lymphatic congestion. When the lymphatic system congests, it is more likely that lymph will back up on the left, more lymph-dominant side of the body. Whether or not this is always true is debatable, but you can see the logic at play here.

In the same non-scientific vein, issues that show up on the right side are thought to be due to imbalances in the liver and blood. Since the liver is on the right side of the body, liver congestion will more easily back up into the right side of the body and potentially cause problems.

The Priority System of the Body

According the Ayurveda, congestion happens in the body according to a certain pattern, or priority system. In this priority system, the lymph is the body’s first detox system to congest, before the liver and blood become overwhelmed. Thus, early lymph issues may present more on the left side of the body and move to the right as they become more long-standing and begin to congest the liver and the blood, at which point symptoms may start to show up on the right side of the body.

You can read more about lymph-related issues in the Detox and Lymphatic Health section of my article library.

Ever Feel Sleepy After a Big Meal?

In Ayurveda, it is common practice to rest on the left side of the body after taking a meal. Unlike a siesta where we take the whole afternoon off, Ayurveda suggests a short, ten minute rest on the left side to help the body properly digest the food.

The stomach and the pancreas (which make digestive enzymes) hang like slings on the left side. When you lie on the left side, the stomach and pancreas hang naturally, allowing for optimal and efficient digestion. The food is encouraged to move through the stomach naturally and the pancreatic enzymes are released as needed rather than all at once, which might happen more easily if you were on the right side with the pull of gravity.

If you lie on the right side, the stomach and pancreas will hang in a somewhat unnatural position, forcing them to empty their contents prematurely.

Meanwhile, the liver and gallbladder hang on the right side. Resting on the left side allows them to hang freely and secrete precious bile, with the help of gravity, into the digestive tract to emulsify fats and neutralize the acids of the stomach.

When the digestive process is encouraged in this way, in can often be a smoother and ultimately shorter digestive cycle that doesn’t leave you feeling sapped throughout the entire afternoon. So by taking a short rest on the left side, you may actually save yourself more fatigue throughout the day!

Get energized—not tired—from your meal! Here’s how:

Try eating a large midday meal in a relaxed fashion, followed by a 10 minute rest on the left side and see if you find yourself with more energy and better digestion as a result.

The Magic of Sleeping on the Left Side

Better Elimination

The small intestine dumps waste through the ileocecal valve (ICV) on the right side of the body into the beginning of the large intestine. The large intestine travels up the right side of your belly the across the tummy, where it dumps waste into the descending colon on the left side.

Sleeping on the left side allows gravity to encourage the food waste to move more easily from the small intestine into the large intestine through the ICV.

As the night wears on and you continue to sleep on your left side, the waste moves more easily into the descending colon. With the help of gravity and a good night’s sleep on the left the side, the descending colon is full of waste to easily eliminate completely each morning.

Better Heart Function

Of course, one of the biggest players on the left side is the heart. It makes sense that if you sleep on your left side, the lymph drainage toward the heart will again be helped by gravity, taking some of the workload off the heart as you sleep.

The aorta, which is the biggest artery in the body, leaves the top of the heart and arches to the left before it heads down into the abdomen. By sleeping on the left side, the heart is pumping its biggest payload downhill into the descending aorta.

Sleeping on the left also allows much of the intestines to hang away from the very thin-walled inferior vena cava (IVC) which brings venous blood back toward the heart. Interestingly, the IVC lies against the right side of the spine, so when you lie on the left much of the viscera falls away from the IVC. Here again, gravity is just making the heart’s job a little easier.

The Spleen Is On the Left

The spleen, which is part of the lymphatic system, is also on the left. The spleen is much like a gigantic lymph node, except that in addition to filtering lymph it also filters blood. When you lay on the left side, drainage back to the spleen is once again helped and made easier by gravity.

Remember, the lymph system drains all the cells in the body via movement and muscular contractions, rather than being pumped by the heart. Helping the lymph to drain to the spleen and heart with gravity is a good thing.

Try it!

So maybe this non-scientific technique of sleeping and resting on the left side makes some sense after all. I am a big fan of understanding ancient wisdom and then finding proof with modern science. In this case, I admit I lack some of the modern science but there is more than enough anatomical logic here to give it a whirl.