2005 Volume 58 Issue 1 Pages 3-9
In Chinese medicine, ginger has been believed to warm up the human body. We investigated whether ingestion of ginger raises human peripheral body temperature, and found that it increased the body surface temperature (at the forehead) in comparison with ingestion of water (p<0.05). It was also shown that gingerbread raised the surface temperature of some parts of the body compared to bread without ginger (at forehead, p<0.05; at wrist, p<0.05). These results indicate that ginger does indeed raise body surface temperature, as has been traditionally handed down in China since ancient times. A sensory analysis of gingerbread indicated no significant differences from bread without ginger in terms of smell, taste, texture and total evaluation. Thus, ginger can be used as an effective additive for bread to warm the body.
