Eight Treasures Congee for the GBA

Everyone loved the Eight Treasures Congee served at the Groton Business Association May meeting.

It was adapted from the recipe Eight Treasures Porridge from Daniel Eng’s book “Cooking With Chinese Herbs.

It’s so easy to make a healthful congee. Basically all you do is throw the ingredients into crockpotin the evening, set it on low, and go to bed.  When you wake up in the morning, Voila! There is your tasty breakfast congee waiting for you.

Here is the recipe.  I adapted it by using organic vegetable broth instead of water and organic Bhutanese red rice. I also used a crockpot. The herbs are available at any Chinese pharmacy or from Mystic River Acupuncture for 15¢/gram. Just tell us you want the eight treasures congee packet.

1/2 cup of purple or black rice (other kinds of rice are fine, too)

2 Tbsp walnuts

2 Tbsp Job’s tears

1 Tbsp hyacinth beans

12 pieces lotus seeds

6 pieces longan fruit, optionally chopped

6 pieces red dates, pits removed

4-6 cups of water

1 Tbsp goji berries

small amount of honey (optional)

Rinse all ingredients except the water, goji, and honey. and place in a slow cooker or a pot.  Add 4-6 cups of water, deppending on your cooking equipment and method (slow cookers generally require less, while stovetop cooking may require more).  If using a slow cooker, turn it on to “low” overnight or all day (8-10 hours).  Alrternatively, simmer in a covered pot over a low flame for about two hours or until everything is soft.  After the porridge is finished cooking, add goji and a small amount of honey.

Serves 2-3

Groton Business Association May Meeting

It’s May and our month to host the Groton Business Association. We’ll miss Andrea this year. She’s opened her own office in Hudson, New York.   Barbara, our receptionist, and Anne-Marie, our office manger, are off on vacations, but you can meet our new staff members Kelly Hunt, administrative staff, and Sara Hartford, Licensed Massage Therapist. It’s your chance to see what an acupuncture clinic and traditional herb dispensary look like.

A GBA meeting at Mystic River Acupuncture means good food. We’ll serve a variation of our famous Chinese breakfast congee (remember last year?) along with tasty  American-style treats made especially for us by Pastry Chef Araminta Poole. Fruit salad and yogurt are on the menu and, of course, coffee, tea, and juice.

While we network and catch up up on the business news in Groton, Sarah will be on hand for complimentary chair massage.

We welcome all Groton businesses to our clinic for the monthly meeting on Thursday May 19 at 7:30 am. RSVP to Greater Mystic Chamber of Commerce at 860-572-9578 or triciawalsh@mysticchamber.org.

Come hungry!

Spring Wellness Fair

Mystic River Acupuncture and Everything Zen are collaborating once again to bring you a Spring Wellness Fair. Stop in to try a sampling of reflexology, massage, and acupuncture. Or come by just to chat with us about what we do and how it works. We’ll have some light snacks waiting for you. We hope the evening will be every bit as enjoyable as out last event was.

Spring Wellness Fair will take place at Everything Zen, 156 King’s Highway in Groton. RSVP to Holly Potter at 860-861-8978.

Surprise Mom with Radiant Beauty

Mystic River Acupuncture and Everything Zen are collaborating to offer you a Radiant Skin Beauty Package just in time for Mother’s Day.

Holly Potter, LMT of Everything Zen will give your favorite mom an anti-aging Vitamin C facial peel and Kathleen Poole will provide a wrinkle reducing acupuncture treatment for only $115. Mom can make a day of it. Visit Everything Zen, then have a bite to eat at one of the areas many restaurants before your wrinkle reducing session at Mystic River Acupuncture. For best results, these treatments can be scheduled up to one week apart.

A full package of six of each is also available for $660, and the sampler pack can be applied towards the full package of twelve sessions. With the full package you can take advantage of special discounts on herbal consultation with Kathleen and an assortment of upgrades from Holly.

What more perfect and unique gift is there for that Special Mother in your life?

Relax With Chair Massage

We are pleased to announce that Chair Massage is once again available at Mystic River Acupuncture. Stop by for fifteen minutes of stress-draining body work and meet our new Licensed Massage Therapist, Sarah Hartford. We are excited about Sarah joining our staff. She has plenty of experience and worked at the Connecticut Center for Massage Therapy for many years.

Chair massage is most often available on Tuesdays, but please call to check the week’s schedule. You can make an appointment or come as a “walk-in” on Chair Massage days. It’s a wonderful followup to acupuncture, although you can come just for the massage. And at $1/minute it’s so affordable.

Stay tuned to learn more about Sarah Hartford, LMT. Meanwhile, pop in for a mid-day chair massage break or treat a friend to one.

Radiant Beauty at Everything Zen

Friday April 29 at 6:30 Kathleen will present a workshop about Chinese “beauty” formulas, herbal remedies that promote healthy skin. Beauty is more than skin deep, and beauty is best when it comes from the inside out.

We’ll talk about the factors contributing to healthy skin from a Chinese point of view and address problems such as dry skin, acne and premenstrual skin changes. Kathleen will bring a sample formula to show you and to try, and she’ll make a special tea for the Sin Ni San ladies’ (you’ll have to come to find out who you are). She will also demonstrate facial acupuncture for wrinkles.

Come have a fun evening at Holly Potter’s fabulous studio, Everything Zen, 156 King’s Highway in Groton. Call Holly 860-861-8978 to RSVP.

Alternative Medicine – How to Choose

On April 11, 2011 Kathleen will present ‘The Jungle of Chinese Medicine: Which to Use and How To Choose a Practitioner’ to the Mystic Rotary at its monthly luncheon at the Mystic Hilton.

She will discuss the various alternative medicines and therapies available in southeastern Connecticut, what they are used for, and how to find a practitioner. She’ll talk about which professions are licensed and which are unregulated and the educational requirements for each. Kathleen did extensive research of schools, programs, and the state statutes regarding the professions. Handouts outlining this research will be available and  she will accompany her lecture with a slide presentation.

All are invited to attend. If you’ve ever felt confused about alternative medicine, now is the time to get the facts.

Mystic Hilton is located at 20 Coogan Blvd, Mystic.

RSVP: Laureen Morley at 860-536-4140.

Receive 5 Massages and Get the Sixth Free!

We have a New Year’s gift for you — our new Massage Punch Cards. We want to make it easy for you to stay healthy this year, and massage is a great way to deal with stress and day-to-day aches and pains. It’s also an excellent way to deal with injuries, and it goes so well with acupuncture. Come into day and get your card. We’ll even keep your card here for you, so you won’t have to worry about forgetting it. Call us today and start collecting those punches. Feel your body melt into total relaxation under our massage therapists’ capable hands. You only need five punches for a free massage. It’s the deal of the year!

Acupuncture is great for athletes.

Today the NY Times published an article about NFL players using acupuncture. Acupuncture can be a real asset to any athlete. It can help them maintain peak performance and enhance their immune system.Acupuncture is a wonderful therapy for sports injuries. It can be used alone for minor sprains and strain or as an adjunct to standard treatments for serious injuries. At our clinic we treat professional, amateur, college and local high school athletes. I often see athletes before an event to give them a sense of well being and focus. After performance they return to ease the aches and pains of competition. Many use acupuncture during training. Like massage, acupuncture is an essential tool for athletes of all ages and types.

Acupuncture and the NFL

We welcome ESCU medical anthropology class.

On November 14, Eastern Connecticut State University’s Medical Anthropology Class visited Mystic River Acupuncture. Kathleen spoke to the class about the history of Chinese Medicine and how acupuncture works. She demonstrated how to put an herbal formula together and weighed herbal ingredients out on both an ancient style scale and a modern digital one. The class had a tour of the facility, with plenty of time for questions. Kathleen explained the ins and outs of practicing in this country and  outlined the requirements for becoming a Connecticut licensed acupuncturist. She told the class about how the profession has changed in the past twenty years.  She described the steps she took in establishing her clinic and its growth over that time period. In past years, Kathleen has demonstrated acupuncture by giving mini-treatments to willing students. Professor Joan Greene includes a trip to Mystic River Acupuncture in her annual curriculum in order to show her students how ancient medical traditions are practiced in the modern western world.

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