It’s recently been the season for Jerusalem artichokes and I enjoy them roasted or making a delicious soup from them. They are good for supporting gut health and as my husband had recently had to take antibiotics, I wanted to make food that would support his gut bacteria. I made the soup with leeks as well as the Jerusalem artichokes because these are also good for the gut microbiome.

Jerusalem artichokes are avoided by many people because they often cause a lot of wind. This is because they contain a sugar called inulin, which we humans are unable to digest but that our beneficial gut bacteria can use for food. The unfortunate by-product of this is gas!

I looked up ways to mitigate this unwelcome effect and found a suggestion to add caraway seeds to the soup, so this is what I did.

I then remembered that my husband had said something about not liking the taste of caraway seeds. I asked him about it and he recounted the tale of a time he had been at a shared lunch where someone had brough some bread with caraway seeds in.

“It was disgusting!” he said.

I then remembered how I had enjoyed a baker’s rye bread because of the caraway seeds it contained. I loved the flavour! I see this as a very good example of how what may be benecifical to our health can be delicious to one person and quite the opposite to another! So while we may find some good advice about the health benefits of certain foods on the internet, or in a book, it may not work for us because of our personal tastes. This is where working with a nutrition coach who can tailor advice for health eating to out personal preferences can be an advantage.

However I’m pleased to say that my husband enjoyed the Jerusalem artichoke and leek soup in spite of the carraway seed flavour. The caraway seeds seem to have worked too because neither of us suffered from wind after several bowls of the soup!

One of the preferences we may have is to avoid eating gluten or reduce our sugar consumption.  It’s been Pancake Day this month and I have been experimenting with pancake recipes that are gluten and dairy free and lower in carbohydrate. My poor husband has had to help with the taste testing! I have come up with a recipe that I think works quite well and you can get it if you sign up for my newsletter.