ABSTRACT
China has an extensive history of understanding the links between food and well-being. The Chinese have long believed that foodstuffs and drugs come from the same source, and the importance of balanced food was discussed in The Yellow Emperor’s Classic of Internal Medicine (West Han dynasty, 206-208 B.C.). That food could be used instead of drugs to treat diseases was discussed in a book entitled Effective Emergency Treatments (Tang dynasty, A.D. 618-907). For the Chinese, food was not only to be enjoyed for the taste, but also to be appreciated for its medicinal values. The most comprehensive work describing basic information about the functionality of food was carried out by Li in 1578. He devoted 27 years to study materia medica, and collected information on 1,892 different kinds of medicinal materials in a book of 25 volumes.
