According to the theory of traditional Chinese medicine, food is divided into five flavors: sweet, sour, bitter, spicy and salty, which are related to the five internal organs: sweet into the spleen, sour into the liver, bitter into the heart, spicy into the lungs and salty into the kidney. The Book of Changes and the Five Elements are matched with five flavors: gold, Moringa, sour water, salty fire and bitter soil.
Spinach, celery, pumpkin, cucumber, ginkgo and other five elements are good for the liver. Raw beef slices, Chili sauce and carrots are five elements of fire, which are good for the heart. Yellow foods such as bean jelly, egg yolk, walnuts and pine nuts belong to soil and are good for the spleen. Radish, soybean sprouts, chestnuts and protein are all white foods, and the five elements belong to gold, which is good for the lungs. Finally, platycodon grandiflorum, kelp, mushrooms and other five elements belong to water, and these black foods are good for the kidneys.