The Chinese Medicated Diet is not just a simple combination of food and Chinese herbs, but a special highly processed diet made from Chinese drugs, food and condiments under the theoretical guidance of diet preparation based on differentiation of symptoms and signs of traditional Chinese medicine. It has not only the efficiency of medicine but also the delicacy of food, and can be used to prevent and cure diseases, build up one's health and prolong one's life.
Chinese medicated diet has a long history. The ancient legend Shennong Chang Bai Cao (Shennong Tastes a Hundred Grasses) shows that early in remote antiquity the Chinese nation began to explore the function of food and medicaments, hence the saying: "Traditional Chinese medicine and diet both originate from the practice and experience in daily life."
In the Zhou Dynasty (11th century-256BC), royal doctors were divided into four kinds, one of which was dietetic doctor, who was in charge of the emperor's health care and health preservation, and was responsible for preparing diets for him.
In the Huangdi Nei Jing (Yellow Emperor's Internal Classic), a medical classic in traditional Chinese medicine, which appeared approximately in the Warring States Period (475-221BC), several medicated diet prescriptions were recorded. In Shennong Bencao Jing (Shennong Emperor's Classic of Materia Medica, which was published approximately in about the Qin and Han periods (221BC-8AD) and is the extant earliest monograph on materia medica, many sorts of medicaments which are both drugs and food were recorded, such as Chinese-date, sesame seed, Chinese yam, grape, walnut kernel, lily bulb, fresh ginger, Job's-tears seed, etc. In the book Shanghan Zabing Lun (Treatise on Febrile and Miscellaneous Diseases) written by Zhang Zhongjing, a noted medical man in the Eastern Han Dynasty (25-220), some noted medicated diet recipes were recorded, such as soup of Chinese angelica root, fresh ginger and mutton, decoction of pig-skin, etc., all of which now still have important values.