Every year around October, the internet fills up with foods that will supposedly stop you getting sick. We sell juice, so you'd expect us to join in. We'd rather tell you what's actually true, because it's more useful and it's the reason people trust us in the first place.
The immune system isn't a dial
The language of "boosting" suggests there's a setting you can turn up. There isn't. A healthy immune system is a balanced one, and an over-active immune response is its own problem rather than a goal. Most of what genuinely supports it is unglamorous: sleeping enough, eating enough, moving, managing stress, washing your hands.
What the vitamin C research actually found
This is the one worth getting right, because it's endlessly misquoted. The Cochrane review — the most thorough look at the question — found that taking vitamin C regularly shortens colds modestly, by around 8% in adults. It did not find that it prevents colds in the general population. And critically, it found no consistent benefit from starting vitamin C after symptoms begin.
The trials that showed the modest effect used 200mg a day or more, taken consistently. A bottle of Farma-C has 68mg — roughly what's in an orange.
So the honest framing is a habit, not a rescue. Drinking citrus through the winter because you like it is reasonable. Drinking it the morning you wake up with a sore throat and expecting it to work is not what the research shows.
What food genuinely helps with
Once you're actually unwell, food stops being about prevention and starts being about comfort and practicality. It can help with the things that make being ill miserable:
- Hydration, which slips quickly when your appetite drops and the heating is on.
- Getting anything in at all, when solid food is unappealing and cold drinks go down easier.
- Warmth, which is not a nutritional claim but is genuinely how people want to feel.
What we actually drink
Through the colder months our own habits shift toward citrus and roots — Farma-C in the morning, ginger and turmeric shots, and soup when nobody feels like chewing. A ginger shot stirred into hot water with lemon and honey is the thing most of our team reaches for.
We drink these because they're warming, because they taste good, and because a hot drink at four o'clock in January is its own reward.
