For babies or small children with a chest infection, first warm some cotton wool. Before when my mum and grandmum used fires for cooking it used to go on the cinders, now on an electric hot plate or in a frying pan on the cooker. Then put some sugar on it and put it on the child's chest. In England, you can put the cotton wool on the cinders in your fireplaces which we don't have because it's hot.

Here are two of my grandmother's recipes. My mum has only used the second one, but she can remember her mother giving her this one as a child: take dried figs, carob, and "gramigna" - bermuda grass (cynodon dactylon) which is like couch grass - and boil them in water until it goes down to half. Add a piece of liquorice root to the syrup after taking it off the heat.

My mum used to take some collard (brassica oleracea) - like kale - cut it in slices, put sugar on and leave it in a cullender for twenty-four hours. The sugar drips through and makes a syrup.

Take a teaspoon of honey and squeeze a few drops of lemon juice - this relieves the tickle and I still use it.