What's In a Spice: Cinnamon

Cinnamon is cinnamon, right?

Well, that depends, as it turns out.

When I prepared to make my second iteration of Dad's Holiday Pie, I knew I had to get some new spices. Both our nutmeg and our cinnamon had expiry dates of up to two years. So I went cinnamon and nutmeg shopping. 

My destination was Whole Foods, only because I thought I could get spices in bulk there. Turns out they were out of cinnamon and didn't carry nutmeg in bulk. I turned to the spice section and picked up a container of organic Korintje cinnamon. I didn't know what the word "Korintje" meant, but it sounded exotic, and the container said it is a product of Indonesia.

The spice seemed to work just fine in my pie, but I became curious about what the difference is between Indonesian and the "Saigon" cinnamon that had been in our spice drawer expiring.

This curiosity led to my discovery that what most North American cooks use as cinnamon is technically not even cinnamon at all, but is "cassia." The only "pure" cinnamon is grown in Sri Lanka. Cassia is grown in China, Vietnam and Indonesia. It turns out, not surprisingly, that Saigon cinnamon is the Vietnamese cassia.

Korintje Indonesian "cinnamon" (cassia) is widely used by commercial bakeries in the US because of its consistent familiar flavor and lower cost. But, it turns out that there are also different grades of Korintje: grade A with 3% cinnamon oil (the most flavorful and aromatic), and the lower grades B and C. It turns out that most grocery stores usually carry these lower grades which have a much lower cinnamon oil content and are considered to be the cheapest and least flavorful of all the cassia.

Although I turned down my nose at the Saigon Cinnamon that I first used in making my pie, it turns out that this variety of cassia has the highest amount of both essential oil and cinnamaldehyde, which makes it the most rich, sweet, spicy, and strong cassia. Looks like maybe I should have stuck with the Saigon ...

Thoughts, anyone?

The first book in my cooking library.