“101 Amazing Uses for Cinnamon” – My New Vinegar

(Gerry Furth-Sides) Nancy Chen’s new 101 Amazing Uses for Cinnamon transforms mainstay spice, cinnamon, into “my new vinegar”. That’s because once aware of the myriad uses of simple vinegar in cooking and cleaning I was “hooked on it as a necessity. This book adds another ancient product into a household necessity. In fact, I finally tossed out the tattered, faded “vinegar use list) held by a magnet on my fridge door that my dad had given me decades before. And with this compact item (with an extra durable cover) , I can always save Nancy’s book.

The little paperback covers so many ways this simple spice can improve your health, your home, and of course, your food From improving memory to aiding digestion to supporting a healthy garden it is conveniently divided into tabbed sections for each category. There are new, enticing recipes, such as Winter Sangria and Paled Cinnamon Raisin Bagels, but ideas for using cinnamon in syrups, pastes, spreads, dog foods (!) and even as a meat flavoring and food preservative. It turns out that cinnamon essential oil has been shown to help prevent bacteria and other microbes from spoiling food due to its high antimicrobial properties. Nancy suggests that, “if you are creating preserves at home (such as jam), you can add a cinnamon sprinkle to your recipe to help extend the food’s shelf life.

101 Amazing Uses series gives practical advice following the the trend of more organic but effective solutions using nature’s non-commercial, easily accessible and easy to store centuries old remedies. Other books in the series do, indeed, include apple cider vinegar, as well as aloe vera, ginger, essential oils, and more.

We loved the easy ideas in “Cozy Up Your Breakfast” that included Breakfast Cinnamon Sweet Potatoes. We actually substituted the coffee paste for the oatmeal topping. It sparked our daily cereal with both sweet and spicy because of the honey and cayenne i it. It was delicious. The paste can be stored, and even used as a novel gift idea at holiday time when packaged in a mini canning jar.

The best way to use cinnamon is in both ground cinnamon that can be sprinkled into recipes, as a topping, and in various homemade household cleaners or beauty products. Different essential oils are needed to prepare a lot of these cleaners or beauty , nutritional supplements.

Cinnamon sticks are recommended to mull wine to “lend its sweet flavor and aroma to the liquid it is sitting in.” It is also an attractive addition to any drink. However, the sticks impart less flavor than the powder. Also, Nancy reminded readers that “it’s best to use a carrier oil due to essential oils’ high potency – something we never know.

Cinnamon is a bark so it is ground up or rolled up, and each has a little bit different shelf life. Cinnamon stored in a container is effective for about six months but it does not go bad. Cinnamon sticks last a little longer. Both should be kept in a sealed glass jar and away from heat and light.

All cinnamon types get their flavor and tantalizing aroma from cinamaldehyde, an organic compound found in Cinnamomum trees. This compound is responsible for man of the spice’s benefits, such as its antimicrobial and anti fungal properties. Its most concentrated form is in essential oils made from cinnamon bark, which is 90% cinamaldehyde.The most important thing I learned right first off was the difference between cinnamon from Sri Lanka, which is the source of the famous Ceylon cinnamon.

We were also tantalized by the idea of cinnamon as a plant healer. The cinnamon, as it turns out, prevents fungus from growing on a plant that is struggling to survive from a “wound.”

101 Amazing Uses of Cinnamon by Nancy Chen ($12.95) is part of the “101 Amazing Uses Book ” series published by Families LLC. For more information, please wee www.familius.com. We highly recommend it!