Cassia

[butter]

A friend of mine has been noticing cassia as a common ingredient in some Australian written recipes. According to my food dictionary, cassia is what we call cinnamon and can buy in any store. The other cinnamon is called Ceylon. My friend says cassia is not the run of the mill cinnamon. Is this a misprint in my book? Is my friend wrong? I tried doing a search here, but it takes too long to go through all the threads. E-gullet to the rescue please.

[ScorchedPalate]

It's my understanding that the stuff we call cinnamon is indeed cassia, whereas "mexican cinnamon" -- a dusty brown, soft-textured bark-like spice -- is actually true ceylon cinnamon.

[Wolfert]

Penzeys does a good job of breaking down the different types of cinnamon and cassia.

http://www.penzeys.com/cgi-bin/penzeys/p-p...yscinnamon.html

[eje]

Depending on your interest in the, uh, botanic component, Gernet Katzer's spice pages may or may not be of interest.

http://www.uni-graz.at/~katzer/engl/

Short answer is, most things considered cinnamon are from the same Genus.

Slightly longer or more complicated answer is for various reasons different cultures "default" cinnamon may be a different species in that Genus.

Fer example, in America, Cinnamomum cassia is most apt to be considered cinnamon. However in Mexico, what they call "Canela" is probably going to be Cinnamomum burmannii or Indonesian cinnamon.

To me, Cinnamomum cassia is a little harsher and more like clove in its flavor. Indonesian cinnamon is mellower and more complex.

[budrichard]

The 'Ceylon' that Penzy's sells is a subtler cinnamin than the Cassia. We use both in various forms. For a strong cinnamin, the Cassia is the way to go. For a milder and floral taste, 'Ceylon' is superb. -Dick

[Episure]

Cinnamon (Left) and Cassia (Right)

Edited November 12, 2005 by Episure (log)

[Adam Balic]

Cinnamon (Left)                  and                  Cassia (Right)

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Have you got three types of cinnamon here? The shards of the far right look like Vietnamese cinnamon (Cinnamomum loureirii), were as the middle stick looks like cassia (Cinnamomum cassia) and the left sticks look like true/Ceylon cinnamon (Cinnamomum zeylanicum).

[Episure]

Cinnamon (Left)                  and                   Cassia (Right)

←

Have you got three types of cinnamon here? The shards of the far right look like Vietnamese cinnamon (Cinnamomum loureirii), were as the middle stick looks like cassia (Cinnamomum cassia) and the left sticks look like true/Ceylon cinnamon (Cinnamomum zeylanicum).

←

Adam, I'm reasonably certain that the one on the right is an Indian subspecies - Cinnamomum Tamala. I have seen the bark being harvested from this tree which also yields the Indian Bay leaf aka Tamal Patta.

The left one is unmistakably Cinnamomum zeylanicum (Concentric Quills). Extreme left are the inner quills of the same.

There is a lot of confusion about Indian spice names, the sub species and the regional languages dont help either.

Hope this helps.

[Adam Balic]

It helps a great deal thank you and you have solved a minor mystery for me. I have a Anglo-Indian cookbook published in Calcutta, 1900 and in some of the curry recipes it refers to the use of bay leaves, which seemed a little odd as most other ingredients were local. Cheers

I have some photos of some other Cinnamon species which I will post when imagegullet is up.

[helenjp]

I think an Australian book would specify "cassia", because Australia and NZ follow the UK practice of using C. zeylanicum as "cinnamon", whereas the typical "cinnamon" flavor of US baked goods is definitely cassia.

I used to work in a Chinese grocery, where we sold cassia bark in big chunks with red paper labels pasted on. It looked very like the RH photo, except that possibly the bark was even rougher. Hard to tell when comparing a small photo with a 20 year old memory, anyway!