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Bernice Chan

Pastry chef Steve Hodge likes to make cinnamon toast – a quick snack for his kids at home. He spreads room-temperature butter on freshly toasted bread and then sprinkles a mixture of equal parts cinnamon and sugar on top.
“When it’s nice and warm, the sugar kind of melts and infuses with the cinnamon. The flavour is unreal,” observes Hodge, the owner of Vancouver-based Temper Chocolate & Pastry.
For many, the smell of cinnamon evokes the flavours of autumn and winter, including apple pie, pumpkin pie, cinnamon rolls, eggnog and mulled wine. Hodge says that’s because the woody spice has a warmth to it.

“Cinnamon has a lot of great flavours because there’s an earthy, woody taste to it,” he says. “If you were to smell or chew on a cinnamon stick, there is a spiced note to it.” He adds that, depending on what ingredients you cook with, cinnamon can enhance the flavours of other spices, contribute a subtle sweetness to spicy food and even provide a hint of acidity.
This woody spice comes from the inner bark of trees in the genus Cinnamomum. “True cinnamon” (Cinnamomum verum), or Ceylon cinnamon, comes from Sri Lanka, formerly known as Ceylon. However, most of the world’s cinnamon production – about 90 per cent – comes from related species grown in Indonesia, Vietnam and China. Ceylon cinnamon has a lighter, milder and sweeter flavour compared to the stronger, spicier and more pungent taste of other varieties.

While cinnamon is commonly used in baking, it is also found in savoury dishes like soups and curries. The spice is added to everything from breakfast cereals to hot chocolate and ice cream. Studies exploring cinnamon’s health benefits suggest it may help support healthy blood pressure, blood sugar and metabolism, and reduce inflammation.
Here in Asia, the spice is synonymous with Chinese five-spice powder, fiery Indonesian and Malaysian rendang, and the festive Korean punch known as sujeonggwa. In the West, of course, cinnamon is known for its association with apple pies. When Hodge makes them, he uses Granny Smiths, explaining that the spice balances the apples’ sharp acidity.
When combining cinnamon and chocolate, Hodge says sweeter and creamier is better.
“When you add cinnamon to dark chocolate, it’s too overpowering. It becomes dry in your mouth,” he observes. “We [use] milk chocolate to bring out the cinnamon flavour but still have a nice balance of sweetness.” He says the spice also works well with white chocolate.

Hodge likes to use cinnamon in his shop’s savoury items too.
“We make a Cubano sandwich [a roast pork, ham and cheese sandwich] at Temper, and when we cook the pork in the braising liquid, we use lemons, limes and cinnamon sticks,” he explains. “The cinnamon gives a nice, earthy note to the pork, and also helps add a little bit of sweetness to the acidity of the lemons. So it has a nice after-note when you eat it – it’s not overpowering.”
At home, most people have cinnamon in powder form in their pantry, but Hodge says freshly grated cinnamon sticks have a more pungent flavour. Which you use depends on the recipe. For baked goods, the powder is best, and for soups and stocks, a whole cinnamon stick will suffice.
When it comes to Indian cuisine, Desi Indian Lounge executive chef Balvant Ajagaonkar says cinnamon is one of the five basic spices in addition to cumin, coriander, turmeric and cardamom.

“When you make basic gravies and curries, you temper or heat the oil and then add spices like cinnamon, green cardamom, cumin seeds, coriander seeds and bay leaves to release the fragrance,” explains the Vancouver-based chef. “Cinnamon has a warm and strong flavour, but you need to know how to use it and in what quantity; we use less of it relative to other spices. When we use it in curries like garam masala, we use it in a powder form, but not too much,” he cautions.
He says a cinnamon stick is usually roasted in a pan or oven with other spices before they are all ground. “In rice dishes, we add cinnamon to biryani rice and pulao,” he says. “We first temper the spices with ginger and garlic to release the flavours before adding the rice and water. If you’re using a whole cinnamon stick at the beginning, it releases the flavour slowly. But before we serve the dish, we take out the cinnamon stick because it’s not edible.”

Ajagaonkar explains that the spice is also added to chutneys like pineapple and apple, while in desserts cinnamon is in shakarpara, a dough that’s baked or deep fried. Other cinnamon-flavoured desserts include cinnamon apple raisin pudding, pistachio and cinnamon lime kulfi, and halva with apple cooked with cinnamon and other spices. Cinnamon sticks are also used to make chai.
For most Cantonese people, cinnamon is combined with star anise, cardamom and tangerine peels to make lo sui or master stock to slowly braise proteins like tofu, goose wings and eggs.
However, many Cantonese also have a negative association with cinnamon, as it is used in Chinese medicine. The bitter medicinal taste of such medicines creates a bias that Cinnabon Hong Kong director Steven Yang Tsuen-men is trying to counter.
“We [Chinese] don’t really have a sweet use of cinnamon like the Western world does,” he explains.

When he talks to potential customers who immediately dismiss cinnamon, Yang asks about their food preferences to find out where their aversion lies, and most of the time is able to persuade them to try the well-known American brand of cinnamon rolls started in Seattle, Washington, in 1985.
“I tell them that they don’t like cinnamon because it’s very strong when they [first] smell it. If you take freshly ground cinnamon, it definitely has a very sharp taste. But once you bake it with butter, margarine and frosting and everything, it’s the sweetness that comes out,” he says.

When the Cinnabon founders were developing their recipe, Yang says, they experimented with 100 different types of cinnamon and eventually settled on Makara cinnamon from Indonesia, which has a higher concentration of essential oils, giving it a more pronounced cinnamon flavour. Each tray of half a dozen Cinnabon rolls uses 20 grams of Makara cinnamon.
“They tried different recipes, but they found that this type of cinnamon has the kind of sweetness and scent that [perfectly complements] the fluffy roll with its frosting,” he says.

There are different variations of cinnamon rolls, with the oldest recorded recipe dating back to the 16th century in Germany. From there the pastry spread to Scandinavia. Europeans likely acquired cinnamon through the Silk Road via Pakistan and India.
“The cinnamon rolls are home-made – some are shaped into smaller circles, some are squarish, and some are bigger. Some are drier; some are more flaky, like a croissant,” Yang explains.
Cinnamon rolls appeared in the US thanks to German immigrants, later developing a fluffier texture and growing in size. “The European style [typically features] a glaze, whereas Cinnabon’s uses frosting, which blends well with the cinnamon and fluffy roll.”


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Food and Drinks

The rich history of cinnamon, from Ceylon to Cinnabon

The US chain Cinnabon uses Makara cinnamon from Indonesia for its buns. Photo: Handout

Charlie Bites from Temper Chocolate & Pastry. Photo: Jimmy Jeong

Ceylon cinnamon is also called “true cinnamon”. Photo: Handout

Cinnamon pairs well with milk chocolate. Photo: Jimmy Jeong

Chutney, daal, pulao and masala chai – all incorporating cinnamon – at Desi Indian Lounge in Vancouver. Photo: Handout

Masala chai, like the one served at Desi Indian Lounge, includes cinnamon. Photo: Handout

One batch of Cinnabons has 20 grams of Makara cinnamon from Indonesia. Photo: Handout

Cinnamon also goes well with, or in, coffee. Photo: Handout

Cinnamon rolls and sticky buns at Vancouver-based Temper Chocolate & Pastry. Photo: Jimmy Jeong

Why the chestnut is so versatile, used in Hong Kong street food, French desserts and pasta sauce

Chestnuts are a favourite street food in Hong Kong at this time of year, but chefs find a use for them in a wide variety of dishes. Photo: Shutterstock

Chestnuts ripening on the tree. Photo: Handout

Chestnut Brae Farm Brae B-Q Sauce. Photo: Handout

John and Linda Stanley of Western Australia’s Chestnut Brae Farm. Photo: Handout

Chestnut Brae Farm Chestnuts in Syrup. Photo: Handout

Canada’s national condiment: the surprisingly versatile maple syrup

Maple syrup, the quintessential Canadian condiment. Photo: Handout

Pier-Alexis Soulière. Photo: Isabelle Blois

Lincoln Country Reserve maple syrup. Photo: Handout

Duck roulade with orange sauce at St Lawrence restaurant in Vancouver. Photo: Handout

Pork chop with maple syrup glaze at House of Dawn restaurant in Vancouver. Photo: Handout 

Runamok maple syrup. Photo: Handout

Discover colatura di alici, Italy’s fish sauce adding zing to dishes worldwide

Anchovies are salted and cured to make the flavour-enhancing sauce colatura di alici. Photo: Handout


Made in Italy using traditional methods, colatura di alici has become popular around the world in recent years. Photo: Handout

Based in Cetara on the Amalfi Coast, Delfino Battista has been making colatura since 1950. Photo: Handout

Anchovies are cured in a barrel with Trapani coarse salt, with the lid weighed down by a heavy stone. Photo: Handout

Salted anchovies give colatura di alici its strong, tangy flavour. Photo: Handout

Spaghetti with Acqua Pazza colatura di alici. Photo: Handout

The many uses of saffron, the world’s most expensive spice: featuring mostly in Persian and Indian cuisine, where it’s favoured for its bright yellow colour and complex taste, it takes hours to process

Autumn pandhra rassa from Prince and the Peacock in Hong Kong. Photo: Handout

Saffron threads on stoneware with an antique spoon. Photo: Getty Images

Harvesters in Spain pick the three red-orange stigma from each saffron crocus blossom to be sold as the saffron spice. It takes approximately 70,000 blossoms to produce a pound of spice. Photo: Getty Images

Tandoori zafrani paneer tikka from Hong Kong’s Prince and the Peacock. Photo: Prince and the Peacock

Zarak, a cocktail served at Elem featuring saffron. Photo: Aditya Pawar

Passing saffron through a sieve for better quality in India. Photo: Getty Images

Rose kulfi dessert from Prince and the Peacock. Photo: Prince and the Peacock

Tahdeeg with aghali ghatogh (dill, bean and garlic stew) at Delara. Photo: Delara

A bowl of saffron ice cream at Delara. Photo: Delara

Why persimmons are cherished for their versatility and distinct varieties

To make delicious Hoshigaki, or air-dried persimmons, the fruits need to be hung up and dried for a week before they are gently massaged until their natural sugars crystallise. Photo: Rick Poon

Persimmons come in many different varieties. Photo: Shutterstock

Peeling Hachiya persimmons in preparation for hoshigaki. Photo: Rick Poon

Christine Wong’s persimmon snow-skin mooncakes created to celebrate the Mid-Autumn Festival. Photo: Christine Wong

Maangchi’s version of gotgam-danji – a snack of stuffed dried persimmons. Photo: @maangchi/Instagram

Dried persimmons, or hoshigaki, develop a white dust as their natural sugars crystallise. Photo: Shutterstock

Penryn Orchard Specialties’ persimmon caprese. Photo: @penrynorchard/Instagram

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A spice derived from the dried inner bark of evergreen trees, cinnamon’s warmth and versatility shine in sweet and savoury dishes alike


A spice derived from the dried inner bark of evergreen trees, cinnamon’s warmth and versatility shine in sweet and savoury dishes alike.


The rich history of cinnamon, from Ceylon to Cinnabon

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}A spice derived from the dried inner bark of evergreen trees, cinnamon’s warmth and versatility shine in sweet and savoury dishes alike

A spice derived from the dried inner bark of evergreen trees, cinnamon’s warmth and versatility shine in sweet and savoury dishes alike