Sugar and spice . . . beware of cinnamon?

One of my most favorite things in the world is cinnamon. I love it in my tea, warm milk and honey, oatmeal cookies, smoothies . . . you name it. Finally the West is now jumping on the health benefit wagon touting its effectiveness as an antibacterial, anti fungal, sugar balancing wonder spice. For centuries lady cinnamon has been used in Chinese and Ayurvedic medicine to fight colds, diabetes, indigestion. This is all great news until I just heard that there are two kinds of commonly used cinnamon one from China derived from Cassia and the other cinnamon from Ceylon. It seems the cassia variety which is sold at most stores like Whole Foods, Trader Joes, etc. is so highly toxic that it has been banned in Germany.  The cassia form which is darker in color contains a substance called coumarin which can be toxic to the liver in large doses. So if you want to continue your cinnamon treats and get a health benefit I highly recommend getting the Ceylon Cinnamon which actually even tastes better! You can purchase it in bulk through a wonderful site called The Spice Sage.