Should You Grind Your Own Cinnamon? Find Out

Should You Grind Your Own Cinnamon? The answer is obviously and absolutely a Yes for me. I prefer to grind my cinnamon rather than buy ground cinnamon from a store.

Cinnamon is a great taste for a species of spices that contains volatile oils which is responsible for the magical satisfaction of the tongue.

It can really change a bite, deeping, sip or a scoop if the flavours are smoothly blended in your recipes. You can make it in different forms. It can be in liquid, stick or powder form. It has very good health benefits like anti-ageing, anti-inflammatory.

Reasons why you should grind your own cinnamon

Buying cinnamon powder from stores can save you the stress of grinding them yourself, especially when you don’t really know how to grind them well or you’re grinding for the first time.

Now I’ll tell you why you should grind your own cinnamon and furthermore, how to grind them.

Nutrients Retention

You can ignore the place of spices as one of the most nutritional natural ingredients and when you mention spices, you can do it without the “c” in it which stands for cinnamon.

When your cinnamon is freshly ground, it retains all of its nutritional elements until perhaps, you don’t use them after a week or two and then these nutrients begin to evaporate or deteriorate as a result of exposure. This means that you should grind your own cinnamon and use as you may need.

Better taste or freshness of flavours

There is obviously no way a freshly ground cinnamon powder will give you a stall flavour right? When you grind cinnamon toasts on your own, you get to use them fresh out of the grinder. There is this element of effective flavour blend you get when the cinnamon spice is fresh.

Using ground cinnamon is not a bad idea at all but for how long do you know it has been ground and how flavorful is it at the moment you are purchasing it from a store. These are reasons why you should grind your own cinnamon.

Health benefits

There is cinnamon sugar, cinnamon spice( which can come in different forms of sticks or powder). These forms perform very important roles in our healthy living. For instance, cinnamon sugar is better than just normal sugar.

Normal sugar can lead to health conditions like diabetes when overly consumed but cinnamon sugar is like honey and comes with a refreshing taste when used.

You can use it to mix your dough or dip a dough in before consumption without the thoughts of negative consequences.

The ground cinnamon or sticks serve as an anti-inflammatory and helps to control fat buildup in the body.

How can I grind cinnamon sticks?

You can grind your cinnamon sticks by first of all roasting and drying the whole cinnamon sticks by heating them in a pan under low flame for just two minutes before you’ll crush them into a fine powder form.

You can use a food processor, spice grinder, coffee grinder, or you can go natural( if you got the strength) by using a mortar and pestle. Make sure you add a teaspoon of brown sugar when grinding for every one cup of cinnamon sticks.

Spice grinder

This type of machine was specifically designed to serve this purpose which is to grind spices into the perfect, fine and smooth gritty blends that will give you great tastes of flavours in your recipes.

Using a  spice grinder gives you a better advantage because the burrs will crush the cinnamon sticks into the gritty sand-sized powder as they are designed not to let a single chunk pass them by. They are perfect for the smooth and fine making of cinnamon powder.

Food processor

It is very advisable to grind your cinnamon sticks in your food processor. This is because the food processor grinds smoothly as it is a heavy-duty machine with high power. It will even give it an enjoyable taste too.

It uses specially designed burrs to grind your cinnamon sticks into the desired elements that suit your recipes. So it’s very good to use this machine if you need an easy way through the grinding process.

Coffee grinder

Coffee beans are a little bit stronger in nature than cinnamon sticks(except in rare cases of over-roasted and dried sticks) and so, coffee grinders are a perfect match for the achievement of a fine cinnamon ground.

Fill in your coffee grinder but not to the full and run as much cycle as you may need to smoothen your sticks into the perfect powder form you desire to enjoy.

Mortar and pestle

You can turn your cinnamon stick into powder form even without a grinder. A more natural, efficient and zero expense or power implied is the use of mortar and pestle. Don’t wonder how or why I said that. Although it is not as efficient as a grinder, this method is good.

All you need to do is put as many cinnamon sticks as you want into your mortar( the more space for accommodation makes them efficient in their way too) , get your pestle and pound gently so they don’t pop out of the mortar.

Keep pounding until you have reached the level of powder you want or your hands’ stamina can withstand.

However, if you desire a great deal of smoothness or finer cinnamon powder, I’ll hate to tell you that this method may not exactly give you that.

So you’ll either use a blender, grinder or food processor or take your chances and pound until you can’t anymore. Just maybe, you will eventually get what you want.

Grater or Zester

It is not a difficult thing to grate cinnamon sticks. You can grate your quills with a box grater or a zester as you may like or have.

You can use these to grind cinnamon sticks into considerable sizes and then, you can further smoothen them into finer natures by using either your spice grinder, blender, food processor or coffee grinder.

You can grate your sticks into a bowl and when you use the fine blades of either a grater or a zester.

FAQs

Is it better to use cinnamon sticks than powder?

If you want to get a wonderful cinnamon flavour from infusing it into liquid, then you are better off with using cinnamon sticks but if you want to get this kinda flavour in solids like cake, then you will have to use the powdered form of cinnamon by adding a pinch or more as it may require on it.

The stick cinnamon is more expensive than cinnamon powder form though. However the former when freshly ground gives your taste better flavour than the latter.

Is fresh ground cinnamon stronger?

The answer is yes. This is because it has more flavours than the ones you buy from the stores. It’s a debate of whether you’re using less or enjoying a great and strong taste of cinnamon flavour.

It will amaze you how there could be such a great deal of difference between fresh ground and purchased cinnamon spice. I am on the side that enjoys great taste though.

Are ground cinnamon and cinnamon powder the same?

Both terms basically mean the same thing. The differences would be in the smoothness as the latter is a little bit finer than but they both suit perfectly into recipes. Ground cinnamon and cinnamon powder are both the same in flavour too, so long as they are the same species of cinnamon.

This is because there are different kinds of cinnamon and as they differ in nature, so do they in the taste of flavours.

Can you grind cinnamon sticks in a blender?

Yes, you can. What you need to do is arrange your cinnamon sticks in your blender cup, attach the cup to the blades and simply press on the “start” button on your blender and it will give you a good blend. If after a blend it is not as smooth as you want(which may be likely to happen) you blend all over again.

One more thing, be sure not to fill up your blender with these sticks and this is to allow for and ensure a good and smooth blend. You can use one of the best spices blenders known as the Magic bullet blender to get a fine and smooth grind of your cinnamon sticks.

Should You Grind Your Own Cinnamon – Conclusion

Cinnamon spices have good influences on the flavours and taste of our food when we use them. Those who have experienced it will know this for sure. You can make it into liquid form and dip your dough in it for a nice bite.

When you grind your cinnamon sticks using any of these methods, add a teaspoon per cup. It is better to grind your own cinnamon rather than pay for a deteriorated one from a store. However, cinnamon powder from stores is cheaper and can still make a great taste.

You can identify the real cinnamon from its tan colour not like the reddish look of cassia cinnamon or by its delicate sweet taste and flaky texture.