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In Hitchcock’s suspense masterpiece Notorious, Nazi villain Claude Rains discovers his wife, Ingrid Bergman, is an undercover agent and plots to kill her without detection by gradually poisoning her coffee.
When we learn about every day foods containing traces of toxins, it can feel like our health is being eroded little by little and no one is minding the store. Cinnamon is a common pantry staple, but it has recently come under fire for containing traces of heavy metals like lead, cadmium, arsenic, or mercury. Many of us add a sprinkle of cinnamon to our morning oatmeal or coffee and will be measuring out more for recipes in the upcoming holiday season. Some people regularly take larger amounts of cinnamon to lower blood pressure, blood sugar levels, or cholesterol. Could our bottle of this popular spice actually be detrimental to our health? Is cinnamon a sustainable crop?
Today we’re focusing on cinnamon that might be contaminated with lead. There is no safe limit of lead to consume, and because lead is a naturally occurring element in the earth’s crust, there are no regulatory limits, so it can infiltrate the food supply wherever food is grown or processed. Last year a major FDA investigation discovered children's apple cinnamon fruit puree tainted with lead. As a result, the FDA started screening cinnamon more carefully and then began issuing warnings and recalls of brands with elevated lead levels. This prompted Consumer Reports to test many different cinnamon brands, which led to the discovery of high levels of lead in over one-third of the samples.
Is Cinnamon Safe to Consume? The US Department of Agriculture says ½ a teaspoon of cinnamon a day is generally safe and even beneficial to health due to properties that reduce inflammation, lower blood sugar, lower cholesterol, improve insulin sensitivity, protect against infections, and protect against heart disease. The United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization proposed an international safety standard of 2.5 ppm of lead for cinnamon or spices that include cinnamon (e.g. garam marsala). The only state in the U.S. that regulates heavy metals in spices is New York, where anything above 1ppm triggers a recall. A pediatrician with Cleveland Clinic Children’s Hospital points out that some cinnamon products, usually unfamiliar brands such as Paras, EGN, and Badia, have levels containing 3.52, 2.92, and 1.03ppm of lead, respectively -- up to three times the safe threshold. This is obviously concerning for anyone but especially for children and pregnant women. Even small amounts of lead consumed on a regular basis can bioaccumulate, cause developmental delays and learning problems, and damage the brain and nervous system. In adults, frequent lead exposure has been linked to immune system suppression, reproductive issues, kidney damage, and hypertension.
Which Brand Should You Buy? If you love cinnamon and its benefits and want to ingest the smallest, safest amount of lead possible, check out this helpful list of "Don't Use," "Okay to Use," and "Best to Use" brands of cinnamon, including the amounts of lead in each.
Is Organic Cinnamon Lower in Lead? Unfortunately, the Department of Agriculture’s organic standards does not include heavy metal testing. The six organic products that Consumer Reports tested happened to come in below 1ppm of lead, and three actually had levels close to zero, but there isn’t enough data to show whether organic brands correlate with lower levels of lead. Choosing organic is generally a good idea though, especially if you’d prefer a pesticide-free bowl of oatmeal or a pesticide-free gingerbread cookie.
Is Cinnamon a Sustainable Crop? There is some controversy about the different ways cinnamon trees can be harvested. When whole branches as well as the bark of trees are harvested, entire forests wind up being logged, which leads to a loss of biodiversity, erosion, and deforestation. Since cinnamon can be manufactured just by stripping bark off the tree branches, clearcutting entire plantations is not necessary and regeneration can occur naturally. In Indonesia, cinnamon crops are harvested once every 10 to 15 years and trees grow back quickly after being cut, not unlike bamboo, another sustainable crop. Cinnamon can be grown successfully without agrochemicals and are intercropped with other trees.
Droughts in Sri Lanka and climate change have impacted the growth of cinnamon trees, which need wet, marshy soil to survive. There’s also a shortage of workers who understand the art of carefully peeling and drying Ceylon cinnamon bark in small quantities, and this drives up the price.
Should You Choose Cassia or Ceylon Cinnamon? The United States imports approximately 75% of their cinnamon from Indonesia and 25% from Sri Lanka. “Cassia” cinnamon from Indonesia is more commonly found in supermarkets and contains more coumarin than “Ceylon” cinnamon from Sri Lanka. Consuming too much coumarin can interfere with medications and cause liver toxicity and other side effects. For this reason, the Ceylon variety is known for being the “truer,” purer, and healthier cinnamon, so individuals who are sensitive to coumarin may wish to choose Ceylon cinnamon. While cinnamon in the UK and other countries distinguish between Cassia cinnamon and Ceylon cinnamon through labelling, products in the States are usually labelled simply as “cinnamon,” making it harder to find the type you want or want to avoid.
As far as taste goes, cinnamon aficionados consider Cassia stronger and spicier in flavor compared to the lighter and milder Ceylon. If you have some organic, lead-free (or almost lead-free) cinnamon, here's a delicious recipe for Snickerdoodle Cookies (which are similar to sugar cookies but rolled in a cinnamon-sugar mix)! Chef Cindy Gershen has shared her recipe for the fabulous Red Lentil Curry Stew (which contains cinnamon), served at last month’s SCOCO Gala!
Sources and further reading:
https://www.rainforest-alliance.org/in-the-field/worlds-first-certified-cinnamon-farms/
https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/side-effects-of-cinnamon
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mn6650M3M-U
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