Tag: cinnamon

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try these: cinnamon brooms

In autumn Trader Joe’s carries these cinnamon brooms, actually made of pine that has been treated with cinnamon oil (from the cinnamon tree, how cool that cinnamon is bark). They smell purely, authentically and, at least at first, powerfully, of cinnamon. I love the smell of cinnamons (there are so many varieties!) along with all of their known associates (nutmeg(s!), allspice, clove, cassia), anything under the compelling umbrella of spicy and warm,* and usually pick up a few. They provide a pleasant, natural fragrance for a good while.

*Remember the original Bulgari Omnia?

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My favorite application is sticking one in the coat closet so I smell like chai all winter.

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drinking: hot toddies

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Toddies are just the thing when you’re under the weather. So say I. This is such a flexible beverage, you can use brandy, whiskey, scotch, bourbon… (or, I mean, you can use anything you want), any kind of tea or just hot water, any herbs or spices you want to toss in…a hot liquored up infusion of any sort I would say falls under this toddy umbrella. Toddy is such a cute word.

While it is flexible, mine generally tend to be something like this:

1-1.5 oz bourbon (often like the slightly sweeter bourbon over whiskey for this application, here Buffalo Trace)

1/4 lemon, juice of

cloves, allspice berries, cinnamon stick

1 Tbs honey

tea (lemon, chamomile, or something fruity, or whatever, here I’ve used Teavana’s Youthberry, a sweet white tea)

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Match Convivio mug, spoon, and Libeco Grainhall napkin on loan from Didriks.

Elaborate beverages cheer me up. Don’t they you? Get someone else to make one for you and it’s even better.

It just got distinctly colder here in Cambridge, so a toddy here and there is all the more welcome. They’re easy drinking, though, so they can sneak up on you…