A Tale Of Two Cinnamons

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Cinnamon’s Health Benefits (But Watch Out!)

Cinnamon is enjoyed for its sweet and punchy flavor. It also has important health properties!

Let’s take a look at the science…

A Tale Of Two Cinnamons

In your local supermarket, there is likely “cinnamon” and if you’re lucky, also “sweet cinnamon”. The difference between these is critical to understand before we continue:

“Cinnamon” = Cinnamomum cassia or Cinnamomum aromaticum. This is cheapest and most readily available. It has a relatively high cinnamaldehyde content, and a high coumarin content.

“Sweet cinnamon” Cinnamomum verum or Cinnamomum zeylanicum. It has a lower cinnamaldehyde content, and/but a much lower (almost undetectable) coumarin content.

You may be wondering: what’s with the “or” in both of those cases? Each simply has two botanical names in use. It’s inconvenient and confusing, but that’s how it is.

Great! What’s cinnamaldehyde and what’s coumarin?

Cinnamaldehyde is what gives cinnamon its “spice” aspect; it’s strong and fragrant. It also gives cinnamon most of its health benefits.

As a quick aside: it’s also used as the flavoring element in cinnamon flavored vapes, and in that form, it can cause health problems. So do eat it, but we recommend not to vape it.

Coumarin is toxic in large quantities.

The recommended safe amount is 0.1mg/kg, so you could easily go over this with a couple of teaspoons of cassia cinnamon:

Toxicology and risk assessment of coumarin: focus on human data

…while in Sweet/True/Ceylon cinnamon, those levels are almost undetectable:

Medicinal properties of ‘true’ cinnamon (Cinnamomum zeylanicum): a systematic review

If you have a cinnamon sensitivity, it is likely, but not necessarily, tied to the coumarin content rather than the cinnamaldehyde content.

Summary of this section before moving on:

“Cinnamon”, or cassia cinnamon, has about 50% stronger health benefits than “Sweet Cinnamon”, also called Ceylon cinnamon.

“Cinnamon”, or cassia cinnamon, has about 250% stronger health risks than “Sweet Cinnamon”, also called Ceylon cinnamon.

The mathematics here is quite simple; sweet cinnamon is the preferred way to go.

The Health Benefits

We spent a lot of time/space today looking at the differences. We think this was not only worth it, but necessary. However, that leaves us with less time/space for discussing the actual benefits. We’ll summarize, with links to supporting science:

“Those three things that almost always go together”:

Heart and blood benefits:

Neuroprotective benefits:

The science does need more testing in these latter two, though.

Where to get it?

You may be able to find sweet cinnamon in your local supermarket, or if you prefer capsule form, here’s an example product on Amazon

Enjoy!

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  • Body on Fire – by Dr. Monica Aggarwal and Dr. Jyothi Rao

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    There are times when you do really need a doctor, not a dietician. But there are also times when a doctor will prescribe something for the symptom, leaving the underlying issue untouched. If only there were a way to have the best of both worlds!

    That’s where Drs. Rao and Aggarwal come in. They’re both medical doctors… with a keen interest in nutrition and healthy lifestyle changes to make us less sick such that we have less need to go to the doctor at all.

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    The writing style is accessible while science-heavy. They don’t assume prior knowledge, and/but they sure deliver a lot. The book is more text than images, but there are plenty of medical diagrams, explanations, charts, and the like. You will feed like a medical student! And it’s very much worth studying.

    Bottom line: highly recommendable even if you don’t have inflammation issues, and worth its weight in gold if you do.

    Get your copy of Body on Fire from Amazon today!

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  • Mindfulness – by Olivia Telford

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    Olivia Telford takes us on a tour of mindfulness, meditation, mindfulness meditation, and how each of these things impacts stress, anxiety, and depression—as well as less obvious things too, like productivity and relationships.

    In the category of how much this is a “how-to-” guide… It’s quite a “how-to” guide. We’re taught how to meditate, we’re taught assorted mindfulness exercises, and we’re taught specific mindfulness interventions such as beating various life traps (e.g. procrastination, executive dysfunction, etc) with mindfulness.

    The writing style is simple and to the point, explanatory and very readable. References are made to pop-science and hard science alike, and all in all, is not too far from the kind of writing you might expect to find here at 10almonds.

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  • Stand Up For Your Health (Or Don’t)

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    You may have heard the phrase “sitting is the new smoking”, and while the jury’s out on whether that’s accurate or not in terms of exactly how damaging it is, one thing that is universally agreed-upon is that sitting is indeed very bad.

    It’s especially bad for your spine (because of being folded in ways it shouldn’t be), your muscles and associated nerves of the lower back and hip area, your abdominal organs (because of being compressed in ways they shouldn’t be), and your heart (because of arteries and veins being squashed up in ways they shouldn’t be), and if you remember how “what’s good for your heart is good for your brain”, the inverse is true, and what’s bad for your heart is also bad for your brain, which won’t get nourished with oxygen and nutrients and which won’t have its detritus removed as efficiently as it should; that’ll be left to build up in the brain instead.

    First, elephant in the room: not everybody can stand, and of those who can, not everybody can stand for long. So obviously, work within what’s attainable for you.

    Also note that while sitting is the disease-bringer/worsener, standing isn’t the only solution, for example:

    • Walking is better than standing. You may be wondering: “who can’t stand but can walk?” and the answer is, a lot of people with certain kinds of chronic pain, for whom walking is less chronic-pain-exacerbating than standing, because the human body is built for movement and inactivity can worsen things even more than movement.
    • Lying down is better than sitting. One of the major problems with sitting is that your organs are all bunched up in ways they shouldn’t be. Lying down is, in this regard, closer to standing than sitting, because your body has a nice straight line to it.
    • Sitting can be made less bad! For example:
      • Sitting in a recliner chair in the reclined position is… Not great, if you’re then tilting your skull forwards to compensate, but if you’re just sitting back and relaxing, this is a lot better than sitting in the usual seated position, because again, it’s closer to lying down, which is closer to standing.
      • Sitting in seiza (the traditional Japanese kneeling position) is, provided you do it correctly and with good posture, better than sitting in the traditional Western manner. The reason for this is simple: instead of having your torso and legs at 90°, they are at 120°ish, give or take the size of your thighs and butt (bigger being better in this regard), and even that angle can be made even better if you use a meditation bench like this one ← we’re eyeballing it and didn’t get out a protractor, but if you look at the model’s torso and thighs, that’s about 135° difference, which is huge improvement over the 90° you get while sitting Western-style.

    For most of us a lot of the time though, we can stand to sit less. Think about the places you most often sit, and what can be done to reasonably minimize those, for example:

    • Car: minimize driving (or being a passenger in a car); walk where reasonably possible. Public transport, if available, may have standing options.
    • Office: a standing desk is, of course, the way to go. You can even use a standing desk converter, like this one. Just make sure to set it at the correct height, both in terms of where the keyboard and mouse go (the same height as your elbows are when your arms are dropped to your sides), and where the monitor goes (center of the monitor should be at eye-level).
      • Note: laptops will never be right for this, unless the natural resting distance between your elbows and your eyes is about 4½ inches, which will only be the case if your total height is approximately 1 foot and 2 inches. For anyone taller than that, laptops are still great to have when on the move and as a backup, but not great for ergonomics.
      • Workaround: if for some reason you must use a laptop for your day-to-day work, consider using a bluetooth keyboard so that you can still set them the appropriate height-distance apart and thus not have to hunch over them.
    • Dining room: sitting to eat a main meal is reasonable, but consider standing options for lighter bites; a standing-height “brunch bar” is great if you can arrange one.
    • Lounge: let it live up to its name, and actually lounge: if you’re not going to stand, then horizontal lounging is an improvement over sitting—as is sitting on the floor, and changing your position frequently. Who knew, kids had it right in that regard!
      • Note: if, like this writer, you do a lot of reading, the same applies regardless of which room you’re doing it in.
    • Bedroom: a culprit for many will be sitting while doing a beauty routine and/or possibly make-up. Easily avoided if you set a well-lit mirror at the correct height to use while standing.
      • Note: at the correct height though! While hunching up over a wall-mounted mirror is an improvement over hunching up at a seated vanity, it’s not a great improvement. You want to be able to stand with good posture and do it comfortably.
    • Bathroom: leave your phone outside—which is also a good approach for avoiding hemorrhoids! See also: Half Of Americans Over 50 Have Hemorrhoids, But They Can Be Prevented!

    Want to know more?

    We reviewed this book recently, which goes into all of the above in much more detail than we have room for here, plus also discusses a lot of social reframes that can be used (since a lot of sitting is a matter of social expectations, not actual need). It’s a very useful read:

    Death by Sitting: The Hidden Health Risks of a Sedentary Life and How to Stand Up for Your Well-Being – by Carolyne Thompson

    Take care!

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    Another book with “The New Science” in its subtitle, so, is this one a new science?

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    Dr. Longo bases his research and focus on his “5 pillars of longevity”. We’ll not keep them a mystery; they are:

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    Of course, all this discussion of academia is not itself practical information for the reader (unless we happen to work in the field), but it is interesting and does give confidence in the conclusions upon which the practical parts of the book are based.

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  • Fall Asleep In 2 Minutes (Doctor Explains)

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    Beyond “sleep hygiene”, Dr. Siobhan Deshauer has insights to share:

    Rest for your body and mind

    First, do still do the basics. That means dimming/filtering lights for an hour before bed, lowering the room temperature a little, ensuring you have nice fresh sheets, not having alcohol or caffeine before bed, and getting out of bed if you’re not asleep within half an hour, to avoid associating being in bed with wakefulness.

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    Non-Sleep Deep Rest: A Neurobiologist’s Take ← a way to get many of the benefits of sleep, while awake

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  • Basil vs Oregano – Which is Healthier?

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    Our Verdict

    When comparing basil to oregano, we picked the basil.

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    You may be thinking: these are just herbs; we don’t eat enough of these for the nutritional values to be relevant!

    And to this we say: there’s nothing stopping you :p Herbs are full of flavor and goodness and there is really no reason to deny yourself. On this note, check out the sabzi khordan (traditional Levantine herb platter), linked below. You’ll start thinking about herbs in new ways, and you can thank us later!

    Now, in terms of macros, nominally basil has more protein and oregano has more carbs and fiber, but the numbers are so close in each case that we’re going to call this category a tie.

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    When looking at any nutrient-dense food (which most herbs are), it’s worth looking at polyphenols. In this case, both are very abundant in polyphenols, and/but their respective numbers are close enough to be within each other’s margin of variation (i.e. exact numbers will depend on the individual plant’s life history), so this category is a tie.

    Adding up the sections makes for an overall clear win for basil, but absolutely please do enjoy both unless you have a good reason not to—they complement each other so well, in nutrients as well as in flavor!

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    Enjoy!

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