Cinnamomum Verum - With translation text
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Cinnamon, Cinnamomum verum, is Lauraceae native to Southeast Asia, especially Sri Lanka, but also cultivated in other tropical areas.
It is a shrub or a 10-15 m small tree, with green, leathery and opposite leaves.
The flowers are hermaphrodite, actinomorphic with an undifferentiated perianth, white, gathered in cymose inflorescenses in the leave axils.
The fruit is an ellipsoid, blackish blue berry containing one single seed.
The part used is the decorticated bark from young shoots, so that it forms some strips constituted by cortical parenchyma and sieve tubes, rich in essential oils and tannins.
In the market, they are presented as overlapping strips (about 10) that when get dry, they get twisted up forming the typical cinnamon sticks .
The tree starts to produce cinnamon 2 or 3 years after growing it, depending on climatic factors.
It has been used as a respiratory stimulant therapy and a mild astringent; it is also antiflatulent (Agua del Carmen ®).
It is very much appreciated as a spice in cooking to flavour all kinds of deserts such as Catalan cream.
It is also used in cosmetics and perfumery.
