I’m tired of things that allege to taste like cin­na­mon but are actu­ally just hot.

A cin­na­mon stick is a brown, tubu­lar when dried, aro­matic piece of tree bark used as a spice. One will note that the scent of a cin­na­mon stick is not hot. It is nei­ther scorch­ing nor siz­zling. It is not even warm unless used in a con­text to describe it as an invit­ing scent.

There is lit­tle to no sim­i­lar­ity between an actual cin­na­mon stick and cin­na­mon candy. They are spice-y, but not as a spice, as cin­na­mon. They are spicy in the way that salsa is spicy.

Of the many notable crim­i­nals of false fla­vor­ing, the most rec­og­niz­able may be Hot Tamales Candy. Care­ful exam­i­na­tion has shown that these can­dies, adver­tised for their burn­ing, scorch­ing or intense fla­vor, bear no resem­blance to tamales or cin­na­mon in shape or fla­vor to any degree, both as a mea­sure of heat and a mea­sure of prox­im­ity, to actual cinnamon.

Look how they lie to you! Right on the front of the pack­age it claims to be ‘Cin­na­mon Fla­vored’ when really it is just irri­tat­ingly hot.

And with all of the imposters in the world, we must hoist the truth-bearing food­stuffs of cin­na­mon fla­vored accu­racy upon right­eous shoulders.

And eat them.

Cin­na­mon rolls, yes, cin­na­mon rolls are so delight­ful; a true gift from the heav­ens and of hon­est cin­na­mon fla­vor. I think God made them on the sixth day. Then, he put them in the fridge and baked them on the morn­ing of the sev­enth day for break­fast before church.

Cin­na­mon rolls are gen­uine. They are not cul­prits in this fiery fab­ri­ca­tion, this siz­zling sham. They are heroes of true cin­na­mon flavor…

Except they aren’t usu­ally fla­vored with actual cin­na­mon, but rather cinnamon’s less costly cousin, cas­sia.

So, while you may be enjoy­ing that Cinnabon, I can’t say it’s truly cin­na­mon giv­ing your taste buds this grace. What I can say for cer­tain is if it’s hot, it’s not cinnamon.