Cinnamon and tea

Ask a Sri Lankan about their cinnamon and you'll hear that their's is the "true" cinnamon, and Vietnamese or Indonesian cinnamon is a poor alternative. This is partly because of the latter's high levels of coumarin, which is a toxin. But it's also about Sri Lankan cinnamon's more subtle floral flavours.

Susanna joined a travelling worldschooling school for their day of learning about cinnamon and tea.

The first stop was a cinnamon plantation where we learned through a tour, "the world's only cinnamon museum" and demonstration.

This man in these photos has 50 years experience working with cinnamon. He is a 3rd generation plantation worker; his grandfather was brought to the farm as a slave by the British. We all gasped at seeing the history of colonization through meeting this man.

He showed us how to harvest cinnamon. You cut one or two of 3 or 4 branches off the tree. The outer bark is scraped off with knife. Then, he massaged the inner bark with a brass pipe to loosen it. Then, he peeled off the inner bark with a hand knife. It's important, the translator said, to do this process all in one day before the inner bark becomes hard. The branches grow back in about two years.

Our second stop was a tea plantation owned by a Sri Lankan who used to work as a manager for foreign owned tea plantations in the mountains.

Sri Lanka is the 6th largest tea exporter in the world. There are three types of tea plantations in SL low, medium and high zones (4000+ feet) for tea growing.

When asked, the owner said good tea is: taste is pleasant to the tongue. Colour of the liquor has to be pleasing to the eye. Good smell.

All tea in world comes from one plant. Its unique characteristics are developed from the soil (terroire).

The steps are:
* Whither. 100kg of green leaf goes down to 50 kg dried.
* Roll with a machine. Twice. Oxidizing
* Ferment
* Dry it. It's done when the colour is right
* Sift. Larger leaves are higher quality. Tea dust goes into tea bags
* Sticks and chaf goes back into the field

They focus on shade grown tea, which invites brids who help eat the bugs and pests.Read more