Cinnamon "Tea"

Matt and I were recently in Charlotte visiting friends for my fall break. We have a ton of fun (as usual) spending time with them! In addition to visiting the North Carolina Renaissance Festival, we ate... a lot (also as per usual). I always end up hovering in the kitchen whenever we visit Blayke and Eduardo because they are both fantastic cooks! Eduardo made this steak for tacos one night that was delicious accompanied by homemade refried beans (which Blayke actually made) and pico de gallo with avacado. Mmmmm... it was good. They also made this wonderful (but totally not good for you) sausage dip (sausage, cream cheese and rotel). This has become one of Matt's new favorite foods.

In addition to the other wonderful things that were made, I was introduced to cinnamon tea. It's not really "tea" in the sense that it contains tea leaves, but tea in the sense that you brew cinnamon sticks in water and let them steep. After you've let them release their cinnamony goodness, you mix the warm cinnamon water with some sugar and a tablespoon or two of evaporated milk (or just regular milk if you don't have the evaporated kind). I cannot begin to describe how much I love this drink! It tastes like those little red hots candies that come out around Valentine's Day but not hot. I always wondered where that flavor came from because it truly doesn't smell or taste anything like ground cinnamon, but now I know! It's amazing to me how different a spice can be when it's applications are varied! I suppose that's my food-nerd side coming out! Any way, hopefully I'll be posting again soon about this...