Mexico

Today we travel to Mexico. While I've never been there, I hear that they also have poinsettia plants growing as wild bushes outside. I encountered these in Kenya, and somehow this came up in conversation with a co-worker who was familiar with Mexico. Most of what I know about this country is that college students liked taking cut rate trips there over spring break, and came home complaining of being sick from the bad (cheap) food provided at the resort. Apparently they all thought that they were immune to the copious quantities of alcohol they were consuming, and it was the dry white toast they were eating the next morning that made them feel bad.

Thankfully there is more to Mexico that drunken college students. They are the third largest Latin American country behind Brazil and Argentina. More than half of the population lives in the central portion of the country as the north is described as being arid, and the south as being tropical. They are described as having a history of boom and bust economies that have progressively lowered the living standards for the middle and lower classes.

They also sit on the Pacific ring of fire, and have several active volcanoes. They also have a lot of earthquakes due to being on the edge of a tectonic plate. Before I started looking into popular teas there, I had it in my head that they drank a lot of yerba mate. As I looked at YouTube, I didn't see that (or I wasn't looking at the right videos). Instead I saw that they drank cinnamon tea. That sounds pleasant, especially as winter drags on. While I think the video I saw steeped the tea for about 10 minutes while simmering in a pot, I didn't have time to do that. Well, I didn't make the time to do that. I also don't like my cinnamon to be too strong. I also made this along with some other questionable herbals in an effort to get a few posts ahead again.

Watch, I'll probably procrastinate writing posts for the next few weeks, and be right back to where I was before...

Back to the cinnamon tea. I went simple. Cinnamon pieces in a wire strainer in a mug with boiling water for about 4 minutes.

I let the water get tinted a delicate cinnamon color.

This turned out really well. I enjoyed the pleasant cinnamon flavor without finding it overpowering. It reminds me of the holidays - remember red hots on cookies (although this tasted better)? I'll have to remember to make this more often when I'm looking for a way to unwind.