The cinnamon has arrived at the point where a spice becomes a personality, and now it has been recalled from fourteen states, so the personality is on hold.
SLR Food Distribution Inc. of Hicksville, New York, is voluntarily recalling Wise Wife Brand Ground Cinnamon after tests found the potential for elevated lead levels. The recall was announced October 29, timed for maximum heartbreak, in the opening bars of the season during which Americans bake at each other at levels unseen the rest of the year. The FDA’s guidance is plain: stop using it, throw it out, or return it to the store for a full refund.
In the spice aisle, plain guidance meets the cinnamon maximalists, a population that has never once used cinnamon for one thing.
“I have a system,” said Dana Whitlock, 34, of Columbus, Ohio, who lists her cinnamon applications the way a pit crew lists tires: coffee, cappuccino, oatmeal, chili, dry-rub barbecue, banana bread, applesauce, and, in winter, stirred into warm milk “for the vibes.” “Half of those aren’t even recipes. The cinnamon is the recipe.”
Asked whether the recall changes anything, she looked at the ceiling for a full four seconds. “I’m rotating,” she said. “Nutmeg is stepping up. Nutmeg knows it’s stepping up.”
Bakers report that the panic has a calendar. The pumpkin lane at the supermarket has been open since September and has already been photographed more than most holidays. Apple pie does not negotiate. One Pennsylvania baker, Linda Kerwin, said her customers reacted to the news the way they react to a rain forecast for a wedding.
“They asked if they could use allspice,” Kerwin said. “I said they could use hope. They asked where to find that. I pointed at the same aisle.”
Retail employees, who have watched this aisle get crowded all week, say behavior is trending toward the inspection of labels with a seriousness previously reserved for car purchases. A stocker in Hicksville, asked whether anyone had actually returned a box, said yes, “a lot of boxes,” and that the shelf now has a gap shaped exactly like the holiday.
The brand name, which had gone unexamined for as long as anyone can remember, is now on everyone’s lips. Nobody disputes it anymore. The box said what it said, and the toast understood the assignment years before the food safety system caught up.
The FDA’s advice stands: discard the box. The cinnamon maximalist in Columbus says he will not be discarding his, that it lives now in the back of the cabinet, unopened, “under new management.”