Make Your Own Cinnamon Syrup for Pancakes & Waffles

Warm, comforting cinnamon syrup, lovely over pancakes and waffles, stirred into coffee, or shaken into a cocktail. It takes four ingredients and one saucepan, and a jar in the fridge quietly makes everything better for weeks. Here is how we make it at home.

Ingredients

• 1 cup water
• 1 cup white or raw granulated sugar
• 4 Ceylon cinnamon sticks
• ½ teaspoon pure vanilla extract (optional)

Method

1. Boil and dissolve. In a small saucepan, bring the water to a boil and stir in the sugar until it fully dissolves.
2. Add the cinnamon. Reduce the heat, drop in the 4 cinnamon sticks, cover, and simmer gently for about 5 minutes.
3. Steep. Take it off the heat, keep it covered, and let it cool and steep for at least an hour. For a deeper flavour, leave it 6 to 12 hours.
4. Finish. Lift out the sticks. Stir in the vanilla now if you are using it.
5. Bottle. Pour into a bottle with a tight seal and keep it in the fridge.

A tip for stronger syrup: break the sticks into large pieces before they go in, so more surface meets the water, and steep it longer. Little effort, much more flavour.

Why Ceylon Cinnamon makes a better syrup

This is where the type of cinnamon shows. Ceylon cinnamon is sweeter and rounder, and it steeps into a syrup that is warm and mellow. Cassia is bolder, and concentrated down into a syrup it can turn sharp. That boldness is exactly what you want in a fiery bun, but here, where the cinnamon is doing all the work on its own, the gentler Ceylon cinnamon holds up better. More on the difference in Ceylon cinnamon vs cassia.

Ways to use it

• Stirred into cinnamon coffee or a pot of tea
• Over pancakes, waffles, doughnuts and swirls
• Shaken into a whisky sour or an old fashioned
• A spoonful in warm milk for the kids

That is it. A jar of homemade cinnamon syrup, ready whenever you want to make an ordinary cup or plate feel like a treat.

Our true Ceylon cinnamon sticks are grown and hand-rolled on our family estate in Sri Lanka and are exactly what this syrup wants. And if you would rather sweeten and spice in one step, our Ceylon cinnamon sugar is our cinnamon already blended through sugar, ready to sprinkle straight onto the finished stack.