It’s always a great time to learn how to make your own edibles. First of all, making edibles is a fun activity to fill up your free time and great skill to have. More importantly, ingesting edibles may be the better option for your cannabis intake right now. Here’s why.
Inhaling vs. Ingesting Cannabis
As of now, researchers have not specifically linked cannabis smoking to any increased coronavirus risk. However, doctors are saying that patients with pre-existing lung conditions are at higher risk of dying from the virus. Chronic smoking of cannabis or tobacco over time can create symptoms similar to chronic obstructive lung disease, or COPD. Damaged cells in the lungs may have a harder time fighting off coronavirus, and inflammation from smoke can make it harder for doctors to make a diagnosis. If inhaling smoke concerns you at all, edibles are a great alternative to help take the edge off during the pandemic.
Related: Here are the states where cannabis dispensaries remain open as essential businesses.
How to Make Your Own Edibles
The recipe below will show you how to make edibles at home. This recipe calls for infusing butter or oil, but feel free to substitute any oil you prefer such as coconut oil, avocado oil, olive oil, or ghee. When choosing your oil, make sure you use a carrier oil high in saturated fat when cooking with cannabis. Your fat is what THC, CBD, and other cannabinoids will bind to for use in cannabis-infused foods. Once you infuse your oil of choice use it to cook your favorite baked goods for homemade edibles!
DIY edibles recipe list of ingredients
- Cannabis flower (Buds, trim, or shake)
- Oil (Coconut Oil or Butter)
- Double Boiler
- Cheese Cloth
- Lecithin
- Tinfoil
Step 1: Pick Your Potency
Decide how much you are making and how potent you want the batch to be, and always start low and go slow when eating. You may want to find an edible dosage calculator and eat a small amount first. I use 28g of plant matter per 16oz of oil or butter. Set your oven to 240 degrees Fahrenheit. Fold the tinfoil over and make a pocket, then grind up the plant matter and put it in the tin foil. Put the tinfoil in the oven for roughly 30 minutes but as long as 45 minutes, this will decarboxylate the cannabis. This will activate the cannabinoids and create a much more potent edible. If you don’t have tin foil, you can line a cookie sheet with parchment paper and spread the ground buds evenly to decarb.
Step 2: Set up the double boiler.
- Set up a double boiler on the stove, Try to always keep the water level inside the pots above contents that are inside the smaller pot. This will keep everything at the right temperature and keep the plant matter from burning. If the plant matter burns, there will be a dark color and unpleasant taste.
- Add in the carrier oil of your choice, unsalted butter is great for cannabis-infused butter but coconut oil is also one of my favofites personally.
- Bring the water between pans to a boil. Then, set it to simmer for the rest of the extraction. The water will stay just below its boiling point from here on out.
- Once the oil has melted down, add in your decarbed cannabis in a ratio of 28g per 16oz of oil. At this point, stir in your lecithin* as well, adding 4 tablespoons per 28g of flower used.
*Lecithin: this is a byproduct of fats found in both plants and animals. I use soy lecithin, but sunflower lecithin is a great choice as well. Soy lecithin granules are easy to find at all Whole Foods locations. They will help as a binding agent in the mixture, increase shelf life, and keep fats and water dispersed (to help evenly dose your edibles). It will also increase the bioavailability of cannabinoids, making it easier for you to absorb them and creating more potent edibles!
Step 3: Mix it up
- Stir the mixture up every 20 minutes. You do not want the flower to settle at the bottom against the hot metal the whole time.
- For a less sedative effect: A quicker extraction will create a less sedating buzz and will infuse less flavor from the plant matter. If you do not wish to be couch-locked or are cooking and do not want the cannabis flavor to over-power everything, then go for a quicker method and do not cook for more than 2-3 hours.
- For a more sedative effect: The longer the cannabis is exposed to heat the more THC will convert to CBN. This is a very sedative cannabinoid and is known to help with sleep. The more potent and sedative you want the edibles, the longer* you should go, just remember to stir! For a super strong batch, try going for 6-8 hrs.
*Longer batches can be done in a crock pot overnight. Just remember to add water, this will prevent the cannabis from settling and burning on the bottom. The water is then strained out later and the infusion is separated from the water and plant matter.
Step 4: Strain and bake!
Set up a bowl with cheesecloth and strain the finished mixture through to remove all of the plant matter. I like to lay the cheesecloth over a strainer, and then pour the mixture through that into the bowl for extra filtration.
Now your oil is infused and ready to bake with! If you are not ready to start making cannabis edibles, store your infusion in an airtight container in the fridge.
How to Store Edibles
With your batch of weed cookies cooling in the kitchen, it’s time to think about storage. Poor storage for your edibles leads to mold growth and potency-loss. To extend the shelf-life and keep edibles fresh, opt for active humidity control packaging. When storing edibles, keeping moisture level in check at 58%-62% RH will keep them fresh. This also happens to be the ideal humidity level for curing cannabis. So, your edibles will actually continue to cure as they’re stored. How cool is that?
Grove Bags TerpLoc™ Pouches are the perfect storage option after making edibles. The pouches are made with FDA-approved materials in facilities with the Superior Rating from the American Institute of Baking (AIB International). TerpLoc™, our multi-layer film technology made for cannabis, will maintain a constant relative humidity while out-gassing excess oxygen, reducing the oxidation of your edibles and extending their shelf life. Whether you make brownies, cookies, gummies, or anything in between, make sure you store them in Grove Bags to keep them at their freshest!
