Beyond Brownies
IN THE KITCHEN WITH CANNA PROVISIONS CO-OWNER MEG SANDERS
By Ellen Spear
Photos by Jimmy ienner, Jr.
March 4, 2022
Cooking with cannabis has come of age. Gone are my youthful days when doctored dorm kitchen brownies made from a boxed mix were the rage. An indeterminate amount of unembellished weed from a wrinkled baggie was sprinkled over the batter; the end result was something that tasted like chocolate cake with lawn clippings.
We are now in the age of $195 per person cannabis dinners beginning, for example, with shrimp with a nicely dosed barbecue glaze and ending with spiked craft lattes under the stars, guaranteeing a light buzz. Somewhat more approachable for the do-it-yourselfers is the cannabis home-cooking perspective of Meg Sanders, CEO of Canna Provisions here in the Berkshires. “Everyone is having so much fun with cannabis,” she says.
Sanders adds that we should not fear cooking at home with cannabis. “It’s all about the milligrams”—how much of various tinctures or oils or infused products are consumed at a time.
When cooking with cannabis, she says, “you have to do the math—or the best you can do with kitchen math.” Like any recipe, she notes, you can make mistakes, and it is a fair concern to be cautious. With a few easy guidelines, Sanders believes we can all approach some simple recipes with minimal trepidation.
The first guideline concerns dosing. No matter what form you use when cooking with cannabis—infused oil, straight plant, infused chocolate, concentrates, full spectrum oils, or cured concentrates—the sweet spot is a five-milligram dose, says Sanders.
Starting slowly and waiting for ingested cannabis products to take effect is a second key guideline. Take a tiny bite of an edible and wait two hours to determine its effect. A cautious approach, and one of Sanders’ personal favorites, is using a honey stick infused with 5 milligrams of cannabis in her tea.
A third guideline is to be mindful of the time of day your product will be consumed to determine what type of cannabis product would be best to use in your cooking. For instance, says Sanders, a product that is energizing might not be the best choice to put into food served near bedtime.
Another important piece of advice is to keep your food and wine pairings separate from your food with cannabis pairings until you understand the effects and dosages that you tolerate best. Drinking wine and eating cannabis-infused food together heighten the effects of both. You may also become more dehydrated than if using either substance alone. Know thy tolerance and find it safely is the Golden Rule of cannabis consumption.
Another point to bear in mind is that heat changes the effects of THC, the active ingredient in cannabis. Heating the product to over 225-250 degrees changes the TCH into CBN, an abbreviation for cannabinol, which is much less potent than THC. “It makes you sleepy,” says Sanders. Which may explain why those college brownies baked at 350 degrees never reached culinary or psychoactive heights for any who consumed them. To control heat in cannabis-infused recipes, Sanders uses an induction cooktop, which allows her to control temperature precisely. A laser thermometer can also be used to ensure steady and accurate heat in cooking.
If you do consume more than what feels good to you, Sanders says there are a few home remedies to take the edge off. Sanders is partial to the peppercorn approach: Take 10 whole peppercorns into your mouth and bite down. Do not chew; just hold the crunched bits as long as you can, then spit them out. Pistachio or pine nuts may yield the same salutary effect, she says.
When cooking with cannabis, remember to keep the mixtures out of reach of children. Cookies look like cookies. Put your pets in another room until you are finished and have swept or vacuumed the floor and cleaned the counters. Pets can consume wayward crumbs or bits that fall to the counters, tables or floor.
*BE SURE TO CLARIFY THE DOSE WHEN PURCHASING THE CANNABIS PRODUCT
Festive Orange Cranberry Smash Mocktail
Makes TWO 12-ounce drinks with 5 milligrams dose per drink.
Note: Dosage is approximate.
◗ 1 cup of orange juice
◗ 2 cups coconut water
◗ 2 droppers (10 milligrams total dosing) Levia energetic tincture
◗ Rosemary sprigs and lime wedges for garnish
◗ Tonic water (optional, if you want to make the drink fizzy)
◗ Cocktail shaker filled with ice
Cut or crush the cranberries and put into a large pitcher. Add the coconut water, orange juice and dropper of Levia energetic tincture. (Use dosage markers on dropper as a guide to add correct amount.) Muddle the ingredients and pour into a cocktail shaker filled with ice. Shake until cold. Pour into tall glass. Top with tonic if using and a squeeze of lime. Garnish with lime wedge and sprig of rosemary.
Recipe provided by Canna Provisions.
CAUTION: Cannabis is for use only by adults 21 years of age or older. Keep out of the reach of children. There is limited information on its side effects, and there may be associated health risks. Marijuana use during pregnancy and breast-feeding may pose potential harms. It is against the law to drive or operate machinery when under the influence. The effects of edibles may be delayed by two hours or more.
No-Bake Peanut Butter Oatmeal Cookies
Yields 50 cookies with 5 milligrams of cannabis infusion PER COOKIE
Note: Dosage is approximate.
◗ 3 cups white sugar
◗ ¾ cups butter
◗ ¾ cups milk
◗ ½ tsp vanilla
◗ 1½ cups smooth peanut butter
◗ 4½ cups quick cooking oats
◗ Half of a 1 gram syringe of full spectrum THC oil. (A full 1 gram syringe is 500 milligrams of cannabis; half is 250 milligrams.)
Run warm water over the syringe of full spectrum THC oil for the liquid to be released easily into the cookie batter. (Note the syringe’s measurement markings to achieve the desired dose.)
Combine sugar, butter, and milk in a pan over a magnetic cooktop or one where temperature can be controlled precisely. Heat to about 400 degrees until the butter and sugar melt, take it to the point just before the mixture comes to a boil. Take the mixture off the heat and cool until under 250 degrees. Heat the cooking element to 250 degrees. Put the syringe under hot water to loosen, then inject the correct dose into the mixture. Put the pot back on the heat. Stir continuously over the heat until completely emulsified. You may use an immersion blender to achieve a smooth emulsification. Remove from heat, then add peanut butter, oats and vanilla. Stir until completely combined. Drop by rounded tablespoon onto a parchment covered cookie sheet. Place into the refrigerator until cold and solidified. Eat one at a time. Be observant of the caution to try a little bit, then wait two hours before consuming more.
An alternative is to make this recipe without the cannabis infusion in the batter and instead use cannabis-infused chocolate ice cream. Form several pairs of three-inch disks from the mixture and place on waxed paper. Refrigerate until firm. Put ice cream between pairs of discs to create your own ice cream sandwiches. (Consult the ice cream package for amount of ice cream to use for appropriate dosing.) Recipe provided by Canna Provisions.
