Sous Vide Your Old, Withered Weed
Seven years ago I used my immersion circulator to make some food (for work), then tried them all at once and got too drunk to order a burrito. Sous vide has been and continues to be an effective method for extracting THC. But I live in Portland, a city where delicious professional edibles are ubiquitous and cheap, so I rarely make my own.
A little over a year ago, I inherited a bag of old weed and weed supplies, including several small jars of dried beef. I smoked it with mediocre results, so I decided to stop inhaling altogether and threw it in a sous vide bath to make a brutal batch of brownies.
Before we get into exactly how I did it, I want to emphasize that this inaccurate method is not the one to use if you are making edibles for the first time or if your only experience with edibles is eating a five milligram bar. chocolate. before bedtime. This is a method that should only be used if you are “well versed in weed” and will not be thrown off by an unexpectedly intense experience. Considering you’re working with old weed (and possibly old beef), it’s impossible to accurately predict the dosage of your edibles. I’ll give some ratios for flowers and beef for those who want to err on the side of caution, but be aware that your edibles are likely to be weaker than expected if you’re working with stale stock.
i love sous weed
Using an immersion circulator – either Anova or Joule – you will be able to decarburize without odor and infuse without agitation. You seal your flower and powder in a vacuum bag (or freezer bag) and then immerse it in a 203ºF water bath for an hour. This step, as I explained seven years ago, is called “decarboxylation” and should not be skipped:
“Decarbonization” has nothing to do with carbohydrates. It is short for ” decarboxylation “, which is a chemical reaction that releases carbon dioxide, converting THCA ( tetrahydrocannabinolic acid ) into THC ( tetrahydrocannabinol ). This process is slow as the potted flowers dry, but you can speed it up with heat. Before you ask, there is no need to decarburize the pot you are about to smoke, as the heat from the smoking process will take care of that.
When cooking in the oven, decarburization can fill your home with a pot-and-pan smell, which is not the most refined smell. By sealing everything in plastic bags and submerging it in water, you will rid your pillow of bad smell, or at least rid it of one particular source of smell. No need to measure flower or beef before decarburizing, just toss them and go.
After decarboxylation, you are ready for an infusion. You can infuse oil, oil, or alcohol. Saturated fats are said to extract THC more efficiently than unsaturated fats, so use butter or coconut oil if you’re trying to maximize your milligrams. If you are working with a pure flower, a ratio of 8 ounces of saturated fat or 16 ounces of unsaturated fat (such as olive or vegetable oil) to every ounce of weed should work very well. According to Hail Mary Jane , a ratio of 5-6 grams of beef to a cup of butter (or coconut oil) is “more than enough to feel the effect.”
If you want to infuse alcohol, use a ratio of one gram of defatted herb for every 250 milliliters of alcohol and sous vide in a glass jar at 203℉ for two hours, but beware: I’ve seen fully grown bags of mud knocked down on their literal asses weed vodka. (If you want to be more precise with your dosing, you can use this calculator to get an idea of how strong your infusion is, but think of it as an approximation just to be on the safe side.)
If you’re not a nerd, you can just toss what you have – in my case, a couple of tablespoons of flowers and two half-empty beef cans – into a bag, degrease, add just enough olive oil to just cover it. weed, then sous vide at 185℉ for four hours. It’s a stupid and irresponsible way of cooking, but if you enjoy surprising your body and mind with sudden and unpredictable effects, I highly recommend it.
What to do with infusion
If you made an alcohol infusion, God bless you. You are on a path for which I can offer nothing but “be careful and start small”. If you have prepared vegetable oil or butter, you can use it just like any other cooking oil. It is best to start with a classic brownie. You can use this recipe (for butter) or do what I did with my olive oil of unknown strength and drop it into the box mix. If your infusion volume is less than the amount indicated in the instructions on the box – which I had – just make up the difference with a small amount of plain oil.
As for the baking temperature, you may have heard that THC starts to decompose as early as 200℉ (the internet is heavily arguing about this), but it doesn’t really matter. Even if you bake your foods at 350℉ or 400℉, air is an inefficient conductor of heat, and fully baked cakes are somewhere in the 180-200℉ range, depending on how you “cook”. like them. Don’t worry about adjusting the baking temperature, that’s all I want to say.
I don’t want to think, I just want to get up
If you don’t want to think about numbers or just like treating your body like a science experiment, I have a method for you. Again, I must emphasize that this method is not optimized in any way and may take you higher than you ever were. It can also give you a lot less than you expected, depending on how old your weed and kief are. This method is for lazy, cranky adults who don’t have a ton of personal responsibilities.
Claire’s infusion method in a dirty sous-vide bag:
- Place the immersion circulator in a water bath and heat it to 203ºF.
- Collect all of your old weed and beef and place it in a Ziploc freezer bag or vacuum bag. If you are using a vacuum bag, suck the air out of it and seal it. If you are using a freezer bag, let out as much air as possible by slowly submerging the bag in water and then seal it.
- Immerse the bag of drugs in the bath for 1 hour.
- Remove the bag and reduce the sous-vide temperature to 185ºF.
- Open the bag and add enough butter or melted butter to cover it for an inch or two. Close the bag again and immerse in a water bath for four hours.
- Strain the flower pieces from the fat and use them to make boxed cakes.
After baking, approach your cakes with respect. A “normal” sized brownie from my batch is enough to flatten me completely, but sometimes a little brain flattening is required. Taste a little, see how you feel, then portion your brownies accordingly and store them in the freezer. They will keep just fine indefinitely, although it took me just over a month to process my batch. (I only have one brownie left, but I’ll save it for the weekend. They’re not school dinner meals, but they’re effective .)
Edited May 22, 2023 10:12 pm ET to correct a typo in procedure.