Cooking with Cannabis
Pot Night - The Book, Channel 4 Television, 1995
by Tom Hodlin
When the moon cries on the crimson rose,
You can breathe again with hope,
And with mimosa in your eyes, just laugh
And simply drain the dope.
Pireh Fahba, c. 1402
The art of cooking with cannabis has a noble and notorious histroy. Today's bed-sit chef who mixes powedered cannabis leaf or black hash into his packet of chocolate cake mix is continuing a tradition noted in the chronicles of the Crusaders and practised more recently by Victoria, Empress of India and Queen of Great Britain and Ireland.
The use to which hashish was put by Hasan ibn al-Sabbah, the 'Old Man of the Mountains' and leader of an Islamic sect of Sh'ia Islam in the 11th century, was responsible for the word 'assassin' being adopted into the English language. According to legend, Hasan would take the most devoted of his followers and feed them hashish in a delicious sherbet. When the devotee had lapsed into a deep sleep, he would be carried into a secret garden and woken to find himself surrounded by glorious flowers, babbling brooks and fountains, and the most beautiful of women. In his intoxication, he would be convinced that he had reached the gardens of Paradise. He would then be fed more doctored sherbet, and so become Sabah's willing slave, knowing (as he now did) of the true delights of Paradise for the true believer, and happy to die in the service of the leader of a sect that espoused a radical mysticism and was feared by orthodox Muslim and Christian leaders alike. The hashishiyyun, or assassins, were reputed to have no fear of death, being only too anxious to regain the wondrous mystical experience of the secret garden, 'raising the imagination until it attained to a beautified realisation of the joys of a future world', according to one Victorian authority.
While Queen Victoria sipped her night-time cordial laced with several drops of hashish oil, she may well have read a translation of one of Persia's greatest mystical poets, Hafiz (died c. 1388), in praise of hashish: 'O Parrot, discoursing of mysteries, may thy beak never want for sugar.' Her Majesty may not have been aware of the deep Sufi symbolism, but she was well aware (as were other Victorian ladies) of the benefits of eating or drinking hashish to alleviate menstrual cramps and get a good night's sleep.
Digesting rather than smoking the drug has a much more powerful effect (and hash is twice as powerful as grass), even if it takes longer to make itself felt - sometimes up to an hour. Because of this, impatient novices often gobble a dose that results not in beatific visions but a paralysed panic. It is very unwise to leave cannabis-laced cookies, cake, toffee or fudge lying around for unsuspecting relations, friends, children or pets to sample by accident, and very uncool to feed them such concoctions as a joke.
BASICS Cannabis is not water soluble, and heat is required to release its potency. It is soluble in fats, oil and heated alcohol, but while some swear by their own brands of doctored vodka, others swear about missing eybrows and eyelashes.
Those that cook with cannabis find that unsalted butter makes a safe and reliable base. A quarter pound of butter is used for every eighth of an ounce of hash or a quarter/half of an ounce of grass. Those who are very into mysticism make ghee by heating the butter until it froths and the removing the froth; those who are lazy mystical slobs buy ghee from Inidan stores. Otherwise, the grass or hash is dropped into and combined with unsalted butter melted over a low heat and stirred for a few minutes as the mixture bubbles. With grass, the butter turns dark green; with hash, dark brown. Care is taken not to allow the butter to burn or overcook as this reduces the potency of the brew.
Some purists like to pour the grass/butter mixture through a fine strainer to remove the mash - others, loathe to lose anything, leave everything in the butter. With hash, there is no straining. The mixture is the basis for most recipes. It can be used immediately or it can be poured into a jar and stored in a fridge.
Cannabis cooks favour children's guides to sweet-making - the Usborne First Cookbooks by Angela Wilkes and Stephen Cartwright are considered excellent - for creating chocolate brownies, fudge and toffee.