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“You have this range of really interesting flavor and aromatic compounds, and you can be precise in how you mix them in.” Claudio Miranda, chemist
When Jim Furman, co-owner of Black Hammer Brewing, agreed to brew San Francisco’s first infused beer with the cannabis extract cannabidiol (CBD) in partnership Cafe Flore in the Castro, the brewer discovered that the CBD extract he originally wanted to use had no odor or flavor.
Even though CBD won’t get you high like pot’s main active ingredient, THC, Furman wanted to ensure that anyone tasting his Tokeback Mountain would know what it contained. It might add to the quasi-illicit appeal — and besides, the resiny aroma of cannabis, the brewer thought, would be great in beer. A chemist at Level Blends, a local lab, brought Furman in to smell the cannabis extracts he could use as a flavoring. “We found one that was fruity and a little floral that would go with hops,” Furman says.
For many years, the last thing that many people wanted to taste in their pot brownies was the pot, especially when the flavor the marijuana contributed was overly grassy, resinous or flat-out dank. But as Americans get used to the idea of legal cannabis — whether medical or recreational — cooks, distillers and brewers are incorporating the plant’s many complex aromas into food and drink. Sometimes titillation is the goal. More often, though, the flavor itself is the appeal.
Some of these non-psychoactive ingredients, like the baby hemp leaves grown by JD Farms in Upstate New York, or the cannabis juice that chef Payton Curry, of Flourish restaurant in Arizona, makes for clients, treat Cannabis sativa as just another vegetable.
Others, like Tokeback Mountain, are flavored with terpenoids, the aromatic molecules that make pot smell like pot. These extracts take advantage of decades of plant breeding that have yielded an astounding diversity of cannabis strains, as well as flowers with elegantly complex aromas.
In addition, more precise extraction methods allow laboratories like Guild Extracts in San Jose to isolate pot’s aroma molecules without the high and to distill them into a liquid byproduct that resembles an essential oil.
“Cannabis has a very broad spectrum” of aroma molecules, says Claudio Miranda, the lab’s director of marketing. “You have this range of really interesting flavor and aromatic compounds, and you can be precise in how you mix them in” for flavor pairings. The aroma molecule myrcene, for example, is a compound dominant in indica strains — and ripe mangoes. Other terpenes evoke lemons, pine needles, lavender and even blueberries.
Jason Eisner, beverage director at the Los Angeles branches of Gracias Madre, says that he chooses aroma extracts from various strains to flavor each of the vegan Mexican bar and restaurant’s CBD cocktails. The Sour Diesel extract, he says, smells like fresh-cut grass and Japanese green tea. His favorite extract comes from the pot varietal called OG Kush.
“It’s pine forward and mixes with amari (Italian digestifs) and Fernet,” he says. “It’s super cool to make reductions with it and cola syrups.”
Almost all of these products are only available in their local area. Although terpenoids should theoretically be legal, and eating raw leaves won’t make you stoned, the only cannabis-flavored product to be distributed outside its home city is Humboldt’s Finest Vodka.
Not everyone uses marijuana in their marijuana-flavored foods. Furman has ditched the terpenes in Black Hammer Brewing’s newest CBD beer release, Frankie Says Relax, relying on hops that smell particularly dank. Hops and hemp are biological cousins, he says. San Francisco’s Bi-Rite Creamery has approximated the same effect in its new Summer of Love ice cream by using a combination of fennel pollen and hemp seed oil.
Miranda of Guild Extracts has big plans for his terpene extracts, which he considers “100 percent legal and safe,” though he hasn’t submitted them to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to consider for its list of food additives the agency considers “generally regarded as safe.”
“We’ve been playing around with terpene-infused ice cream and cocktails,” Miranda says. “It’s mostly for fun at this time, but it could blossom into an interesting partnership.”
“You have this range of really interesting flavor and aromatic compounds, and you can be precise in how you mix them in.” Claudio Miranda, chemist