DOSE:

oral

Cannabis

(flowers)

I've been having great results eating buds straight, or with just a simple decarb beforehand— but with no additional cooking and no added ingredients.

After 25 years of daily cannabis use, I wanted to pass on this little nugget of info, wish I'd known this years ago. But edibles didn't agree with me as much when I was younger. Either it wouldn't work or it would put me to sleep. But today, edibles are right where I want to be all day long, and I just want to vape the concentrate at night time only.

For some mj background on me, been into concentrates since the mid-90s when I started making black oil, like what the kids call RSO nowadays. Made my first BHO in 2000 and never looked back. Started pressing rosin in 2015 and never looked back. And I use edibles at least 3 times a week too, so my tolerance is now and has always been pretty high.

Now back to the the topic of discussion. I see blanket statements like this quite frequently on the net:
'fine go ahead and waste your medicine, but I (capital-K) Know that cannabis will not work, at all, not ever, for any human on planet earth at any time in history, unless they decarb it first and cook it in oil too.'

I disagree with this and I'm writing an experience report rather than in a forum to avoid getting flamed by these same blow-hard know-it-alls. But now I'd like to drop a different blanket statement:
'If a batch of edible cannabis didn't work at all without a decarb first, then it probably wasn't cured properly, or long enough.' or I just didn't eat enough.

I find that older bud with dark amber trichomes can work fine straight out of the jar. I just examine it first under microscope. If the trichs are clear, milky or white then more decarb will be needed. Only the very most immature and/or uncured bud will simply *not work at all* without decarb.

Sure, it takes more. By my reckoning, it takes 1.5-2 times as much if it's not decarbed. But depending on the situation, the high can be preferable. Myself, if I want to spend a day out and about, be good and high all day but without feeling tired at all— I'd much rather eat twice as much raw (cured) bud than eat a normal amount of decarbed bud.

That's all I wanna say on that. Many will debate it. Some will outright refute it based on an experience or two. But I've been doing this enough years now, using enough different samples from different grows, different strains, different growers and different shops— to know what works for me and what doesn't. Anyone who says non-decarbed bud can not ever get anyone high... Needs to climb down off the horse. Just because they swallowed a j while getting pulled over one time and didn't get blasted off it— does not mean a whole hell of a lot in my book.

Now on to the cooking thing. I tried a lot of different recipes over the years. And while I liked the coconut oil and soy lecithin trick, I felt it wasn't worth the amount of time and energy it took. And the reduction in onset time was not worth the additional sleepiness from cooking the cannabinoids so long.

Especially if I want to make one-off edibles a-la firecrackers. No method I tried hit fast enough to be worth the time & effort. If it takes 45 minutes to make a firecracker, well it's not like the firecracker hits me 45 minutes faster than the straight bud. Does that make sense?

If person 1 starts making a firecracker and at the exact same time person 2 eats some straight bud... Guess who's gonna feel it first? Even if person 2 has to do the decarb step for 15 minutes, person 1 still has to do the same decarb but then also mix it with PB, spread on the crackers, wrap in foil and cook an additional... However long. So cooking takes longer and makes me sleepier, I'm just not about it anymore.

Today, I have two methods. One is the 'up' method: pull raw buds out of the jar and eat them like popcorn, wash down with a drink hot enough to break off the stuck-on trichomes from my teeth.

The other is the 'down' method: put bud in an oven bag and decarb at 250F for ~15 minutes, then eat like popcorn, wash down with a drink hot enough to break off the stuck-on trichomes from my teeth. This takes 1/2 as much or 3/4 as much as the up method.

If I really do need to make a big batch of edibles for people other than myself, I still don't cook up my bud in oil. Instead I do an extraction and add that to a carrier oil, plus lecithin. RSO for down edibles, BHO or rosin for up edibles. I really do agree that concentrate edibles hit me faster and come with fewer gastric issues. Still not worth my time unless I'm doing a whole batch.

Good time to mention, my only gastric issue with eating raw (cured) bud is gas. If anything I'll take a couple simethicone gas pills along with my dose. Admittedly, this eating bud straight trick is probably not for everyone.

Of all the vile, nasty shit I have consumed over the years to get high, chewing top shelf nug is definitely not even on the list anymore. I truly enjoy it now; potent buds are spicy, like peppery almost. Each strain and grow is different and I now look forward to eating it. It tastes so much better and so much stronger when it's only cured and decarbed compared to when it's fully cooked.

Also of note, I regularly eat my rosin chips without any further processing— I just pop em and eat em like potato chips. Those are definitely less potent than bud and with more sleepiness, but they still work plenty well without any additional cooking and without any carrier oil.

One last thing- I tried the critic acid trick that makes the cannabinoids supposedly water soluble and hit you faster. This did not work for me. Not only were my resultant products *not* able to dissolve in water-based drinks, but they also seemed to not work as well as eating straight or cooking normally. Rather than offend anyone, I'll leave my conclusion about this technique at 'maybe I just didn't do it right.'

Don't think I'll ever go back to cooking my bud for edibles. If the trichs are dark enough I eat em out of the jar, or decarb for a more night-time high. If the trichs are clear or white I always decarb, but never fully cook.

I purposely left out dosage discussion due to varying personal needs.

Exp Year: 2017	ExpID: 111445
Gender: Male
Age at time of experience: 40
Published: Feb 2, 2018	Views: 2,272
[ View PDF (to print) ] [ View LaTeX (for geeks) ] [ Swap Dark/Light ]
Cannabis (1) : Not Applicable (38), Preparation / Recipes (30), Retrospective / Summary (11)