Subject: Cannabutter
From: [email-masked] (more Hair than There)
Date: Sun, 2 May 1993 02:49:40 GMT
Newsgroups: alt.drugs

The first step in cooking magical cannabis-laced foods is extracting
the cannabinoids (THC, CBD, and many many more) from the plant matter,
usually in a oil/fat/butter-based solution, since the cannabinoids do
not readily dissolve in water. My best FOAF has a method for doing
this that he has not seen mention of in this forum. He got it from a
little book called _The Art and Science of Cooking with Cannabis_, by
Adam Gottlieb, orignally published in 1974. Gottlieb calls the product
of the extraction `CANNABUTTER'.

The procedure is actually very simple. He brings a pot of water to a
rolling boil, then puts a small amount of butter in the water.
Quickly, the butter melts, and mixes in with the water because the
whole mixture is at a rolling boil.

Then he puts the grass in and boils it. (Of course, he separates all
the seeds first so he can plant them in the nearby park.) Now all the
grass is riling around with the water and butter, and get this: The
cannabinoids dissolve into the butter, while most of the nasty flavors
and gook dissolve into the water. He stirs the stuff regularly. After
cooking the grass like this for a while (say, half an hour), his
kitchen really smells incriminating. He strains out the spent plant
matter, squeezes all the juice out of it, and puts the liquid in the
fridge.

A few hours later, the mixture is cool enough that the cannabutter has
solidified on the surface. It looks kind of scummy, but its just
enchanted butter. He scoops it out and retains it in a bowl or a jar.
The grass-nasty water is thrown out.

The cannabutter can be used just like butter, in brownies, on garlic
bread, or mixed with honey on your finger!

Although this method takes longer than the usual saute-n-strain
method, it has several advantages:

* As explained above, the nasty shit is separated and removed from the 
  fun shit.

* You can make stronger cannabutter than by saute-ing, because you can
  cook more grass in the same amount of butter, due to the extra
  volume of the water.

* There is no danger of burning the precious, price-inflated, hard and
  dangerous to obtain herb, as there is when you saute, because the
  water keeps the whole mixture at boiling temperature!

If I have given any incorrect information, please let me know, so I
can learn. (On Usenet, though, no email please.)

					--- more Hair than There

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oh, I don't think that heating for 1 hour will break down the THC: brownies
and breads are usually baked longer, and they seem just fine ;-)
	I suppose that one does want to avoid _extreme_ heat, though... like
open flame ;-) Anyway, I made my butter in a double-boiler, which is sort
of a saucepan full of water, with another saucepan that mates on top of it,
so that the bottom of one covers the top of the other (I went out and bought
a very nice Revereware double-boiler recently, but I digress). So, in the
bottom boiler, you put water, enough, say, that you have only an inch or two
between the water and the bottom of the second boiler. In the second boiler,
put 1 quart of water, 1/4 oz, and a stick of butter. Simmer the stuff over
low heat for a few hours, at least: I waited till it turned brownish.
(the double boiler keeps direct heat away from the stuff, so it's used to cook
heat-sensitive foods such as eggs and butter, without burning them).
	Now, once you're satisfied with your mixture of butter, THC, water, and
vegetation, prepare a bowl and something like a funnel lined with cheese-cloth,
or a cheese-cloth bag. You can buy cheese-cloth at the grocery store: it will
catch the vegetable matter, keeping it out of the bowl, inot which you pour
the butter/water mixture. Squeeze as much liquid as possible out of the cheese-
cloth. If you really want to, you could keep the now-hopefully-impotent bud,
but I've always just pitched it.
	So. Allow your butter/water to settle and cool (I refrigerate it).
The butter will rise to the top, and can be lifted out, but I usually am not
satisfied with all the particles of butter that remain, so I run the water
through a piece of cheesecloth and try to catch some of it. Anyway, that
green gunk is butter, and you can spread it on your toast, make a sandwich
with it, or cook with it. About two "pats" of butter stone me pretty well,
but your milage may vary. I usually try to disguise the taste with something
like a pepperoni and garlic pesto cheese on rye sandwich, but you tastes
_probably_ vary ;-)