fine dining four twenty

Finding good edibles where you live may be difficult, but finding edibles that taste great, seems damn near impossible. Fortunately, when we add fine dining to the concept of making edibles we can create something delicious.

Let’s start with our infusion oil. Cannabis, like so many other herbs, can be infused into oil of almost any kind. the most common homemade edibles are generally made with infused butter or vegetable oil. Virtually any oil or fat with a high smoke point can be used for infusion. For this recipe, i am going to use duck fat. As per usual, creativity is encouraged. You can also try using olive oil or infusing honey (mixed with part coconut oil) if you don’t mind it getting a little sticky. 

I’ll be using fresh cannabis as well as previously vaped bud. One dope thing about using a vaporizer is that they’re made to extract THC in such a way that it never ignited, which leaves some THC behind.What that really means is you can easily vaporize cannabis, get high, then use that same bud (in high quantity) to make edibles or cannabis infusions. I also tend to keep large stems which are great for tea, but for this recipe, we’ll throw them right into our infusion oil.
 
shopping list: 
- 8 Oz of Duck Fat or Oil of Choice
- 1 cup (about 7-9 grams) of bud
- cheesecloth
- rubber band 

Rule number one when it comes to infusion is that your oil should be able to get very warm but should never touch heat directly. We'll need to make a double boiler to achieve this. If you're wealthy enough to have one already, that's poppin’ but for me and the rest of the poor folk here, we'll be making one using a very large pot half filled with water and another heat safe vessel on top where our duck fat and cannabis will infuse. Here, i'll be using two pots one large and one small. If your pots have plastic handles or are otherwise not safe for heat, try using a Pyrex glass bowl or a metal mixing bowl on top. 

Our setup should look like this:

large pot at the bottom with enough water for your smaller pot or bowl to sit in. Bring the pot of water to a boil, then bring down to medium heat.

Here's where your patience will be required, the longer your oil infuses, the more potent it’ll be. I personally prefer infusions of three hours or more. During this time, you'll want to ensure that no matter how hot the water becomes that the duck fat or oil of your choice never boils or begins to burn. This will likely also mean needing to add more water to your large pot at some point. If this becomes necessary, add hot water rather than cold to maintain temperature.

When the time has come, we'll want to strain all of the leaf and stem material from the oil. here, I’m using fine grade cheesecloth. Cheesecloth can be found at some grocery stores, specialty food stores, or on Amazon where you already buy everything else. We’ll wrap a rubber band around a wide-mouthed jar or small bowl, with the cheesecloth in between. This will act as our strainer and leave us with a jar full of infused duck fat. 
Allow your oil to cool for at least an hour. 

Now that we've created this infused oil, we can use it in savory recipes in the same way that we would utilize butter or oil. Here are some photos that include infused scrambled eggs, infused mashed potatoes and infused cheddar biscuits. Go fly.