In this article we will tell you how to reuse grass waste, whether you are a grower or a regular user. We know that there is a saying that says "Nothing about hemp is thrown away", precisely because we can use all the components of this plant. Specifically we will address these topics:
- Nothing of hemp is thrown away
- The extraction
- Cooking with cannabis
- Steam the leaves
Nothing of hemp is thrown away
Nothing of the cannabis plants is thrown away. At the end of cultivation, when you have harvested your buds and are ready to dry them, you will find yourself having to manage a fair amount of plant waste , which contains a moderate amount of cannabinoids . Despite not having the concentration of active ingredient present in the buds, pruning waste can reserve great surprises.
Usually the inexperienced grower does not worry about using cultivation waste, especially given the negligible quantity obtained from modest cultivation. Those who grow marijuana for commercial purposes, however, will find themselves dealing with a considerable quantity of plant waste, which it would be a shame to throw in the garbage bin or use for compost.
What type of waste are we talking about? Once you have harvested the flowers, the branches, leaves and trim will remain on your cannabis plant. The trim is the resulting material from cleaning the inflorescences : each flower is covered by small leaves, which must be removed to allow them to ripen correctly. The trim can be performed on fresh, just harvested buds, or on dried buds , which in this way preserve all the smells and aromas of the living plant inside. The trim is rich in resin, especially if it is done dry, and it would be a real shame to waste it. You can use the waste all together or separate them, allocating them to different uses, to make the best use of them.
The extraction
To make the most of a good amount of plant waste, you should consider using it to make an extract . Using what is left over from cultivation in this way will allow you to pay homage to your plant down to the very last one. The extracts are far more valuable compounds than the inflorescences themselves, characterized by more intense effects , given precisely by the large quantity of cannabinoids they contain. There are many ways to obtain a cannabis extract , but some procedures are complex and dangerous to perform at home. We point out what in our opinion are the simplest and safest methods for obtaining a very high quality cannabis extract.
The first technique we will tell you about is solvent extraction . There are many solvents suitable for the operation, but we recommend using alcohol, certainly the easiest to find on the market.
You need to break the branches and mix them with the leaves and trim residues, so that the solvent penetrates the waste as much as possible and dissolves the resin. After mixing for about 10 minutes, remove the plant material and let it drain. Place the remaining liquid in a pan and let it evaporate in a bain-marie, taking care to open the windows and not use open flames. When the solvent has completely evaporated, you will find a viscous amber-colored extract at the bottom of the container.
Then we need to talk about the famous iceolator , the result of the cold extraction of the resin. This is a rather safe technique, which does not involve the use of solvents, but only ice or frozen water and special sieves in which to put the herb and collect the resin. The process uses the cold to facilitate the detachment of the resin from the walls of the plant: the low temperatures cause the resin glands found on the plants to solidify, making the detachment from the flowers and leaves much easier.
To make the iceolator at home, you need to keep your scraps in the freezer for about an hour, to facilitate crystallization. Obtain the appropriate micro-perforated bags and place them in a bucket, placing the bag with the narrowest mesh inside. The first bag will be the one you fill with water, ice and cannabis, while the second will act exclusively as a filter: keep the mixture covered for about an hour, mixing occasionally. Once the time has passed, lift the bag and let the water filter. Once it has emptied, collect the crystals, crumble them on a smooth surface and leave them to dry.
Another widely used and completely safe method for obtaining an extract is that of the sieve , useful for obtaining kief, a concentrate of trichomes only. To facilitate the process, the Sifter Box was invented, a sieve box that allows you to extract the kief in a simple and effective way. It is a box divided into three parts containing a fine mesh metal filter and a removable dark glass panel. You need to place the cannabis in the top layer of the box and shake it gently to loosen the trichomes from the leaves and branches and pass them through the sieve.
Cooking with cannabis
Cannabis doesn't have to be smoked, but it can be used in many ways . If you want to try something new and make a dinner with friends special, we recommend using your scraps to prepare cannabutter, marijuana-based butter and - obviously - cannabinoids, essential for making any recipe with cannabis.
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Butter is usually prepared with inflorescences, but if you have a considerable amount of plant material, you can try it anyway, sacrificing some low-quality inflorescences. The best butter is obtained by infusing the plant material for a very long time over a low heat.
RECIPE:
- Chop all the plant material, after keeping it in glass containers for about 10 days, to alleviate the hints of chlorophyll;
- Pour 300 ml of water into a pan and heat it over a moderate heat. When it is hot, add a 250g stick of butter and wait until it is completely melted;
- Add scraps and chopped inflorescences to the butter and water mixture;
- Simmer for a minimum of 8 hours to a maximum of 24 hours, taking care to add approximately 50/100 ml of water for every hour after the eighth.
Without the aid of a lid, the water vapor will tend to separate from the mixture more quickly, also making it easier for heat to escape from the pot/pan. As cooking progresses, some of the water will evaporate, but the amount of butter will always remain the same.
There are many cannabis-based food products that you can use together with butter, for example to prepare a cake made with cannabis milk (extracted from cannabis seeds) and hemp flour . There are hundreds of blogs, websites and social channels that can inspire you to create wonderful cannabis-based delicacies, to amaze your friends with the taste and - after a few hours - also with the effect.
Steam the leaves
Buying weed online makes it much easier to find the substance, but there are still those who prefer to take risks and grow their own weed . In this case you won't lack inflorescences, but you may want to make the most of all parts of your plant, for example by vaporizing cannabis leaves too . Resin-producing glands are found throughout the plant and cannabinoids are also everywhere, albeit in much smaller quantities than in the inflorescences.
What do I need to know about vaping leaves? First of all, there are different types of cannabis leaves: if the larger ones are known to contain traces of THC and CBD, it is above all the leaves surrounding the flowers that are loaded with resin and terpenes . Thanks to the possibility of managing the temperature of the vaporizer , it is possible to control which parts of the plant matter are extracted without burning them, improving the effect of the cannabinoids, eliminating health risks .
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