Cannabis tea is a soothing and simple way to consume weed, though it’s not as easy as throwing some buds in hot water. This drink will warm you up and take effect within the time expected for edibles (anywhere from half an hour to a couple of hours) and have a longer-lasting effect than smoked weed.

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Want to wake and bake without lighting up? Brew yourself a cup of cannabis tea, a discreet and relaxing way to get your fix.

If you’re running late, you won’t be able to brew a quick cup of weed tea on your way out the door. Making cannabis tea is an easy process but it will require a bit of patience and time.

There are a few types of cannabis tea you can make. For the sake of this piece, we’re going to stick to the kind that will provide psychoactive effects, rather than a tea of leaves and flowers with hot water that may be soothing but won’t get you high.

Ingredients:  

Cannabis herbal tea and marijuana leaves IStock / FabrikaCr

Steps:

1. Boil the Water

You’ll want to bring the water to a boil in a pot rather than with a kettle, because you’ll need to heat the cannabis in water for longer than you would making regular tea. While you’re waiting for the water to reach a boil on the stovetop, you can move to step two.

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2. Grind Your Bud

This is not the time for picking your weed apart with your fingers. You want well-grounded flower to allow more surfaces for cannabinoid activation. The amount you use will depend on how big of a batch you plan to make and your own tolerance. If you’re not sure, start with under a gram and see how intense the effects are so you can adjust your next batch.

3. Prepare for Activation

THC needs to bind with fats to become bioavailable. If you skip this step, you’ll successfully make yourself a cannabis tea that will not produce a high.

Mix your ground buds with coconut oil or butter, thoroughly covering your flower without oversaturating it. A teaspoon or so should do the trick. Now scoop your buttered goods and place them in a tea ball or if you have a bag of tea, you can open the top, shove in the cannabis, and seal it shut.

4. Steep the Tea

Now drop the tea ball or bag into the water and bring to a low boil. It’s a good idea to leave your cannabis steeping in water for at least 30 minutes to ensure it has activated. If you’re in a pinch, 15 minutes has been found sufficient to activate the cannabinoids.

Some of the water will evaporate during the boiling process, so it’s always a good idea to add more than you’re planning to drink. If you don’t have a tea ball or filter you can put your contents in, you could also pour the ground cannabis and fat mixture into the water directly and strain it out (or eat, yum) after you’ve boiled the contents.

5. Enjoy

Once your tea has steeped for at least 15 minutes, you should be good to go. Unless you’ve got a palate that appreciates the natural flavor of weed, it’s a good idea to dress up the tea to your liking.

You can add milk and sugar to make it better but another option is to mix other tea with it, so it’s not overwhelmingly flavored by cannabis. You could open a bag of your favorite tea, add your cannabis and fat mixture straight to it, and enjoy the combination of flavors when the tea is ready.

Remember, cannabis tea is akin to edibles. Don’t expect to be feeling effects within ten minutes, and certainly don’t brew yourself another cup if you’re nervous it won’t affect you. Wait at least an hour and see how it goes. If you don’t ever feel effects, you didn’t fully activate your tea.

 

Cannabis tea and marijuana leaves on white fabric top view iStock / Creative-Family

Other Options For Cannabis Tea

To ensure you’re making yourself a strong cup of tea, you may want to decarb your weed before making the tea. Decarboxylation involves baking the ground bud at about 225 degrees for 30 minutes.

Decarbing your weed before making tea will ensure that you’re going to feel the effects. Of course, if you followed all the steps above properly, boiling the cannabis and fat in water should be enough to activate it, a common complaint from people making weed tea for the first time is that it wasn’t activated, most likely because it wasn’t boiled for long enough. Decarbing bypasses that risk.

You’ll still need to add butter so THC can bind to the fats and become bioavailable for the consumer.

If you already have cannabutter on hand, you can easily just dissolve some into your teacup and enjoy cannabis tea that way. This involves no other preparation because the cannabutter has already been prepared.

Weed tea doesn’t taste particularly good, but it will get the job done if prepared properly. That doesn’t mean you can’t spice it up and make it more palatable. Try mixing cannabis with your favorite tea, milk, and sugar to make a better tasting tea. Matcha or chai is a good choice for this because matcha has a strong flavor and the spices in chai draw attention away from the weed flavor. Add sweetener and milk and you’re golden. Ooh..or make cannabis golden milk!