How to Decarb Weed for the Best Edibles

If you are someone who is into growing weed for personal consumption, there’s a good chance you’re doing more than just smoking it up. Other than consuming your weed by smoking it, using it in edibles is a really good way to experience the magic of the cannabis plant too. However, before your weed can be added to your edibles, there’s one thing that you’ve got to do: decarboxylation, or ‘decarbing’ your weed, as it is commonly known. 

Decarboxylation is to be done before you cook or process your weed or before you extract oil out of it. This isn’t something you will need to do if you are a conventional stoner and are going to smoke your weed to get high. However, if you are into edibles and prefer to consume your weed by mixing it in various food items, or if you want to extract the oil and make use of the THC and CBD that is present inside the plant, you might want to read this article further.

How to Decarboxylation cannabis

Let us answer the basic questions first, what is decarboxylation, and why is it important. Once we have answered that, we’ll get to the core of this article: how do you decarb your weed.

What is Decarboxylation? 

Decarboxylation, or decarbing, is the process of converting some inactive cannabinoids into an active status so that their psychoactive properties can have an impact on those consuming them. Basically, the most important thing about decarbing is that it helps convert the inactive THCA acid into active THC, which is the principal psychoactive component of the marijuana plant. 

There are a large number of cannabinoids present inside the marijuana plant. There are close to 150 of them. While CBD and THC are the two most popular ones, there are several others too. However, before you actively convert THCA into THC, it exists in the form of an acid, which provides those who consume it with a large number of health benefits, but isn’t necessarily psychoactive and cannot get you high.

When you define it in a more technical way, decarboxylation (or decarbing) is the process by which you remove the carboxyls and release carbon dioxide. This is a process that generally happens by applying heat, light or solvents to your weed. There are a number of ways in which decarbing can be done – and this is a process that can be done in labs using complex machines to attain a level of precision, but it is also something that you can do in your own kitchen in order to get your edibles ready Industrially, when oils or other similar products are prepared, there are machines called ‘decarboxylators’ that are used to get this done. !

Over the course of this article, we are going to take a much detailed look at some processes via which you can decarb your weed. However, before we actually get into that part, let us take a closer look at why is it important for you to decarb your weed:

Why is Decarbing Important?

Decarbing is an important process because this is actually the first step towards preparing your edibles. This is something that is of particular importance to those who like to consume their weed by mixing it in various edibles. If you don’t decarb your weed, your edibles are not going to get anyone high. 

Decarbing can actually help you make your weed more potent when being consumed in ways other than smoking. The process of decarbing has to be done before you infuse the weed with the edible, and not during that. There’s a significant difference because when you decarb during infusion, your cannabinoids are only 10-25% activated. 

How to Decarb Your Weed?

Now that you have a fair idea about what decarbing is and why is it important for you to decarb your weed, let us take a detailed look at three major ways in which weed can be decarbed:

  • Decarbing Using Oven

One of the simplest and the most common ways in which people decarb their weed from home is by using an oven. This is a process that is fairly easy and can be done in pretty much any kitchen without any special equipment or skill involved. 

  • Start by preheating your oven to a temperature of about 240F 
  • While your oven is getting ready to reach those temperatures, spend some time breaking down your cannabis flowers and buds and rip them into very small pieces. There are two ways in which you can do this – you can either use a grinder to have it finely grinded, or you can use your hands to break it down to as small pieces as possible. We’d suggest you do it via hand. 
  • Spread out a baking sheet along with a parchment paper on the oven and then place this broken weed on it. Using this sheet/paper will allow you to collect the final decarbed weed with greater ease.
  • Let the oven run for about 30 minutes at that temperature. If you’re running a lower temperature we suggest running it for a little longer, but just make sure you don’t end up burning the weed. 
  • After thirty minutes are up, open your oven and check how your decarbed weed is looking. It should no longer be green and moist and will appear a little on the brownish side, and will have a very dry appearance. The image below represents how the weed will look once you decarb it.
  • Take the weed out of the oven and allow it to cool for a while.
  • Once the weed is cool enough to be handled and transferred, we recommend you use an airtight jar to store it. Ideally, a jar made out of glass would suit the purpose. Once you’re done transferring the decarbed weed to the jar, you need to keep it in a dark and cool place. This process is no different than what you would do for regular weed so treat it like that, except you should avoid smoking it and use it only to prepare edibles.

Decarbing Using Oven

  • Decarbing Using Mason Jars

This is the second way in which you can decarb your weed. This one too makes use of an oven, but it is done in a somewhat different manner where you don’t have to store the weed toward the end, but put it in a jar right at the starting. This is a process that can be followed if you do not want the strong smell of weed to make its way into your home from your kitchen.

  • In this process, preheat the oven to about 220F (and not the 240F that you would do in regular oven-based decarbing)
  • Break the cannabis flower and buds into small pieces using your hands or a grinder. We would again recommend using hands and breaking it down into really small pieces using hands because finely grinded weed tends to burn faster.
  • Here comes the important difference between this process and the one above this – here, you need to place the grinded weed inside a mason jar and seal the jar shut. Make sure that the glass that you are using in this process is made of high quality and thick glass so that it does not become brittle or break while you are putting it in the oven. Place the weed inside it and make sure the lid is very tightly shut. 
  • Insert a baking sheet in the oven, and place a kitchen towel which is a little moist (though not too wet) inside it. The jar need not stand upright on the towel, it has to lie down upon it.
  • Close the oven and let the heating process go on for about an hour. For best results make sure that you are keeping the jar in the middle rack of your oven. Also, another very important thing to note in this process is that every 15 minutes, you need to take out the jar from the oven and give it a gentle shake to toss and turn the contents. While you do this, make sure you are wearing thick protective oven mitts because this can get really hot.
  • After an hour of heating (+ shaking it every fifteen mins), take out the jar and keep it aside to cool down under normal temperatures for about 30 minutes. Once that is done, you can store it in a dark and cool place. 
  • Decarbing Using Sous Vide Bags

This method is different from what we’ve seen in the oven method and the mason jar method above. Here, you don’t require an oven but instead do it in a sous vide immersion circulator, or a pressure cooker. This method is great when it comes to preserving the original taste and smell of the weed, and also ensures very little smell leaks out.

  • In this method of decarbing your weed, you need to use finely grinded weed. Using the ones that you’ve simply broken using your hand won’t work. 
  • Here, you have to place this grinded weed inside a sous vide bag, and then proceed to seal the bag shut. It has to have a proper vacuum so that no smell leaks out.
  • Fill a pot with water and place the circulator inside the pot. Set the temperatures to about 203F, and then put this sous vide bag inside it for about one and a half hours. 
  • After 90 minutes are up, take the bag out of the water. However, make sure that you are doing it using proper precautionary measures such as mitts and aprons because this water is going to be VERY hot. 
  • Allow the sealed bag to cool for about 30 to 45 minutes. Post that, use an airtight glass jar to store the weed in a dark and cool place, just as you would with the other two methods. 

What Happens if I Don’t Decarb?

If you do not decarb your weed, you are going to end up with substandard edibles. The cookies that you bake or the butter that you churn is going to be as good as regular cookies or regular butter as it will have no psychoactive properties. Besides, what is even the point of spending months of your time and money on growing a plant that won’t even get you high. This is why it is best suggested to decarb your weed. 

While even the weed that hasn’t been decarbed will give you a very mild buzz because of the properties that it carries, but that is nowhere close to the ideal levels of buzz that you are going to feel when you consume a decarbed weed. 

However, do keep in mind that there’s a difference between dried weed and decarbed weed. When weed is dried after harvesting, it leaves behind some THCA and some moisture in it, which gives it a truly ‘sticky’ bud sort of a feel. This is the kind of weed that you are supposed to smoke. However, when you are decarbing your weed, it will still get you high, but that isn’t the best kind of weed for smoking but is better suited for consuming via edibles. 

This is because after the weed has been decarbed, there are chances that some bits of the bud can turn into cannabis dust which, when smoked, gives a very harsh smoking experience to your lungs, and also tends to taste quite bad. 

Coming back to the point – if you do not decarb your weed, you are going to end up with bud that will have no psychoactive properties when you prepare your edibles using it. Hence, it is always strongly recommended to decarb your weed if you plan on preparing edibles. 

Things to Keep in Mind While Decarbing Your Weed

Here are some things that you need to keep in mind while you decarb your weed. Following these tips will ensure that your weed is decarbed in a better manner and also retains a proper taste and flavor when you use it to prepare edibles. 

  • The first thing that you need to keep in mind is that you are not supposed to smoke the decarbed weed. There’s no hard and fast restriction on it and it is totally ok to smoke this weed, but we’d suggest you don’t do it because it carries a very different taste and feel compared to regular weed and doesn’t give you the optimal experience. 
  • It is extremely important for you to break the bud properly. If you are doing it by hand make sure you are breaking it into small pieces. However, if you are grinding it using the oven method or the mason jar method, don’t grind it too fine or else you might risk burning the weed and ending up with product that tastes rather burnt. 
  • It is generally advised to not go beyond 240-250C. You can go lower and heat for longer, but don’t go any higher as that will leave a burnt taste. This is again something you need to keep in mind during the oven-method and the mason jar-method. But in any method, don’t heat it so much (or for so long) that it ends up damaging the flower. 
  • The kind of weed that you are using matters quite a bit. We recommend that you make use of weed that is kind of fluffy and loose instead of moist and compact. You also don’t really have to manicure your weed while decarbing it. If you are planning on creating oil out of it, make sure you’re using high-CBD strains. If you are growing your own weed, make sure you are drying it well before you begin to decarb it.
  • Lastly, it is also very important to store it in the right way. Store it in airtight jars and in a dark and cool place – just like how you would store regular marijuana. 

Conclusion

We hope that by the time you’ve reached this section, you have a fair bit of an idea about what decarbing is, how it is done, and what happens if you do not decarb your weed. This is an important process – but one that can actually be carried out in your home with quite an ease. Do make sure that you decarb your weed if you are preparing edibles, and feel free to drop us a comment or let us know over the email if you are facing any problems during the process and we shall get back to you on this as soon as we can! 

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