Holiday Brownies

Brownies!

I wanted to get into the holiday spirit in a couple of ways. For one thing I felt like doing some baking. But really, what I really wanted, was to have some special medicated snacks available over the holidays. I'm a grown ass man (with no kids) and I want to celebrate on Christmas.  Now, I don't want to be ducking in and out of the house all day -- I'll be with family for one thing -- so I thought it would be a great idea to make some heady treats!

a jar of ABV (already been
vaped) material

This kind of food goes by many names: "special" brownies, space cakes, cannabutter, etc. But no matter what you call it, for the social- and health-conscious consumer, eating your recreational herb is about as good as it gets. I use a vaporizer most of the time, and you can actually bake with the leftover material. Yep, you can use it again. When consumers use a vaporizer, they dump the used material into a glass jar. Because you don't use a flame when vaporizing, none of the plant matter or potent ingredients get burned away when you vaporize. This is great news when you're actually vaping -- 100% of the carcinogens are eliminated. But it's even better news once you're finished vaping -- you have leftovers to bake with.  It's commonly known as ABV (already been vaped) material.

ABV + oil & heat = Yay!

You can actually add the ABV directly to a recipe -- any recipe that uses oil -- or, ideally, you can use it to make "green" oil or butter ahead of time, which you then use in whatever recipe you want. The basic idea, just like baking with regular herb, is that the heat and oil activate the chemical ingredients, which, of course, you then eat. Consumers in more progressive areas are well aware of the variety and creativity abundant in the medicated snack industry.

Here are some basic principles:

1. If you're going to put the ABV directly into the recipe, use something like a coffee grinder to grind the material up. You want it to be really fine.
2. Add an extra egg to make the batter gooier to mask the ABV.
3. Use about an ounce of material per batch of brownies. (You need about 4 or 5 times as much used as you would fresh.)
4. If making the butter or oil ahead of time, you just need to heat them together over very low heat in any of a variety of ways, and then strain it.
5. Use a low temperature -- about 280-300 -- for all baking of this type. This is key.
6. Check out Kads Baker's demonstration!

ground up nice and fine in the Magic Bullet

I used 71.8 grams of ABV in
a double batch of brownies.
It was plenty.

oil and material

It will sizzle when heated!  

I sort of did both techniques. I did make the oil ahead of time and strain out a bunch of the matter, but I let plenty of it go in, which is no big deal. So I'm sure I ended up adding about half of the material into the recipe anyway. To make the oil, I dumped the ABV into a glass baking dish and then mixed in the oil. I put it in the oven for about an hour at 300 degrees.

Here's the brownie recipe I used after I made the oil:

• 1 cup ABV oil
• 2 cups sugar
• 2 tsp vanilla extract
• 3 eggs
• 1 cup flour
• 2/3 cup cocoa powder
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt

1. Mix the oil, sugar, and vanilla, and then beat in the eggs.
2. Combine the remaining dry ingredients and add to the wet mixture.
3. Spread the batter into a 9x13 greased pan and bake at 300 for 45-60 minutes.
4. Brownies are done when inserted toothpick pulls out cleanly.
5. It might take longer to bake since the temperature is low.

After they cool, try just a couple of bites to see how strong they are. Wait an hour or two to feel the effect before eating any more!