Cannabis Cabernets: The Growing Popularity Of Marijuana-Laced Wine

Cambria Bold
Cambria Bold
Cambria Bold is the Executive Editor of Cubby, and one of Apartment Therapy Media’s first full-time editors from way back when. She was the founding Design and Lifestyle Editor for Kitchn and the Managing Editor for Apartment Therapy’s green living site, Re-Nest (RIP). After a few years offline and then working elsewhere, she’s back to share ideas about design, kids, and family life. It’s helpful that she now has two little kids and lots of thoughts about all those things. She lives with said kids and their father in St. Paul, MN.
published Apr 24, 2012
pinterest
comments
We independently select these products—if you buy from one of our links, we may earn a commission. All prices were accurate at the time of publishing.
Post Image
(Image credit: Patricia St. Martin)

The news of the day*: apparently “pot wine” has become quite the surreptitious trend among some Northern California winemakers. For obvious reasons, these vintners keep their weed winemaking on the down low, reserving the bottles for special friends and a select group of “like-minded” individuals. What’s the draw? According to Crane Carter, the president of the Napa Valley Marijuana Growers: “People love wine, and they love weed.” Well, okay then!

The recipe for pot wine (which can also be found online here) basically consists of dropping one pound of marijuana (which yields about 1.5 grams of pot per bottle) into a cask of fermenting wine. The marijuana is usually blended with hearty reds, like cabernet sauvignon and syrah, and as you might expect, “the better the raw materials–grapes and dope–the better the wine.” The fermentation process then converts the sugar in the grapes into alcohol, and the alcohol extracts the THC from the marijuana. It takes about nine months for maximum extraction.

Most of the marijuana used for wine comes from Humboldt County, California’s weed capital, and according to The Daily Beast, pot wines have a “pungent herbal aroma” and the ability to produce “an interesting little buzz.”

Read More: Marijuana-Laced Wine Grows More Fashionable in California Wine Country at The Daily Beast

Related: Terroir and the Napa Valley: Cabernet Sauvignon

* Clearly I should have posted this story last Friday on 4.20. (Oh, missed opportunity!) But hey, it’s still Wine Week on The Kitchn, so I guess it’s not a total loss.

(Image: Big Buds)

Filed in:
Wine
Beverages