For this updated CBD honey review, we tried one of Populum‘s newest products. This delicious treat went great with a hot cup of tea, whether we were starting our day or winding down. We also tried this CBD honey on pancakes, and it makes the breakfast favorite even more fun.

The simple, carefully-selected ingredients in their new CBD honey reflect the quality and transparency we’ve come to expect from Populum. Populum Orange + CBD Raw Honey features the fresh orange flavor found in their CBD tincture, and raw honey from Sweet Summer Farms, a small independent farm in Arizona. The result was a wonderful edible CBD experience from one of our favorite brands.

A sweet, relaxing way to start or end your day

Populum products are always made in the U.S. with domestically-sourced, top-quality ingredients.

They’re also thoroughly lab-tested. While the latest third-party lab tests show this product to be stronger than labeled, Populum tells us that’s because it’s difficult to evenly mix CBD into a thick substance like this. Their internal testing shows that there’s 100mg per bottle. If you need a more precisely dosed product, we’d recommend Populum softgel capsules instead.

Though some people claim honey has its own health benefits, the latest research suggests that could be mostly hype. That doesn’t matter much because we think most people really like honey because it’s sweet and delicious and this honey is no exception. We couldn’t detect any bitterness or hempy aftertaste at all.

This CBD honey tastes great … and the effects from the hemp extract were relaxing too. This product is a true full-spectrum extract and contains trace amounts CBN, which may enhance the stress-relieving power of CBD. Populum also recently added a hazelnut flavored CBD coffee syrup to their lineup, another luxurious way to start your day.

This honey is apparently a limited-edition product … but we hope it’s popular enough they find a way to keep offering it into the future.

Populum Orange + CBD Raw Honey

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• Highlights: Populum Orange + CBD Raw Honey combines Populum’s cannabinoid-rich full spectrum hemp extract and signature orange flavor with carefully-sourced raw honey for a delicious treat that’s delicious in tea… or on pancakes.
• Strength: 100mg per bottle
• Price: $39.00
• Customer Service & Shipping: Fast, friendly customer service. Free shipping available.
• Independent Test Results: Online and included with all orders.
• Scent & Texture: Thick, rich raw honey sweetness and texture with a refreshing orange flavor. You won’t taste any hempy flavor or bitterness even if you eat this CBD honey by the spoonful!
• Ingredients: CBD oil / Full-spectrum Hemp extract in Raw honey, Organic oranges, Grapeseed oil, Hempseed oil, Virgin Coconut oil, Stevia extract
• Other: A 30-day money back guarantee is available for first-time customers.

Populum uses Analytical 360, our trusted third-party lab. Download test results for Populum Orange + CBD Raw Honey, from November 04, 2020.

Populum, one of our Top CBD Brands, uses Colorado-grown hemp in all their products. Dog owners should try Populum Zen Pets CBD dog treats.

The post CBD Honey Review: Delicious Relief With Populum Orange + CBD Raw Honey appeared first on Ministry of Hemp.

If you’ve ever created cannabis or hemp flower-infused butter before, you know it’s a time consuming and somewhat messy process. Though it isn’t particularly difficult if you know what you are doing, you have to constantly monitor the butter to make sure it doesn’t burn. There’s nothing worse than getting distracted and wrecking a perfectly good batch of butter (and it stinks pretty badly too).

That’s where the Levo II Infusion Machine comes in. This attractive appliance sits on your countertop, taking up about as much space as a coffee machine. With the help of some tips from Levo, you can easily make hemp infused butter with a minimum of mess and very little fuss. The two stage process takes a couple hours. Your hemp or cannabis flower infuses at a low, slow temperature for maximum benefits. Once you’re done, cleanup is easy and most of the parts are dishwasher safe.

Levo offered us free products in return for our honest opinion. If you purchase a product from one of these links, we’ll receive a percentage of sales. Read more about sponsored content on Ministry of Hemp.

Keep reading to find out more about the Levo II Infusion Machine, including what we did (and didn’t) like about making butter with it.

Easily create potent edibles and infused oils with Levo II Infusion Machine

Before the Levo, we frequently talked about making infused butter, but rarely actually made it. It just always ended up seeming like too much trouble to get out a double boiler, a thermometer, and spend a couple hours babysitting a batch of butter.

Now that we have the Levo II Infusion Machine, we’ve made infused butter on a weekly basis. The old way, I had to block out time in my busy schedule just to make butter. Now I simply set up the Levo II and ignore it until its finished.

The Levo II uses a two-stage process to create butter. First, you coarsely grind up your herbs and load it into a special cage that sits inside the Levo. Then, it gently warms the hemp flower to activate it (a process also known as decarboxylation).

For the second and final stage, you add your butter to the reservoir, along with a magnetic stirring device. Over the course of a couple hours, the Levo warms and thoroughly mixes the melted butter, or oil of your choice. At the touch of a button, the reservoir opens and your infused oil pours into any container.

One thing to note here: to get all the butter out and thoroughly empty the reservoir, we had to open the top of the device and use a small spatula to push it into the drain, while holding down the dispenser button. This two-handed process feels a little awkward.

Beautiful appliance, great oils …

The Levo makes potent infused oils that taste great. We used them to make baked goods and also added CBD butter to our morning oatmeal. This breakfast kept our reviewer relaxed and reduced chronic pain levels all through the morning. We also experimented with making rosemary-infused olive oil for salad dressing. A Levo Calculator makes it easy to find the right settings and they publish recipes regularly.

Cleaning up the appliance is simple. The mixer, herb cage, and reservoir can all go right in your dishwasher. You should also gently wipe the machine itself down to keep it from getting greasy.

To remove or replace the reservoir, you hold down the same button which dispenses oil. The reservoir leaks a little bit if it’s not perfectly seated. It helps to keep a container under the spigot while you are making oil to catch the drips.

With its sleek, modern looking design, the Levo II Infusion Machine is an appliance you won’t mind leaving on the counter. Nothing about it looks “stoney,” embarassing or crude. That’s good since this device will take up a bit of counterspace. The chimes it makes when you push the buttons or when a cycle finishes sound pleasant to your ears too, a subtle touch we appreciated.

… But a terrible app

Our major complaint about the Levo II is the smartphone app. We didn’t have any trouble connecting the device to our WiFi network, but the app never worked reliably. Typically, it only showed a black screen and, even when it worked, logging in seemed impossible. When the app does work, you can access the calculator and recipes without logging in, so it can still be worth downloading.

While we only tried the Android version of the app, both the Apple and Google app stores are full of one-star reviews for it. For a device that costs this much money, there’s really no excuse for such a poorly performing app. However, you can fully operate the device without the app or a WiFi connection. All the information and recipes from the app are also on the website.

Levo II Infusion Machine (Ministry of Hemp Official Review)

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• Highlights: The Levo II Infusion Machine is a tastefully designed, modern appliance for making cannabis or hemp butter, as well as infused culinary oils of all kinds. Making oil is easy and cleanup is too, but the connected smartphone app leaves a lot to be desired.
• Price: $249.00
• Customer Service & Shipping: Fast, friendly customer service. Free shipping available.
• Pros: Attractive appliance you won’t feel embarrassed to leave on the countertop. Easy to operate from the appliance itself. Very reliably makes delicious, potent infused oils and butter while you do other things. All major parts are dishwasher safe.
• Cons: The smartphone app is terribly unreliable, based on our experience & app store reviews. Dispenser sometimes leaks a little if it’s not perfectly placed. You’ll need to use a spatula to get all the oil and butter out.
• Other: Comes in 5 colors. Levo offers a 100-day risk free trial on these appliances.

The post Levo II Infusion Machine Makes Delicious Hemp Infused Butter & Oils appeared first on Ministry of Hemp.

In this episode of the Ministry of Hemp podcast, our host Matt warns about fraudsters selling Coronavirus cures. Then Chef Ron Silver, CCO and Founder of Azuca, comes on the ‘cast to talk about their unique CBD infused sugar. Their CBD sugar is perfect for CBD drinks or almost any elevated recipe that requires some sweetness.

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CBD Sugar with Azuca’s Ron Silver: Complete episode transcript

Below is the complete transcript of episode 33 of the Ministry of Hemp podcast.

Matt Baum:
I’m Matt Baum and this is the Ministry of Hemp Podcast, brought to you by MinistryOfHemp.com, America’s leading advocate for him and hemp education.

Matt Baum:
Welcome back to a another edition of the Ministry of Hemp Podcast. My name’s Matt Baum and I am your host and today in the show we are going to talk about Azuca, a company created by a chef that is infusing CBD into sugar in small packets to help you with your dosage. It’s very cool. But before we do that, let’s take a minute to talk about the coronavirus.

CBD & fake coronavirus cures

Matt Baum:
The novel coronavirus, or COVID-19 as it’s been called, has dominated the news cycle recently and for good reason, it’s dangerous. The NBA has canceled their season along with the NHL. March Madness is canceled. Baseball doesn’t know if it can get started. As of Tuesday of this week, things seemed to ratchet up very quickly in the news and the United States woke up to the fact that this is serious and it’s probably going to affect a large chunk of the population.

Matt Baum:
Now with a warning like this comes a lot of misinformation. Just last week, disgraced televangelist Jim Bakker got a cease and desist letter from the state of Missouri for selling a fake cure. Alex Jones of InfoWars fame also just received a cease and desist for selling fake coronavirus cures. And of course there are people on the internet saying that CBD can cure of coronavirus. This is absolutely false.

Matt Baum:
CBD will not cure the coronavirus. It can be used to help with pain. It can use to help with anxiety centered around the coronavirus, sure. But I repeat, it is not a cure for the coronavirus. And if you find a site or a person or a shop that is selling CBD and saying that it is a cure or even preventative, they are lying to you. Do not give them your money and report them to your local authorities so they can be told to stop lying to the populace.

Matt Baum:
It’s kind of a scary time right now, I know. But we’ve all just got to stick together. We’ve got to share facts as we get them and make sure you and your loved ones are not being taken advantage of by criminals and conspiracy theorists trying to make money off this latest national panic.

Meet Ron Silver

Matt Baum:
Ron Silver has been the chef owner of Bubby’s, with locations in New York and Japan, for 30 years now. But recently he started a new venture called Azuca. Azuca took the idea of infusing CBD into organic sugar. They’re now doing it with simple syrups and chocolates too. I spoke to Ron from his apartment in New York and here is our conversation.

Matt Baum:
You started off as a chef. What kind of cooking were you doing? What was your background cooking?

Ron Silver:
Well, I own restaurants in New York City and in Japan called Bubby’s. And our specialty is home cooked American food, but it’s sourced from local farms that … I’ve been open for 30 years. So, I’ve been doing that. [crosstalk 00:03:54]

Matt Baum:
I’m sorry. I don’t mean to cut you off. What was the name of the restaurant? You blinked out a little bit.

Ron Silver:
The name of the restaurants are Bubby’s.

Matt Baum:
Bubby’s, gotcha, okay.

Ron Silver:
Yeah.

Matt Baum:
So, how do we go from being a chef to hemp? How does this come about?

Ron Silver:
Well, first of all, being a chef I have absolutely also been in the scene and I’m not a big drinker, or I haven’t been a big drinker, so cannabis is my go to thing and it really always has been all my life.

Ron Silver:
So, cannabis is something that I have a weird understanding of more than your average person. So, when cannabis started to become legal, I started to try to understand what the problems were and how I could help solve those problems and that was maybe seven years ago. And since then I really have been zeroing in on a lot of interesting solutions for cannabis edibles.

Matt Baum:
And how did you get to CBD from cannabis? Was it something you just about seven years ago you haven’t discovered?

Ron Silver:
Well no, I didn’t know anything about CBD until maybe six years ago. Actually I was at a little meeting where people were talking about what the new cannabis industry was going to look like. We were in a suite at the Four Seasons hotel in San Francisco and there were about 20 people and there were all kinds of things going on there.

Ron Silver:
And one of them was that people were dabbing. And I had never heard of that before. I didn’t know what it was. And somebody had too much of the dab. And another person said, “Well, just smoke of this CBD, it neutralizes it.”

Ron Silver:
So, that was the first time I had ever heard of CBD. And I was really quite interested in that. And since then, the things that I’ve learned about CBD in the possibilities of what CBD is and also in experiencing how it has affected other people or has affected people who I’ve given it to or who take it, is amazing. It’s been an amazing journey of learning about another aspect of this plant, cannabis, and really what I surmise and realize is that what we called dirt weed back in the day in the old days was actually just high CBD cannabis.

Matt Baum:
I’m from the Midwest, so it was ditch weed, is what we called it here.

Ron Silver:
Ditch weed, exactly. Where are you located?

Matt Baum:
I’m in Omaha, Nebraska.

Ron Silver:
Cool.

Matt Baum:
So, you had a lot of river basin and a lot of ditch weed growing all over the place.

Ron Silver:
Well, yes. It basically grew wild. It does, it grows wild out there, right?

Matt Baum:
We had no idea that it was CBD benefits we were getting.

Ron Silver:
Well, it’s not only CBD benefits, it’s fiber benefits, it’s fuel, it’s building materials, it’s a million things, plastic replacement. A billion, weird little things that can come out of that.

From cooking to CBD sugar

Matt Baum:
So, you get interested in this at this party and experiencing it, did you start to incorporate it in your life after that to see how it affected you?

Ron Silver:
No. First of all, things were not that available seven years ago. So, it was part of a process of understanding, first of all, that it was something that was super interesting and really, I know that there is a big trend and fad and all kinds of people using it for all kinds of different things, but I’m not really so interested in that.

Ron Silver:
I’m interested in like actual … I wouldn’t call it hard data because it’s hard to get hard data. But I have direct experience with direct people in all kinds of different ways. Including for example, my nephew. He’s high functioning Asperger’s and he’s 22 years old probably. I think he’s something like 22 and he has a really high functioning job and he does amazing shit. This kid is amazing in that he sets up whole stadium sound systems for concerts.

Matt Baum:
Oh wow. Yeah.

Ron Silver:
Engineering that goes on behind that. And he also does computer programming and stuff like that. Super high functioning guy. And at the same time he has anxiety because he really does have Asperger’s and it is a certain way of looking at the world that requires medication oftentimes, that is given to people that is very, very strong.

Ron Silver:
And so this particular nephew of mine basically has been using this sugar for probably four years and he really uses it as a medicine and he’s replaced all kinds of bad drugs like Prozac and, I don’t know, Thorazine, just really serious drugs.

Matt Baum:
Anti anxiety drugs.

Ron Silver:
That were really messing him up.

Matt Baum:
Yeah.

Ron Silver:
and giving him other affects, and so he’s replaced it with this and he really is the best ever patient to tell, because he really is very specific with how it helps him and how much he takes and how often he takes it and exactly what he uses it for. In the daytime, he uses it in this way. At nighttime, he uses it in this way, and he’s very conservative and very responsible about it.

Ron Silver:
He reached out to me just yesterday. He said, “Uncle Ron, I am out of sugar. Could I get some more? Because it’s the only thing that helps me.” And we talk about how to get more out of it and to get the feedback on it and what exactly it is doing. So it’s super … I don’t know, it’s almost like being doctor, but not really [inaudible 00:10:51] and I’m used to that because I feed people food and I really do take that seriously. And so it feeds into that. But this is, this is a special thing and I take it very seriously. Very seriously.

Why make CBD sugar?

Matt Baum:
So you brought up the sugar. Let’s talk about that because that’s why you’re here today. You started a company called Azuca, which literally means sugar, that incorporates CBD into sugar. Can I ask why go that direction instead of just starting a company that makes a CBD tincture like a lot of other people did? Why sugar?

Ron Silver:
Well, for one thing, it’s a very understandable thing. My main concern is making it so that people can take a controllable dose and decide what that dose is.

Matt Baum:
Yeah, very important.

Ron Silver:
If we sell a packet of sugar and it’s 25 milligrams, that means that that person takes half that packet, or 1.25, whatever the measurement is in there, a quarter teaspoon, 12.5 mg, or if they want 30, it’s easy to figure out.

Matt Baum:
Yeah.

Ron Silver:
So, essentially that’s the first a reason that I went with sugar. And it’s also something that you could bake with or make beverages with or put it in your coffee or tea. It’s very easy use and it’s a familiar thing. The main thing is, is that the technology that we have, it’s called Azuca Time Technology, which time stands for Thermodynamic Individual Molecular Encapsulation.

Matt Baum:
That’s so cool. It’s like shield out of the Marvel universe. I love it.

Ron Silver:
It’s cool, but it’s also accurate which makes it actually cool. To me, it’s amazing how cool it is in that it really does it allow that CBD molecule to be delivered in the best way possible. So, there’s a lot of amazing sort of science and factors going on to make that happen.

Matt Baum:
How did you stumble upon this, this Time, we’ll call it, how did you happen into this? And I’m not trying to downplay your job as a chef, but you don’t usually think of chefs when you think of molecular chemistry and whatnot. How did you find this method, I guess, we’ll call it.

Ron Silver:
So, that is a really interesting question. And one of the things I would say is that cooking is chemistry.

Matt Baum:
Oh, definitely, definitely.

Ron Silver:
You just don’t think about it. But it is chemistry and if you do it poorly, it really doesn’t taste good.

Matt Baum:
That’s true.

Ron Silver:
And that’s because of chemistry. 100%. And the other thing is that I’m sort of dilettante-ish in figuring out stuff. So, I’ve read a bunch of textbooks and theses and interviewed people and experimented with a whole bunch of stuff and tried to understand where the problems really were and really stumbled on a bunch of things and one of the things I’ll say is that because cannabis was illegal, I was able to have fairly candid conversations with CEOs of companies that were willing to, to me off the record because they couldn’t do anything about cannabis.

Ron Silver:
So, I was able to really dive into … Well, one thing that I would say is that oftentimes in the world, there are 37 people thinking about really interesting ways to approach a problem. But those 37 people don’t really talk to each other. And some of them don’t talk to each other because they’re dead and some of them don’t talk to each other because they’re competing with the other guy, and some don’t talk to each other just because whatever.

Ron Silver:
But what I found myself doing is diving into a whole bunch of different thoughts about how to approach this problem. And was able to, after really a long time, it took me five or six years to really, really get to where it is now, which I would say, this is always a mistake to say, but I would say it’s in a really, really good spot. I don’t see how it could be better. But of course, things can be better and I think it’s important to pay attention to that.

The cooking connection

Matt Baum:
Do you think the Genesis of incorporating CBD into sugar, making it almost an ingredient, did that come directly out of your experience from cooking and whatnot?

Ron Silver:
100%. I would say that for sure. It makes it easy to think about. Sugar is easy to think about. There’s a million ways to use it. And all those ways can be used with this product through this thing. But the technology can also be applied to savory things. I’ve made weird food things with it, but we also have what I call plop, plop, fizz, fizzes, little-

Matt Baum:
Alka seltzer type things? Yeah.

Ron Silver:
Yes. And those really work nicely and there’s no sugar in that. Personally, and I catch grief from this and unfortunately in the Azuca family and the company, I’m the weird brother [crosstalk 00:17:10] really the business end of the stick at all.

Ron Silver:
And the blessing for Azuca is that we really do have leadership that is totally responsible and I’m just not that one person who is [inaudible 00:17:23].

Matt Baum:
That’s fine. There’s nothing wrong with that. Have you incorporated anything with the sugar into your own restaurant?

Ron Silver:
Well, in New York city that is forbidden. So, we do not do that. We were doing that for awhile and then it became not allowed and we stopped.

Matt Baum:
There was a cease and desist type thing or?

Ron Silver:
Through the whole city. A lot of people started to do it and the city said you can’t do that. And they gave certain deadlines and everybody, well, we followed them. So, one of my main things is to be compliant and it’s really work to do that.

Matt Baum:
In the future when things loosen up, is that the plan to start to incorporate stuff like this into menus and whatnot?

Ron Silver:
That’s not necessarily my plan. If I had my druthers, and I’ve said this a whole bunch of times, I would prefer to sell THC infused, cannabis infused drinks at my bar than liquor any day.

Matt Baum:
Absolutely.

Ron Silver:
The thing that Azuca Time allows us to do is, and one of the things that being a chef allows us to do, is have a bunch of cool syrups.

Matt Baum:
Right?

Ron Silver:
And it’s possible to have a cocktail that’s exactly three milligrams. And that way you can have three or four or five of them and being really fine shape and not have any problem in it and it hits you while you’re sitting at the bar. It’s not like you’d go home, feel it eight hours later, you’re in a bad state of affairs.

Ron Silver:
So, for me I would love to see that, but I don’t foresee that happening. But I do think that would be a responsible and interesting thing to do with no … It’s not dodgy. I would way rather sell that then whiskey any day.

Using CBD sugar

Matt Baum:
Fair enough. So, let me ask you as far as your product goes, and you sent me some and I really enjoyed it, it’s very cool, and I tried the sugar in my coffee and I use the simple syrup to make some drinks. Can you explain for someone who’s never messed around with something like this, what will they experience when they take a packet of your Azuca sugar and pour it into their coffee? What is the experience like?

Ron Silver:
Not to double back a question with a question, but what was your experience like?

Matt Baum:
That’s fair. I will say, obviously I use CBD daily and I host a podcast about hemp, so I’ve used a lot of it. It did seem to me that when I put the sugar in the coffee I felt the effects much faster than if I were to take the tincture that I take daily or if I were to, there’s a powdered CBD that I’ve been using daily as well in different drinks.

Matt Baum:
I felt like this hit really quickly and it really mellowed me out. I drink a lot of coffee in the morning because I work in web hosting and I need to be aware and I’m working in engineering, but I also don’t want to get to the point where I’m vibrating through my workspace and I do feel like this really hit me almost as fast as the caffeine did.

Ron Silver:
Right. Did we send you enough for you to … Do you still have some now?

Matt Baum:
Oh, I need much more. I’m going to beg for that later.

Ron Silver:
I’ll probably send you a bunch of cool stuff. 100%.

Matt Baum:
Yeah, most definitely.

Ron Silver:
That’s one thing is that I really do play with things and I need people to try things, it’s the best [crosstalk 00:21:11].

Matt Baum:
I would love to be your guinea pig, definitely.

Ron Silver:
That sounds good.

Fast acting CBD through science

Matt Baum:
Is that part of the technology though? The effects hitting that fast? Or is the sugar doing something?

Ron Silver:
100%. The effects of the technology make it hit that fast. And essentially what that means is that, you use CBD all the time and you’ve seen the oil and you know how thick that is. If it’s very thick, and obviously if you drop the oil into a glass of water, it would drop right down to the bottom it does not mix up well. And even if you boil it up, it doesn’t mix well, it’s oil and water.

Ron Silver:
And so when it goes into your system, those molecules are perfectly round and very hard and they have to go through your esophagus and through your entire digestive system to your liver and your liver has to break that down and your liver can get 2% to 6%, in, say, one to four hours. There’s a lot of variables there depending on liver function.

Ron Silver:
And so some people have come up with something that’s a very popular approach, which is called nano lipid technology. Maybe you’ve heard of that.

Matt Baum:
Yeah. We’ve talked about this on the show.

Ron Silver:
Nano lipid is an emulsion. It’s like mayonnaise. The best nano particulate, smallest nano particulate, would be about 20 nanometers and that would be the smallest particulate and that would also be the weakest emulsion because it’s like making a mayonnaise. When you put that last drop of oil in, it breaks, and the same with nano lipid technology.

Ron Silver:
If you bring it to 20 nanodes, it’s the most possible that it can hold to make it that small. So, the nano lipid technology in edibles, which is not monitored or thought … You could almost say anything, but there are decisions made in a nano lipid process were you’re deciding how stable you want that to be because the less stable it is, the more returns come back on the shelf. That’s a big source of waste. Big source of waste. And so essentially the nano particle could be anywhere from 20 a 1,000 and people would more than likely choose a 400 or 500, 600 size to make it nano lipid but still shift stable on the shelf.

Matt Baum:
So, the smaller the better? Is that where we’re going with it?

Ron Silver:
(inaudible 00:24:02) particle is, the more able it is to pass through soft tissue. Your esophagus and your mouth and your stomach into endocannabinoid receptors that are placed all over your body. There are billions of them. And it’s a system that exists within your body, the endocannabinoid system. I’m sure you know about that.

Matt Baum:
Yeah, absolutely. Talk about it a lot.

Ron Silver:
With Azuca Time technology, it only works in one way, which is one molecule is completely encapsulated and that little molecule, 1.5 nanos, that’s how big our particle is. And so, that absorbs the best and it goes directly to your brain and the endocannabinoid system and does its thing. And that really is how it works.

Matt Baum:
So, correct me if I’m wrong. Most times when I’m talking to companies that are using tinctures or using something like MCT oil, because the CBD bonds to fat really well, is this basically CBD bonded to a very small amount of fat? On a molecular level almost?

Ron Silver:
There’s no fat involved with it. It’s more of like the difference between mayonnaise and slime that you would buy for your children at the store.

Matt Baum:
Okay.

Ron Silver:
And that slime, it stretches and it really stretches. And if you have the sort of machinery and the exact viscosity, you could stretch that out to one molecule thin.

Matt Baum:
Gotcha.

Ron Silver:
So, essentially this is what it is, is a really, really, really fine wetsuit around each individual molecule.

Matt Baum:
Gotcha. So, the same thing happens with your simple syrup where it’s basically, this is so small that you can break it down into a syrup and not affect it whatsoever.

Ron Silver:
Well no. What we do is we encapsulate the molecules and then we incorporate that into the simple syrup so that it’s evenly distributed. And before we apply it to sugar, there’s no sugar involved. So, we encapsulate and then we apply it to sugar, which is also simple syrup. It can be applied to topicals and it’s very effective. All kinds of stuff.

Matt Baum:
So for those who don’t know, simple syrup is basically exactly what it sounds like. It’s almost a sugary syrup and in this case, if I were to take enough Azuca sugar and cook it down, like I was making simple syrup, would that still work? Is it the same type of thing or is there another step in that process?

Ron Silver:
If you take Azuca simple syrup and put a teaspoon in, a teaspoon is 25 milligrams, and you can put that into a drink.

Matt Baum:
Right. I’m sorry, I was speaking as far as the sugar. If I just took your raw Azuca sugar, could I make simple syrup the same way out of it?

Ron Silver:
Absolutely. 100%.

Matt Baum:
Okay.

Ron Silver:
Yes.

Matt Baum:
So, you are literally just taking the sugar that you already make and making a simple syrup that has CBD in it.

Ron Silver:
Well, basically.

What’s next for Ron Silver & Azuca

Matt Baum:
That’s brilliant. So, what else is Azuca working on right now? I noticed there were chocolates that just popped up on the website not too long ago.

Ron Silver:
We have chocolates. We have sugar stick packs. We are working on a nice cool stevia packet. We are working on some flavored syrups to make different kind of cocktails.

Matt Baum:
Very cool.

Ron Silver:
A bunch of cool stuff.

Matt Baum:
So, where’s the future go for this, do you think? After the FDA comes out and says, “All right, we figured it out. What’s the future for Azuca? Where do you see this going?”

Ron Silver:
Well, I hope that we can continue to find interesting ways to deliver CBD and THC to people in ways that are helpful for whatever the sort of use that they come up with is. We come up with different kinds of hangover cures and athletic ways for runners to take it and weightlifters and stuff like that.

Ron Silver:
So, I think there’s a lot of different ways to go with it. It also seems to help people who are dealing with opioid addiction. And then it somehow shuts off some receptors that create a lot of the addiction issues.

Matt Baum:
Yeah. There’s our early stuff coming in on that. I can’t remember who it was, the name of the doctor, but there’s some early information coming out on that that looks very promising actually.

Ron Silver:
Yeah.

Matt Baum:
Very promising.

Ron Silver:
And there’s also other cannabinoids that are super interesting for specific things like weight, diet either control or diet stimulation or any number of things. Sleep and studying and all kinds of wild possible applications that obviously all need to be researched and one of the big things right now is that CBD companies can’t make any claims like that and we don’t make any claims like that and it really is a very big deal to understand those regulations and work within them every step.

Matt Baum:
Absolutely. And stay honest while doing so.

Ron Silver:
100% yes.

Matt Baum:
Definitely. Chef Ron, thank you so much for your time today. This has been fantastic.

Ron Silver:
Thank you for having me.

Final thoughts from Matt

Matt Baum:
I love what you guys are doing and like I said, thanks again to Ron for joining me and the good people at Azuca for seeking us out and asking to be on this show. That was really cool. I wouldn’t have known about them otherwise. And if you want to try Azuca’s simple syrup or organic sugars or even their chocolates, we’ll have link to their website right here in the show notes.

Matt Baum:
That brings us to the end of our episode. I hope you had a good time with this one and I’d love to hear from you if you’ve got comments, questions, you can call me at (402) 819-6417 with your Azuca or any hemp related question and every once in a while when we get enough good ones, Kit, the Editor in Chief of MinistryOfHemp.com and myself will answer your questions right here on the show. It’s very cool.

Matt Baum:
Of course, you can hit us up on all of our social media. You’ll always find us at MinistryOfHemp or /MinistryOfHemp and be sure to check out our Patreon over at Patrion.com/MinistryOfHemp. You can become a supporter of MinistryOfHemp.com and there’s all kinds of cool rewards including the podcast extra, and in this latest one I’ll be talking to Chef Ron Silver about some drinks you can make using Azuca products and they’re awfully tasty. We’ve already made a couple. So, get over to patrion.com, search for Ministry of Hemp, and become a supporter and help us to get the good word of hemp out there to the people.

Matt Baum:
Speaking of MinistryOfHemp.com, get over there right now and check out two awesome articles we’ve got up. One is an update to understanding the different types of CBD oil and an update to an article we had about how to identify high quality CBD. Both are great and very informational stuff.

Matt Baum:
Here at MinistryOfHemp.com, we believe that an accessible world is a better world for everyone. So you will find a complete written transcript for this show in the show notes on the post for this podcast over at MinistryOfHemp.com. Next time on the show, we’re going to talk about testing and a company that is trying to make it easier for everyone to have access to real lab results. It’s going to be very cool. Be sure to tune in, and I know I say this at the end of every show, but I think it’s especially important right now. Remember to take care of yourself, take care of others, and make good decisions, will you? This is Matt Baum and the Ministry of Hemp Podcast signing off.

The post A Spoonful Of CBD Sugar, With Azuca’s Ron Silver appeared first on Ministry of Hemp.

With fresh New Year’s resolutions, many of us have pledged to start healthier habits. So, if you’re doing your due diligence to finally start eating healthier, you’ve come to the perfect place.

Today we’re giving you a simple recipe that fuses the nutritional goodness of oats with the superfood capacities of hemp and the benefits of CBD. We’ll also explain some of the health benefits from eating oats and hemp.

Bring the benefits of hemp and oats together in hemp oatmeal

Oats are some of the healthiest grains available. They provide health benefits like weight loss, lower blood sugar, and even reduce the risk of heart disease.

Having a balanced nutrient composition, oats are high in fiber and carbs, and are loaded with many important vitamins and minerals. Only half a cup of oats contains 51 grams of carbohydrates, 13 grams of protein, 5 grams of fat, 8 grams of fiber, with only 303 calories! This makes oats a super nutrient-dense food, providing you with a good ratio of nutrition to calories. In addition, oats are rich in antioxidants, can lower cholesterol levels, and lowers blood sugar. To add on to all of that, oats are very satiating and don’t require a lot to make you feel full.

Hemp, of course, is high in plant-based protein, contain good fats, and are also nutrient-dense. One ounce of hemp seeds contains nine grams of protein, twelve grams of fat, and two grams of fiber. It also contains all twenty amino acids and all nine of the essential amino acids which our bodies do not produce naturally.

Hemp is also extremely easy to incorporate into your diet through the use of hemp hearts (shelled hemp seeds) and hemp oil. We commonly sprinkle hemp hearts into our food and smoothies; you can even mix chia and flax seeds with hemp hearts to create a trifecta of plant-based nutrition.

CBD offers a wide-range of health benefits as well, most notably it’s anti-inflammatory properties and the calming effect it can have on your body. Coming in as an oil or tincture, it’s easily incorporated into liquids in your dishes or even in your water.

Ministry of Hemp’s Ultimate Hemp Oatmeal recipe

Serves: 1

Prep time: 5 minutes

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup of oats
• 1 cup of almond milk
• 1 tablespoon brown-sugar
• 1 tablespoon shelled hemp hearts
• 1 tablespoon chia seeds
• 1 tablespoon flax seeds
• Fruit or berries and additional hemp hearts as a garnish
• Your favorite CBD tincture

Preparation

• dd all dry ingredients in a microwave-safe bowl
• Microwave for 2 minutes on high setting
• Top with more hemp seeds and mix in CBD tincture
• Can also top with fruits such as blueberries, bananas, or strawberries. We also love adding peanut butter.

The post Ultimate Hemp Oatmeal: Supercharge Your Mornings With Hemp appeared first on Ministry of Hemp.

Look for Chef Sebastian at the Texas Hemp Convention next week in Dallas, where we hope to try a few of his infused treats. About the convention, the chef told us:

I’m super excited to be part of the Texas hemp convention, helping to educate new states about cannabis and hemp as they become medically and recreationally available to the public.

It is vitally important and necessary to me as an award winning, nationally recognized farm-to-fork chef that has been cooking with cannabis since the early 90’s to let people know that there is more to consuming hemp and cannabis than in candy form made with sugar. I’m educating the general public about clean cannabis consumption through food as my primary focus.

Eat your greens!

Using hemp or cannabis bacon fat

Over the years I have infused cannabinoids into a tremendous amount of things, from high octane alcohols, to MCT oil, grapeseed oil, hemp seed oil, creamery butter, coconut oil, and extra virgin olive oil.

But the most exciting of all the fats I have use to help bind to all of the readily available cannabinoids in cannabis has got to be bacon fat. Preferably rendered from heritage bread pork belly smoked over applewood, or what other folks call bacon.

I realize that 99% of the previously mentioned fats and oils are plant derived but according to an article I read in the June 1, 2016 issue of High Times Magazine, bacon fat is one of the top three fats to use when extracting the cannabinoids and terpenes found in cannabis and hemp.

First off, I couldn’t be happier when I heard the results of the study on bacon fat and cannabinoids. Secondly, I had no frickin’ idea that there was such a study. As a professional chef of over 25 years who has been proudly cooking with cannabis since the early 90’s, cannabis bacon fat only made sense.

So over the years I have transformed this super simple, traditional peanut butter cookie recipe that has floated around the family cookie archives for decades to include a couple of full spectrum cannabis products that will help mellow situations and liven up the conversation at any event (cannabis tends to do that). Do not skip the light sprinkle of sea salt flakes, it’s a palette pleasing addition.

(and just to help clear up any future questions that may appear in my in-box, duck fat works just as well)

Recipe: Cannabis Bacon Fat Peanut Butter Cookies

Prep time: 15 minutes

Cook time: 10 minutes

Servings: about 24 cookies

Total Cannabinoids: Depends in potency of products used

Equipment

• Stand mixer or handheld mixer
• 2 stainless mixing bowls
• Measuring cups + spoons
• Rubber spatula
• Parchment lined baking sheet,
• Spatula,
• Wire rack

Editor’s Note: You can use the old fashioned, double boiler method to create infused bacon fat and vanilla, but Chef Sebastian recommends using the MagicalButter MB2e.

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup cannabis bacon fat
• 1/2 cup crunchy peanut butter
• 1 cup dark brown sugar
• 1 tsp cannabis vanilla
• 1 large farm egg
• 1 1/2 cups Al-Purpose Flour
• 1 tsp Baking Soda
• 1/2 tsp Kosher Salt
• 1 tbsp Jacobsen sea salt flakes
• 1/2 cup chopped salted peanuts
• 1 drop True Terpenes Beta Caryophyllene

Directions

• Preheat an oven to 350°.
• In the bowl of a stand mixer or in a stainless bowl with an electric mixer, beat the bacon fat, peanut butter, peanuts and sugar until the mixture lightens in color and the mixture becomes creamy (2 to 3 minutes).
• Add the egg and terpenes, keep beating until completely incorporated.
• In a separate bowl, combine the flour, baking soda, and kosher salt.
• Slowly add the flour mixture to the peanut butter mixture, mixing until all of the ingredients are combined well.
• Roll the dough into balls about 1 inch around. place the cookie dough about 1 inch apart on a parchment lined baking sheet and gently press the top of each cookie dough ball with a fork dipped in granulated sugar to make a crisscross pattern.
• Sprinkle the cookie tops with the sea salt flakes.
• Bake the cookies for 9 to 10 minutes, until barely browned around the edges. Do not overbake the cookies. The cookies may appear slightly puffed, but it’s all good, they are ok.
• Let the cookies cool on the baking sheet for 5 minutes.
• Then carefully transfer the dank ‘n delicate cookies to a wire rack to cool completely before devouring.

The post Cannabis Bacon Fat Peanut Butter Cookies (Recipe) appeared first on Ministry of Hemp.

We’re right in the middle of summer! What better way to cool down & relax than a refreshing drink? That hot weather inspired this delicious CBD strawberry limeade.

Our recipe is quick & easy to make and delicious!

Quick note from our video producer: Please note that I misspoke about the dosage! It’s not 600mg, 2 droppers is equivalent to 20mg. As I was filming I was thinking about the number 300 and mixed it up.

Remember to subscribe to the Ministry of Hemp on YouTube to get our latest hemp videos!

CBD Strawberry Limeade Recipe

Prep time: 15 minutes, plus time to chill

Servings: Makes 2 servings

Ingredients

• 1/3 cup of sugar
• 1/3 cup of water (for simple syrup)
• 1/2 lb sliced strawberries
• 20 – 30 fresh mint leaves, washed
• 1/2 cup lime juice, the fresher the better!
• CBD Oil (such as Elixinol 300mg CBD Hemp Oil)
• Topo Chico (or other sparkling or still water) for the lemonade

Preparation

• Combine sugar and water in a pan over medium heat to make simple syrup. Stir for 5-10 minutes until sugar is dissolved.
• Combine simple syrup with other ingredients.
• Chill in the fridge for 2-3 hours.
• CBD oil can be added before chilling or when serving.
• Stir well and enjoy CBD strawberry limeade!

This video was sponsored by our friends at Elixinol. Get your own Elixinol 300 mg CBD tincture.

Read more about sponsored content on Ministry of Hemp.

More CBD cooking recipes

• Cranberry Sparkling CBD Cocktail
• Homemade CBD Hot Cocoa
• Ministry of Hemp Podcast: Eat, Drink & Be Hempy!
• Our Favorite CBD Cocktails

The post Easy CBD Strawberry Limeade Recipe: A Refreshing & Relaxing Summer Drink appeared first on Ministry of Hemp.

The protein smoothie, widely renowned as the fitness-junkie’s go-to meal, can be much more than just your daily dose of protein. The protein smoothie can actually be a highly-customizable tool used in your daily nutrient intake. Given the right ingredients, the smoothie can be tasty, filling and nutritious.

Below, we’ll take a deeper dive into the anatomy of the protein smoothie and how hemp can supercharge an already near-perfect food.

The power of the hemp protein smoothie

If you haven’t figured out by now, we absolutely love the protein smoothie. Possibly the biggest reason for that love is the aspect of its customizability.

No matter what diet or macro-nutrient mix you’re actively trying, there is a protein smoothie recipe for it. You can also achieve your macro-goals by adding in green superfoods (kale, spinach etc.) to add a healthy dose of micro-nutrients that most people forget about. Not only can you customize your nutrient intake, but you can also customize the taste of the smoothies.

As a platform, the protein smoothie can pretty much accommodate the tastes of anyone. You can make classic flavor profiles like banana & peanut butter, or you can go off the wall and make your flavor combos. My weirdest smoothie to date was a blueberry & ginger flavored one.

Finally, we love the hemp protein smoothie because it can serve as a meal replacement. All too often, we find that “health oriented” recipes tend to produce dainty meals that leave us wanting for more. While protein smoothies can certainly be made ‘light,’ they are, for the most part, thick and filling meals.

Not just protein, hemp nutrition

The final part of our smoothie equation is protein. More specifically, hemp-based protein powder. This will give us is an easy-to-integrate powder, while giving us all the protein that traditional whey protein gives. Hemp protein may be more digestible than other proteins, especially other plant proteins.

The difference comes in the origin of the protein. Not only is it a plant-based protein, which is awesome for vegetarians or vegans, but it obviously has all the added benefits of hemp. Hemp-based protein powder is perfect for those who still want their protein intake, while taking advantage of hemp’s super-food qualities. Hemp is packed with essential fatty acids and essential amino acids. It’s also a great source of vitamins, minerals, and fiber.

Ministry of Hemp’s Easy Hemp Protein Smoothie Recipe

Prep time: 5 minutes

Servings: 1

Ingredients

• 10 ice cubes
• ¼ cup blueberries & strawberries
• 1 scoop of hemp-based protein
• 1 tablespoon of hemp hearts
• 1-2 tablespoons of organic honey
• ½ cup of almond milk

Preparation

1. Put all ingredients into blender
2. Blend into desired consistency (change amount of ice & milk to change thickness)
3. Pour & enjoy!

The post Easy Hemp Protein Smoothie Will Start Your Day Off Right appeared first on Ministry of Hemp.

This easy hemp recipe only takes 5 minutes to prepare. Our No Bake Hemp Energy Balls are both vegan and healthy!

We love hemp hearts, or hulled hemp seeds, for all their amazing hemp nutrition. This is a delicious, fun recipe you can throw together in minutes and have on hand whenever you get hungry.

No Bake Hemp Seed Energy Balls (Easy Hemp Recipe)

Prep Time: 15 minutes

Servings: Makes 10 energy balls

Ingredients

• 1 cup quick oats
• 1/4 cup dark chocolate chips
• 1/4 cup shredded coconut
• 1/4 cup raw hemp hearts
• 1/4 cup maple syrup (or honey)
• 1/2 cup peanut butter

Preparation

• Stir ingredients together in a bowl until thoroughly mixed.
• Roll mixture into balls.
• Chill balls on tray in fridge for 10 – 20 minutes, or until serving.

The post Easy Hemp Recipe: No Bake Hemp Energy Balls appeared first on Ministry of Hemp.

With the rise of Starbucks in the ‘70s and the more recent rise of local 3rd wave coffee shops, cold brew coffee has become commonplace in millennial Instagram stories worldwide. Providing an easy-to-drink, smooth and crisp coffee beverage, it’s no surprise to see the cold brew become so popular.

While awesome on its own, a benefit that cold-brew carries from its hotter cousin is the innate ability to serve as a perfect canvas for other flavors, sugars, milks and syrups. This is where we insert the hemp seed oil part of this equation; a nutrient-dense oil that is easily integrated into all kinds of beverages, it can not only provide a nutritional boost but also tastes great.

While lots of people add coconut oil or even butter to coffee, we think hemp seed oil is a better choice. We’ve even seen at least one commercial hemp seed oil coffee on the market. However, our hemp oil cold brew is easy to make, and it’ll help you get through your stressful workday.

THE BENEFITS OF THE COFFEE BEAN

While coffee is good for improving athletic performance & liver health and even reduces the risk of diabetes, cold-brewed coffee brings with it a separate set of benefits. When the coffee grounds are steeped overnight (and sometimes even longer), the chemical composition of the drink changes. More specifically, the phytochemicals contained in coffee beans (which in turn contain antioxidants) stay preserved within the coffee. Normally these phytochemicals are burned away when exposed to high temperatures in the traditional preparation methods of coffee and in the roasting process, but when you use the cold-brew method paired with a light roast coffee bean, these antioxidants stay intact (for the most part).

Another benefit of cold brewed coffee is its lower caffeine content. Now, this may sound counter-intuitive to the ethos of coffee, but trust me, if you drink coffee for pleasure then cold brew is perfect for you. If you get easily wired from coffee, but you still crave the taste of coffee, try cold brew. With its lower caffeine content, you can drink cold brew multiple times throughout the day while mitigating those unwanted caffeine highs and lows.

With drastically different tasting notes than traditional coffee, cold brew is great at bringing out the individual tasting notes of the coffee bean, while also giving you a cool rush of flavor with every drink. Perfect as a canvas for other flavors or simply a refreshing coffee drink on a sweltering summer day.

WHY YOU SHOULD MAKE HEMP SEED OIL COFFEE

Hemp seed oil’s benefits are similar to hemp seeds. Pressed hemp seed oil has a myriad of health benefits such as anti-inflammatories, fatty acids, and Gamma-linoleic acid (GLA). Hemp seed oil also provides more valuable antioxidants.

The most important of this bunch is arguably the GLA contained in the oil. Not only does it reduce inflammation, but GLA is essential in regulating blood pressure, heart pressure and even obesity. In terms of macro-nutrients, hemp-seed oil gives you a nice nutrient boost while providing a source of good fats.

Plus, we just love the flavor of hemp seed oil coffee. We think you’ll love the way it brings out the earthy, nutty flavor of cold brew coffee.

MINISTRY OF HEMP’S HEMP OIL COLD BREW RECIPE

Prep time: 8-20 hours

Servings: 8

Ingredients

• 8 ounces whole light roast coffee beans (pro tip: look for a roasting date on the package for freshness and overall quality, coffee makers who put roasting dates on their packaging are usually higher quality)
• 8 cups water
• 2-3 tea spoons hemp-seed oil
• ½ cup of hemp seeds
• Sweetener is optional. We love this coffee black.

Preparation

1. Use a coffee-grinder to grind the coffee (you’ll want to use a larger grind, meaning keep the coffee similar to the texture of raw sugar).
2. Combine the coffee-hemp seed mix with water into a large jar or pitcher. Mix in the hemp-seed oil at this point (this will allow the oil and coffee to mix while it steeps overnight).
3. Gently stir to incorporate it into the water. Five ‘stirs’ should be good.
4. Cover and place in the fridge overnight. Steeping the mixture for longer means a more potent concentrate.
5. Strain the coffee via cheesecloth or paper towel. DO NOT squeeze the coffee grounds as that will release bitter tasting notes (Paper filters not recommended as they tend to rip and make a huge mess).
6. Put into resealable container.
7. Drink and enjoy! This recipe creates a strong coffee concentrate that you can mix with water to taste, but 1:1 is a good starting point. You can add more hemp oil per serving of coffee if you want.

The post Hemp Seed Oil Coffee: How To Make Hemp Oil Cold Brew At Home appeared first on Ministry of Hemp.

After launching her hemp business with her husband, Maxine Woodhouse didn’t want to concentrate on products she felt were already being done, like oil and protein power.

So she chose something that would stand out – hemp beeswax food wraps.

Available in funky retro tie dyed colors, which makes them perfect for a dinner party, you might say they really are the bees’ knees of food wraps.

“We decided we wanted to have something different because we want our business to be a bit unique from everyone else, so we went ‘okay what if we dyed them and dipped them and we get our beeswax’,” Maxine Shea, co-founder of Australian-based business Hemp Collective and Fields of Hemp, told us.

LOCAL BEESWAX & HEMP COMBINE FOR SUSTAINABLE HEMP FOOD WRAPS

The locally made wraps, which can be purchased online, are all-natural, anti-bacterial and anti-fungal, water-resistant and sustainable.

The beeswax is sourced locally and infused with organic coconut oil and pine tree resin from the Byron Bay community in northern NSW, not far from where Shea and her husband and business co-founder Mike have a hemp farm for industrial use.

“People go ‘oh is it farmed from bees that are being harmed’ and we went ‘well no the bee keepers look after their bees,’” Maxine said.

With a background that includes studying and teaching about waste education, the product also fits in with the ethos of the couple and their business.

“We came up with the hemp beeswax wrap because we’re trying to eliminate plastic within our business. I come from that zero waste (belief) and also moving forward I think it’s important to do that for society,” Maxine said.

“There’s so much going on with plastic at the moment that it is an unsustainable product and it is killing a lot of wildlife, so the beeswax wraps made sense.”

Perfect for storing food and keeping produce fresh – from vegetables and fruits to flowers to kids’ lunches – the list of uses for the wraps is endless, say the Hemp Collective.

The biodegradable wraps, which can be moulded into a pouch or cone (no pun intended) are also easy to use, are water-resistant, and are easy to wash.

FROM HEMP FOOD WRAPS TO HEMP PAPER: HEMP IS WHERE WE ARE

Following their launch, the Hemp Collective unveiled their hemp paper and hemp business cards.

“I couldn’t find any hemp business cards. I thought ‘no one’s actually making them in Australia’,” the entrepreneur said.

“We went ‘okay you know what we could actually do wedding invitations, we could do all sorts of things with it.’ But the business cards were what we started out with.”

The fact that it’s a premium product again sets it aside from the others that do exist, Maxine said.

The Hemp Collective’s soaps come in myrtle, activated charcoal, lavender oil, peppermint and eucalyptus, and oatmeal flavors. Ingredients include organic cold pressed coconut oil, purified water, Australian hemp seed oil, and organic unrefined shea butter.

“There’s probably seven ingredients in there and it’s all either organic or Australian,” Maxine said.

Next up they will launch their hemp shampoo and conditioner bar range. A healing balm is also in the pipeline.

The main concern for their products, Mike said, is that they are producing high quality.

“We made sure that we got not just any coconut oil, we made sure that it either came from a sustainable source but also good quality,” he says.

“The same with the shea butter.”

MAKING HEMP FANS IN AN AUSTRALIAN TOURISM HOT SPOT

The couple’s business is based in the small town of Mullumbimby, not far from the tourist hot spot Byron Bay, with a wall of hemp that the community helped make for their office.

“We said we’re going to build this hemp wall. Ten people (said) ‘oh we’ll come and help’,” Maxine said.

“We hand harvested that hemp. The community has been amazing around here.”

The couple, who have been together for 17 years, were based in New Zealand, where they had a distribution company, before they moved to Australia in 2017.

Maxine had earlier given birth to the couple’s son who was diagnosed with a severe form of eczema. Maxine was later diagnosed with a brain tumor, a type that affects only one to two per cent of people. In New Zealand, they were given some CBD oil.

“When we came over here, we did a whole change and we looked at hemp and went yeah, I think there’s something in this,” Mike said.

“And then the food law changed (in November 2017) and that’s when we thought ‘well this is what’s going to get the wheels moving for the hemp industry.’”

The couple say they have recurring customers and their main customers are probably mostly female, but their ages are different.

“The soap gets an older demographic whereas we feel like shampoo bars and conditioner bars are going to be good for that travellers 18 – 35 type age groups where they’re kind of on the move,” Maxine said.

“It’s perfect for travel, you just shove it in your bag. You don’t have to carry all these big bottles.”

“Artists are loving the paper.”

HOPES FOR HEMP’S FUTURE IN AUSTRALIA

Maxine said there’s also some exciting things happening “behind the scenes”.

“We really want to start getting some infrastructure happening around the region, farmers growing but growing so they’re actually going to get better yields and outputs and also money because farmers are always struggling,” she said.

She said the Australian hemp industry was “stifled due to a range of different things”.

“It’s stifled due to thought process the fact that there’s stigma around the products,” Maxine said.

“Australia is behind due to its crazy policies.”

Maxine said her vision for the hemp community in Australia was one where people could collaborate but every single person could still have a niche within their business that sets them, their story, and their product apart.

“If everyone can work together you’ve actually got a bigger way of talking to government and getting things changed,” she said.

The post Hemp Food Wraps: Sustainable Food Covering As A Substitute For Plastic appeared first on Ministry of Hemp.