Nowadays, cooking is more popular than ever. Foodies are becoming more and more prevalent, and this trend includes cannabis users and aficionados. As a result, we now have a far better understanding of gastronomy. We have higher standards for the foods we eat and the way they are presented to us because we are more conscious of what is scrumptious and nutritionally sound.
Cannabis has made its way into haute cuisine restaurants using innovative culinary techniques, but only for recreational purposes. As a result, we can experience its organoleptic properties in a new sensory realm.
Prepare to start foaming dishes, smoking them with cannabis, adding terpenes, or utilizing the Roner sous-vide cooker and whipping siphon. This exhibition will arm you with the knowledge by fusing Chef Xavi Petit’s innovative and sophisticated food with the Hash Marijuana & Hemp Museum’s cannabis expertise.
Discover the chef’s cannabis-infused menu and have a culinary tour with cannabis.
Present-Day Cannabis Cuisine
The Hash & Hemp Marihuana Museum’s exhibition, Cannabis Cuisine, which was launched on April 20, 2017, at its Barcelona headquarters, is currently showing at the museum in Amsterdam. From December 1 until February 25, 2018, it is in effect.
The exhibition not only demonstrates the plant’s use as food throughout history but also looks at how sensory enjoyment of food and cannabis’ hallucinogenic effects have interacted historically.
The Hash & Hemp Marihuana Museum collaborated with creative private chef Xavi Petit to advance the experience and put it into action. This past October, Ana Rodriguez, the manager of the Barcelona Museum, gave a discussion at the World Cannabis Conferences 2017, which was part of Spannabis Madrid.
Attending that discussion was chef Xavi Petit. The two then had a fun and educational conversation about Petit’s work and Rodriguez’s innovative, modern culinary ideas for creating haute cuisine cannabis dishes.
Contrary to the widely popular and manufactured cookies and brownies, the plant is used in modern cooking in more ways than just as a recreational ingredient. It also extends beyond hemp, a superfood that is utilized in flour, oils, and other products.
The plant and its numerous variants provide us with a world of culinary options that enable us to create new flavors and scents in our dishes, especially in the present day thanks to the methods and equipment employed in modern cooking.
Also: Cannabis Oil: Health Benefits of Cannabis Oil, Uses and Its Side Effects
A Very Creative Private Cannabis Chef, Xavi Petit
When he uses cannabis in his meals, chef Xavi Petit represents all of the aforementioned aspects: the recreational use, the nutritional benefits, and the gastronomical delights, both visual and gustatory.
This agitated chef, who has a long history as a chef and business owner, has worked as a private chef in Ibiza for 7 years. He currently also owns and operates Marewa, a company that provides a variety of exclusive gourmet services on the island of Formentera, which is adjacent to Ibiza. Only a small portion of his work is related to cannabis cookery.
The logical next step is for a contemporary chef who has long used marijuana to further incorporate cannabis into his cooking. And Xavi actually did it.
He started to use his newly acquired knowledge in the dishes and recipes he was already preparing after learning how cannabis is altered by heat and how all of the organoleptic features of the plant could be extracted through a fat consisting of oil and alcohol.
Menu for Cannabis: Chef’s Recommendations
The chef obtains the raw materials for his cannabis-infused dishes from a number of associations in Barcelona with whom he has various partnerships.
There are different choices: guests can select to sample a single variety or many different flavors across the menu; a terpene can also be utilized to flavor the food. The use of THC and CBD might also vary from dish to dish.
The methods used are likewise very varied. Cannabis can be utilized as an oil infusion, and the chef will use the entire plant—including the stem and any leftovers—instead of just the flower. Petit employs the terpenes found in the plant’s fresh and dried leaves to flavor the food.
The chef and his staff examine all the cannabis used in cooking to determine how much to incorporate, for the security and comfort of all guests. The end effect is never the same because every plant is unique.
Every time cannabis is used in cuisine, the chef advises that it be checked before being consumed. This is crucial because cannabis consumption can result in stronger effects.
A beverage and an aperitif at the bar open each cannabis meal. With Xavi’s innovative, modern, and recreational cannabis cuisine, the delectable culinary and recreational experience for guests begins.
Here are some of the chef’s intriguing and delectable recommendations along with a brief explanation of some of the most popular contemporary cooking techniques:
Also: Types of Cannabis: Everything that You Want to Know!
Drink: Pina Calada (soaked Pineapple)
This variation of the well-known Pina Colada yields a quality cocktail. Lemongrass and fresh, vacuum-packed buds are added to the rum during the infusion process, which allows for a controlled temperature and no smell loss. To prevent the fresh buds from fermenting, the mixture is first infused at 55 degrees Celsius for one hour and then refrigerated for three days.
The chef demonstrates how to use a cooking thermos, also known as a Roner, which is currently available for a very reasonable price. In order to keep the vacuum-packed pineapple from losing its texture, the rum is then filtered and used to infuse it.
By eliminating the air and allowing the liquid to soak the fruit without altering its natural appearance, we create a vacuum with a liquid and a fruit.
A coconut milk foam that has been flavored with gelatin, leaves and coconut milk is served alongside the infused pineapple. The chef claims that the Roner is “extremely simple to use.” To dissolve the gelatine, the pineapple is heated to a temperature of around 70 to 80 degrees. After straining, it is placed in a whipping syphon and charged multiple times to create foam before being served.
While there are various kinds of vacuum food packaging equipment, sous-vide vacuum equipment produces the finest outcomes. Due to their size and considerable cost, these are solely intended for professional kitchens.
Vacuum cooking at low temperatures is done with a Roner. This widely utilized gadget was developed by the great Joan Roca and is frequently used by contemporary cooks. This method of cooking preserves the food’s natural structure.
The flavors are neither diluted or evaporated away. Food is cooked in its own juice, which enhances both the flavor of the food and the condiments used while preventing oxidation.
The whipping syphon, one of the most common kitchen tools nowadays, is also mentioned by the chef as another extremely simple and rapid method of aromatizing alcoholic beverages.
Everything is put directly into the syphon in this instance, and two quick charges are prepared—one to extract air, the other to extract liquids. All of the solids can be eliminated after there is no more air. The outcome is a fairly rapid aromatization that leaves a clean scent.
Happy Chicken Eggs as A Starter
This delectable beginning is made out of eggs cooked with sobrassada parmentier, crystallized honey, and sobrassada crumbs at a low temperature. The chef decarboxylates the cannabis bud or flower, which is the oldest and most fundamental process, to create this dish.
The flowers are well pulverized before being placed on a tray and baked for 30 to 40 minutes at a temperature between 115 and 120 degrees (not higher to prevent the cannabis from burning). THC and other cannabinoids, including those, are to be activated.
Two alternative strategies can be used to incorporate cannabis into various dish components, albeit the chef advises using just one technique every dinner. For instance, honey can be sous-vide packed at 80 degrees for about an hour and then infused with cannabis by adding soy lecithin, which increases the amount of emulsification and gives the honey a totally distinct texture. THC-infused honey is the end product.
Any sort of oil, butter, or fat can be utilized using the same method. For the sobrassada from Ibiza, which has a lot of fat, the chef separates it and gives it a cannabis infusion before adding it to the meat later. The end result was a sobrassada that appeared normal but had a “strange” flavor and effects.