Ever wondered what the best way to enjoy your favorite herb is? You may have heard about inhaling marijuana — either by vaporizing or smoking — as the quickest way to get that ultimate high in no time, but those who love cannabis edibles argue that nothing beats the joy of eating cannabis-infused foods to achieve the most pleasurable yet relaxed state of mind.
We at Smokazon.com take these claims into closer details to help you, our cannabis aficionados choose which of the two options would work for you. So, would you rather vaporize your herbs or eat them together with your favorite cookies, brownies or main course? Let’s find out.
Eating Cannabis Edibles
How Orally Ingested Cannabis Works
Oral ingestion of cannabis has always been popular among those who use the herb to treat medical conditions. From cancer to epilepsy to even Alzheimer’s disease, these medical woes are just some of the reasons why users often resort to eating cannabis-infused foods, now popularly known as ‘edibles.’
The main difference between vaporizing and eating cannabis is that the orally ingested materials pass through the gastrointestinal tract and are then processed by the liver. This results in cannabis digested and broken down into its individual components and, as another effect of the chemical reactions in the digestive system, new compounds that are also equally potent as the original ones found naturally in the plant material. The effect of orally ingested cannabis takes effect the moment these components enter the bloodstream.
In the liver, THC is transformed into the more powerful 11-hydroxy-tetrahydrocannabinol. This newly formed byproduct of the digestive process poses stronger sedative effects. This means one good reason for patients suffering from pain or insomnia to use THC orally.
Because of the slow digestive process, the effects of THC and other cannabinoids start within 45 minutes to about 1 hour and 30 minutes. This may seem slow, but the potency of the digested cannabinoids would usually last between six to ten hours after eating cannabis.
How to Prepare ‘Edibles’
Edible cannabis usually comes in infused cookies, brownies, candies or any flour- or sugar-based food products. Because THC and other cannabinoids are fat soluble, ‘cannabutter,’ or cannabis-infused butter is the most popular way to introduce the herb into the edibles . At first glance, the cannabutter looks greenish because of the chlorophyll from the plant. And of course, edibles infused with marijuana offer unique flavor cannabis enthusiasts will surely enjoy. But if you prefer milder flavors, you can use hash oil for that less dense taste but with the same effects as raw cannabis.
When preparing cuisines infused with cannabis, you can always be more creative by balancing the amount of the herb or cannabutter and the calories that go with your cookies, candies, brownies or even vegetable salads.
For easy way of making it check out the MagicalButter!
Dosage for Cannabis Edibles
This is perhaps the trickiest part when ingesting cannabis through eating. Unlike vaporizing, eating cannabis results in all of the plant material gets ingested into the gastrointestinal tract, and that means all the potent compounds digested and introduced to your bloodstream. This means dosage results may vary among individual users, with some reporting milder effects with the same amount of plant material consumed by someone else experiencing nausea and other physical discomfort.
Now, this is where the danger lies especially with some users too impatient to feel the effects of eaten cannabis. Because the effects may take place between 45 to 90 minutes after ingesting the herb, others who cant wait try to increase the amount taken, in turn running into the danger of experiencing even more adverse effects of too much cannabinoids in the system.
To curb such effects, only gradually increase the intake after a full 90 minutes has passed since the last consumption of the herb or infused food items. This way, you can gradually monitor the effects of THC and other cannabinoids in your system. It is also important to note that different individuals experience different effects of the same amount of the active compounds found in cannabis.
Adverse Health Effects of Oral Cannabis Consumption
Taking cannabis doesn’t always perfectly whisk you into that ultimate high. Sometimes, proper care and attention must be made if the users starts feeling nauseous or begins to vomit. However, there are no known irreversible, fatal or long-term side effects of taking cannabis. This is, in fact, good news to all because almost all other drugs prove fatal when taken in unusually large amounts.
Overall Benefits of Oral Cannabis Intake
Eating is perhaps the safest way to consume cannabis because no heat or combustion is required, thus the absence of any chemical changes at the point of contact with fire.
Also, infusing marijuana into your food would make you less of a target by authorities in places where possession or use of this herb is still not legal. Who would arrest someone holding a piece of brownies for a snack? In other words, it is the most discreet way to experience the pleasures of cannabis in public — no cigarettes or vaporizers in plain sight.
Also, if you want longer lasting health benefits, you’d rather take cannabis orally than by any other means. This holds especially true for those who use it to treat certain medical conditions.
Downside of Orally Ingested Cannabis
Because dosage becomes unpredictable when eating cannabis, this may not be a good option especially to those who easily experience the effects of cannabinoids. These include nausea and even lack of appetite. And because the effects take time to build up and are longer lasting, eating cannabis is definitely not for recreational marijuana users, who simply want to experience the sudden highs by inhalation but not long enough to be disrupted with other daily routines.
And because the slow onset could leave some individuals into believing that they needed more of the herb, large intake could result in an even more magnified set of discomfort.
Because most of the edibles are mundane-looking cookies, candies or brownies, children might easily mistake them for pure treats. It’s important to note that the effects of cannabinoids, including THC, are more profound in children than in adults. So, extra care must be done in keeping these edibles away from children’s reach.
Vaporizing Cannabis
Technically, cannabis inhalation could mean vaporizing or smoking the plant material or any of its processed kind. But let’s focus more on the use of vaporizers mainly because of their better health benefits .
Unlike eating cannabis, inhaling it using a vaporizer offers quick delivery of THC and the other cannabinoids into the respiratory system and into the bloodstream. Now, this offers better therapy for those suffering from respiratory ailments such as asthma. Even those who suffer from pain as a result of chemotherapy or certain medical conditions easily benefit from inhaling cannabis. But those who get the most advantage are vaping enthusiasts, who intend to use marijuana for recreational purposes. The moment you inhale the vapor, you immediately feel the effects working in your system.
The Many Forms of Vaping Materials
You can vaporize cannabis in its dry, ground form or, for more potent effects, use hash oil, budder or any of the concentrates processed using the plant materials and solvents. Technically, you may choose to smoke the herb, but the toxic chemicals that result from burning the plant material would be comparable to that produced by burning tobacco leaves. That in turn could defeat the purpose of using cannabis to improve health or keep it at the optimum level.
So, if you really want to closely experience the level of high you get with smoking, you can use concentrates such as hash, kiefs, waxes and other forms of derivatives. These types of materials contain more of the active compounds rather than the cellulose-rich component of the original plant material.
Is Vaporizing Better than Smoking?
From a medical perspective, yes, we agree that vaporizing does offer good health effects to the body. Vaporizers use heating elements that get hot enough to release the active compounds from the cellulose material but not too hot to burn it. The result is pure vapor without the carcinogens, carbon monoxide and other toxins.
On the other hand, from a recreational perspective, smoking does offer quicker ‘fixes’ because of the convenience of lighting up a stick without having to do some preparations and waiting for heat up time. But overall, we’ve seen more benefits with using vaporizers than smoking.
Sure, many vaporizers come in hefty price tags, and some even priced as much as $600. And smoking cannabis, on the other hand costs only a roll of paper, a lighter and your ground plant material. But consider your health as your investment when thinking about the long-term benefits of vaporizing as compared with smoking.
That said, we at Smokazon recommend that smoking should not really be an option when you can get hold of vaporizers that are worth the buy (link to: http://blog.smokazon.com/top-5-quality-pen-vaporizers-100-and-theyre-worth-buy/ ). Talk about keeping our bodies healthy by freeing ourselves from the toxic effects of smoking.
So, in all, we say that vaporizing is better than smoking especially if we think long-term. In fact, newer technologies like sophisticated heating elements and filtration systems make sure that the vape you use produce only the purest of vapors without any foreign particulates coming from the parts inside the vape. That said, choose only brands and models with good reviews on quality, durability and vapor quality.
What’s the Best Vaporizer?
Well, it really depends on your lifestyle and personal preference. Do you often find yourself mobile or outdoors? Then a vape pen might be the right choice for you. At Smokazon, we offer only the best vape pens in the market that could range from being the most discreet to the best in vapor quality. Read our blog and know which vape pen you are.
Then come the portable vaporizers, which come in bigger sizes than the pen-style models but offer denser flavors with their larger herb chambers. And because they’re a tad wider to offer more room for electronics inside, they do offer more features like multiple temperature control settings and automatic timer settings.
For both pen-style and portable vaporizers, they are further classified into concentrate vaporizer or dry herb vaporizer category. However, the growing demand for versatility has given rise to models that could support concentrates and dry herbs in just one device. We even had some customers asking for vaporizers that could vaporize dry herbs and concentrates at the same time! But as of now, you can use these vapes for different materials one at a time.
A good all-in one vape is the Snoop Dogg G Pen Herbal Vaporizer (link to: http://www.smokazon.com/special-edition-g-pen-herbal-vaporizer-by-snoop-dogg ). We’ve heard good g Pen review thus far, and yes, we do offer it too!
Now, for those of you who love to get high at the comfort of your own home, choose desktop vaporizers instead. Yes, they need to be plugged to a constant power source to work, but that also means they command greater power and in return, produce the best flavors that are also fit in social settings.
Tabletop or desktop vaporizers usually come with whips, or long tubes with one end attached to the device and the other end attached to a mouthpiece. Other models, the rather more expensive ones, even allow a plastic bag — called balloon — to be inflated so you can carry it with you anywhere within your home without having to carry the rather heavy and bulky vaporizer.
Thus far, our best vaporizer in terms of craftsmanship and durability is the Volcano vaporizer, followed by the AroMed 4.0 vaporizer, which tops the list in terms of vapor quality. But these models come in hefty price tags. There are, however, more affordable ones like the Arizer Extreme Q or the Vapir Rise vaporizers. Models that do not support the balloon (without internal fan system) include the Arizer V Tower, Da Buddha and AroMed 4.0 vaporizers.
The Bottom Line
So, what really is the best way to enjoy cannabis? Would you eat it and wait for the effects to set off gradually, or would you rather inhale it using vaporizers?
It actually depends on how you intend to use cannabis. Will it help you alleviate your internal medical condition like cancer, seizures, glaucoma, multiple sclerosis or even Alzheimer’s? Then oral intake may be the best way to make sure your system digests and absorbs all active compounds from the plant material. The process may be a tad slower than inhalation, but the dosage is significantly higher. Just take some precautions when administering cannabis orally because the effects vary and can sometimes be unpredictably strong in some individuals.
On the other hand, are you the recreational marijuana user? Or, do you happen to lack the patience of waiting for the effects of THC to set in? Choose a good vaporizer and use it to vaporize your plant material or concentrates. The vapors quickly enter the bloodstream through your lungs, thus instantly delivering the effects THC and other cannabinoids. Also, the effects of inhaled cannabinoids easily wane down in about two to three hours.
So, for example, when you are in the office or at work and would want to take a few hits, do not eat cannabis-infused cookies or candies for a snack, only to be under its spell a few hours after, and making you lethargic or nauseated for several hours. But when you use a vaporizer, the effects are quick, and in two to three hours, your done and actively focused on your routines again. In the end, we want you to feel the joys of using cannabis without compromising your focus and your safety.
So, which cannabis aficionado are you? The edibles lover, or the vape goer? Share with us your thoughts by leaving a comment below.
What’s the Real Score? Vaporizing Vs. Eating Cannabis is a post from: The Ultra LifeStyle Blog | Smokazon.com