Making Tinctures

[buz]

I want to try my hand at tinctures and have read some and found a recipe involving a crock pot and another recipe involving long term storage. I have a question if anyone is up on this.

I'm going to use a vegetable glycerin. I'm wondering, if the recipe calls for a half ounce of trim and 2 cups of glycerin, does that mean that the '2 cups' will become saturated using that amount of herb so don't use more herb? I mean, can you use more herb and make stronger tinctures?

[Dutchman1]

Two cups of trim to two cups of glycerin is a little bit weak in my opinion. I use 190 proof alcohol ( 150 can be substituted) Break up buds loosely Then I decarboxylate.. Then I put two cups of broken up buds in a mason jar in the freezer along with the alcohol.After they attain a stable temperature I pour alcohol into mason jar and let sit ONLY overnight. Shake occasionally Filter through a coffee filter then reduce the volume by 3/4 by simmering the container in a bath of water. I put a facecloth folded a few times in the bottom of the pan so the Pyrex Measuring cup I boil my tincture in doesnt come in direct contact with the pan bottom. Alcohol fumes are explosive so a fan and good air flow are imperative. Dont make this on a flame burner only flat top stoves. When it reduces down from 16 ounces to 4 or 5 I let it cool then add an equal amount ( 4 or 5 OZ ) of glycerin and a little food grade fllavoring and your done. This method produces a golden oil with alot less harsh taste.Trim can be used just add a third more and boil it down a little further. You can also use the crockpot method but I would use more than two cups ( say 4 ) in cheescloth then slow cook in the glycerin. Know that glycerin is not the best avenue to get trichomes to dissolve into. Alcohol is the best , then oils ( like olive oil), then honey or glycerin.

[buz]

Good info Dutchman1, thanks for the reply.

[Jason]

I use 1 oz of EverClear (189 in my state) to one gram of decarbo'd flower. I let the alcohol/flower mixture sit at room temp for a couple of hours. Strain into a cup measure, then press and strain the flower with a garlic press. Resulting Golden Tiger can be rather potent. With my current home grown, 5 ml to 15 ml is more than enough for most of my friends.
No cooking alcohol, no freezing, no multi filtering (which can lose a lot of your liquid).
If I wanted to use vegetable glycerin instead of EverClear I would probably let the flower soak in it for a day or two at room temp. Or less time if heated. I would not re heat in a crock pot up to decarbo temps.
I've tried the glycerin in crock pot for hours to decarbo and to make the tincture. I was not very satisfied.
The EverClear soak/strain method works well and is predictable. Although you do have to deal with consuming a bit of very strong alcohol. Try mixing with V8 or another favorite drink.
OR you can take Golden Tiger and evaporate it down to goo. Put the goo in a gel cap and consume. Did that and it worked. Takes a good hour to kick in.
For the same amount of material and effects, the liquid EverClear/Golden Tiger is the most repeatable method I've used.

You can also use EverClear to soak leaves and trim for vaping stuff. Let it soak in a plastic sandwich bag for a day or two. Strain and let evaporate in a Teflon BHO platter . it will look like tar. Now vape.

[GreenDragonRon]

So many ways to try.

I've done the decarbed flower and Everclear soak before; I used 12 grams in 3oz of Everclear. Tough to determine potency cause I used a 2:1 strain and I always take it before bed.

Next I'm going to make dry ice hash, decarb it and then soak the hash/kief in Everclear. I will also reduce some of that mixture and dilute it with fractionated coconut oil and sunflower lecithin.

[gbauto]

Hello, Buz.
I've made a few batches of Green Dragon-cold wash ethanol. It makes a potent oil but it does strip alot of chlorophyll into the solution and it does taste pretty funky. I make CCO caps for my pain management-30g of flower steeped in 250ml of coconut oil in a rice cooker. Strain and put up in OO gel caps-works very well for me.

[buz]

I appreciate all the ideas when it comes to alt means of consumption, gives me lots to work with.

[Jason]

Hello, Buz.
I've made a few batches of Green Dragon-cold wash ethanol. It makes a potent oil but it does strip alot of chlorophyll into the solution and it does taste pretty funky. I make CCO caps for my pain management-30g of flower steeped in 250ml of coconut oil in a rice cooker. Strain and put up in OO gel caps-works very well for me.

When I do an EverClear soak on trim and leaves, the resulting Green Dragon is full of chlorophyll and everything else the alcohol will dissolve. Looks like tar when the alcohol is evaporated. We use that to vape.
As I don't decarb trim and leaves, this is only good for smoking.
When I decarb the flower for edible Golden Dragon, the roasted flower is pretty tan colored and the alcohol turns amber to golden/green colored. In my vodka/soda, it tastes like cheap gin.
A friend puts it in V8 and says he can hardly taste it.

[Grinder]

I use a similar method to others that have posted here. Decarb, place in everclear and freeze it. Shake it daily for 1 month. Strain and strain and strain. Heat a pot of water to just above the boiling point of alcohol and reduce the alcohol volume by 1/2. Bottle and enjoy.

[Dutchman1]

Only thing Id add is freeze decarbed cannabis and alcohol before you combine them. This traps all water which is not soluble in alcohol at below 32 degrees.Also I dont believe its necessary to soak for a month. Trichomes are very soluble in alcohol and Ive soaked for as little as 3 hours. I usually soak overnight though. I also do a " second wash after ive filtered the first batch by adding fresh alcohol to the now filtered cannabis to get a weaker but still effective tincture.

[buz]

What do you use to strain with. I see all these references to straining but don't know what is used.

[Grinder]

I use this for the first strain then combine with cheesecloth for 2 to 3 more straining.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0000VLZXU/ref=oh_aui_search_detailpage?ie=UTF8&psc=1

[GreenDragonRon]

I collected and decarbed a bunch of dry ice hash today and I took 25.5 grams of my decarbed 120 micron hash and I have it currently soaking in about a cup or so of Everclear. I plan on straining it tomorrow and diluting with fractionated coconut oil.

Can anyone suggest a volume of Coconut oil I should use?

[Dutchman1]

Are you going to reduce the amount of alcohol or no? It makes a difference in the amount of coconut oil you add.

[Dutchman1]

I would reduce the alcohol volume from one cup to 3 liquid ounces. Then add about 8 ounces of oil. Its going to be fairly strong where your using hash but everyone has his own potency preference so add more or less oil depending on what your looking for. When you start out trying it Id try 5-10 drops from an eye dropper first time and you'll
get an idea of where you stand potency wise.

[GreenDragonRon]

I reduced the alcohol mixture and added 500 mL of Fractionated coconut oil and 2 TBSP of Sunflower lecithin. I am continuing to heat the oil in a water bath at 202°F, I will take it out once the bubbles stop and alcohol is completely boiled off.

[tyler_ hobbyist]

I just made made it with vg and it took 60days. VG looses its solvency after 30days so u need to add ur vg in 2 stages. Stir it everyday and do not freeze it will become extreamly liquidy but if that happens then u can always cook it down to thicken it as gyclol thickens when the moisture is removed. I used 6g of bud and 1 cup of 90/10 and the strength came out at 7/10 atleast thats what 3 different people have told me lol it all depends on the strength of the bud going into it. Also vg breaks down the thc very slow thats why u need a long time but the "oil" came out very amazing!

[tyler_ hobbyist]

U can also make it with iso or alcohol but ur oil will come out dark like black, u can use butane but its a very carefull process that takes 4ish weeks if u want clear oil also depending how much ur makeing but in my opinion vg/pg oil is way better for the fact its sweeter smoother and it makes a huge cloud of smoke just like a cheech and chong video.

[Sammy]

Everclear, double boiler, hash oil got to love it 🙃

[buz]

Ok, so I just finished my first tincture, veg glycerin and about 1.3 oz of decent trim and a few small buds. I made it in the crockpot. I laid a cloth in the bottom and laid my jar on the cloth (now the lid will close), set it for 'low' and checked the temp, it stayed 140 deg's. 24 hrs later I cooled it and strained it through cheese cloth into a pint mason jar. Haven't tried it yet, soon enough. The finished product is still quite cloudy with sediment, what would I use to strain this a little finer?

[Aloner]

Good luck, I hope it works!

[buz]

Turns out the glycerin has too much body to pass through the coffee filter, so it's fine, just being picky.

[Aloner]

That's too bad. I just googled and cheesecloth looks like it. Maybe a second pass would help? Or maybe that's just more work and more loss of product : (