Making scrumptious cannabis items
Does THC have a flavor, and if so, how do producers of cannabis-infused foods and beverages decide which flavors to use? Jay Denniston gives thoughtful answers to these and many other issues in an interview with Joshua Minchin.
It is easy to overlook that a great deal of research and labor goes into making cannabis-infused food and beverage items taste nice, among all the talk about laws, production challenges, and even product promises. Joshua Minchin of New Foods chatted with BellRock Brands’ Chief Scientist Jay Denniston, who owns the well-known American cannabis beverage company Dixie Elixirs, to find out more about flavor in the cannabis food and beverage industry.
First things first, Jay: Is there a taste to THC?
Jay Denniston (JD): I would think that THC has very little, if any, flavor in and of itself. However, if flavor perception is what we’re discussing, then I’d say it evokes bitterness.
The other ingredients in THC oil provide the majority of its flavor. In an oil that contains 90% THC, for instance, there would be 10% of other ingredients! That 10% of other “stuff” is where the majority of the flavor originates. The taste that people would describe as earthy, grassy, or nutty comes from those other components, which can include things like chlorophyll [a green pigment found in plants]. THC provides that physical experience of bitterness and stringency.
Chlorophyll is present in many extracts, which is why they have a green color. I’ve never tried THC that is 100% pure because of its chemical makeup, which makes it incredibly challenging to produce in a lab.
JD: We usually cover up certain flavors in our goods at Dixie Elixirs. This is because our brand is intended for a broad audience and we are a recreational one. We employ popular flavors that people are accustomed to. With Dixie Elixir goods, we’re not aiming for the ultra-cannabis aficionado; instead, we have other items in our portfolio targeted at that market.
We employ fruit flavors like berry lemonade, cherry limeade, and fruit punch in addition to strong flavors like root beer. We utilize a lot of citrus because it is actually one of the most well-known cannabis “maskers.” We use a small amount of lemon in our flavor profiles since it engages customers immediately and helps to mitigate any negative effects later on.
Another crucial ingredient in reducing bitterness is sugar. The decision to add sugar or not is a big one for makers of edibles because adding sugar will require a significant amount of work.
Manufacturers have two options when it comes to masking and producing new flavors: they can utilize flavor modifiers or maskers. Additives known as flavor modifiers have the ability to weaken flavor characteristics. While flavor maskers only serve to enhance a flavor, they work directly on your tongue.
Because it has a very pleasant, well-balanced flavour and helps to reduce a lot of the sharpness and bitterness, vanilla is frequently employed in modification. In our masking operations, we employ flavor modifiers, maskers, and flavorings in addition to varying sugar ratios.
How challenging is it to make delicious edibles while honoring product claims?
JD: Let’s talk about Rebel Coast, one of our other brands. We make four distinct flavors of seltzer in addition to wine. It was decided to move on without adding sugar to that product range, thus it now has zero calories, zero carbs, and zero sugar. Now that you’ve limited my product creation toolkit with those product claims, you’ve really lifted the ante. I can’t utilize sugars like sucrose, fructose, galactose, or maltose if I want to employ sweetness to cover up flavor, for example.
To try to balance that flavor, you would need to put more masker on the five and more sweetener on the ten, for instance, if the beverage has five milligrams compared to ten milligrams. It’s a challenging challenge!
Furthermore complicating matters are other features of the product. For instance, the majority of gummies are created with gelatin, so you might want a vegan option. Thus, we require a vegan substitute for gelatin; how can we do this? Even fish-based gelatine, which is obviously not vegan but rather pescatarian, is too costly for us to use in the production of a pescatarian-suitable product.
This only serves to highlight the need for me to be knowledgeable about every choice as a product formulator. I occasionally find myself in a difficult spot, therefore I best have every tool in my arsenal ready! To meet the claims we make about our products, I require all of my additives, modifiers, stabilisers, and preservatives.
How do you choose the flavors that you want to use?
JD: Upon joining Dixie Elixirs seven years ago, I made contact with numerous prominent flavor companies. I picked one that was headquartered in San Diego, and I arranged for two of its officials to come to Denver and join us in the lab.
Regulations prevented us from conducting infused testing, but we were able to conduct eight hours of daily uninfused flavor testing for a week. With the help of that flavor manufacturer’s substantial sales data, we were able to identify popular flavors for various regions and age groups, such as millennials and Generation X.
Thus, we did not only focus on cannabis-related products—that is not what I wanted at all. I’d like to
As an illustration, hibiscus and elderberries are in right now’s enormous demand; this is why we have a lemon elderberry gummy.
I greatly depend on our flavor firms; we conduct weekly flavor reviews and inquire about the newest, cutting-edge flavor with them. I communicate with them on a weekly basis. How is the market doing in Colorado? How is the market doing nationwide?
I want people to just think about THC as a component found in some grocery store products. I want more for [our goods] than just dispensaries to carry them going forward. I would like a customer to select one of our goods from a dispensary and take up a