An Introduction To Kief And Six Ways To Put It To Good Use

Smoking cannabis flower is an age-old and highly effective way to experience the psychoactive effects of THC. However, some smokers like to step things up a notch and opt for concentrates, refined versions of the active constituents of cannabis that make for a fast-acting and hard-hitting high.

What is Kief?

One such concentrated form of cannabis is known as kief, which is essentially trichome dust. Trichomes are tiny glands that occupy the flowers and leaves of cannabis plants, excreting a thick and sticky resin that houses molecules we know and love, such as THC, CBD, and many other cannabinoids and terpenes. Trichomes aren’t just there to provide humans with a psychoactive experience; they play an important role in the survival of plants. These small glands produce secondary metabolites that help protect plants against potential threats such as insects and high temperatures.

Creating kief involves detaching these small chemical factories from cannabis flowers and saving them up until a large quantity has been collected. This pile of trichomes can then be used in a multitude of ways to provide a potent high. Because the trichomes contain cannabinoids, kief offers a much more intense high than smoking cannabis flowers, where the smoke would normally contain combusted plant material and other less desirable molecules.

How to Collect Kief

Kief is a simple cannabis concentrate and doesn’t involve much preparation or work at all. The easiest way to harvest kief is from bone dry buds that have been properly dried and cured. Wet and incorrectly dried flowers will not grind up as well, meaning the trichomes will be harder to remove.

The typical way to start building a collection of kief is to use a grinder with multiple chambers, with three layers being ideal. These grinders feature an upper chamber, where the cannabis flowers are placed between metal or plastic teeth and ground up to a powder. The ground up particles then fall through small holes into the second layer where they are collected on top of a metal mesh. This ground plant matter is too big to pass through the mesh, however, the miniscule trichomes easily fall through to a kief chamber that resides below.

Over time, this bottom chamber will fill up with trichomes. Before long, you’ll have a mountain of trichomes ready to be used in whatever ways you wish.

What to Do With All This Kief?

Once you have built up a decent supply of kief, it’s time to decide how to use it. This trichome powder can be used in many different ways to provide a potent psychoactive high.

1. Load It Into a Joint

Kief can be used as a THC supplement when it comes to rolling joints. If you and your smoking buddies feel like it’s time to blast off, then reach for the kief jar and sprinkle a few pinches inside the joint before rolling. This will add some serious kick, and will be of particular assistance when the flower you’re smoking isn’t as potent as you’d hoped. Alternatively, the more creative joint engineers out there may wish to coat the outside of the joint in kief for an extreme aesthetic appeal. Douse the outside of the joint in wax, or simply lick it and roll it around on a plate full of kief.

2. Get Creative in the Kitchen

Kief can be infused into cannabutter, which can then be used in practically any recipe to provide a potent edible high. Kief cannabutter can be added to cakes, brownies, sauces, dressings, and a whole host of other options. Just remember the golden rule of cooking with cannabis: decarboxylation. Whatever you’re cooking, make sure to expose your cannabis to a temperature of 110ºC for 30–45 minutes first to convert THCA into psychoactive THC.

3. Make Some E-liquid and Vape It

Kief can be used to create some homemade e-liquid that can be loaded into a vape pen and used at home or discreetly whilst on-the-go. To make e-liquid, you’ll need to obtain some propylene glycol and vegetable glycerine, along with a coffee filter, a metal or glass bowl, a cooking pot, and some syringes.

Fill your pot with water and place your bowl on top of it to create a DIY double boiler. Then pour a 1:1 ratio of vegetable glycerine to propylene glycol into the boiler. Add your kief to the mix and turn up the heat to a boil. Wait for the mixture to melt and form a thick and smooth consistency. Then proceed to pour the mixture through the coffee filter into a container and let it cool. Fill up your syringes and you’re ready to load up your vape.

4. Turn It Into Rosin

Kief can be used to make your own supply of hash, considering you have saved up a good quantity of trichomes. To make this, you’ll need some parchment paper and an iron (hair straighteners can also be used). Place your kief within the parchment paper and fold it over. Press the paper with the heating device of your choice for a short period of time under heavy pressure, and watch a brown goo ooze across the paper. This resinous substance is ideal for loading into bong bowl or firing up on the dab rig.

5. Make a Sift-hash Stash

Hash made from kief is also known as dry-sift hash. This substance has a different consistency than normal hash and is more powdery and crumbly. The key to making hash is compressive force. This force can be applied via the use of a pressing machine or with bare hands. You'll need a fair amount kief to get started on this project, but once you have enough it's very easy to make. Fill a small plastic bag with your kief, roll it up tight, and tape shut. Next, wrap the package up tightly in 3 layers of newspaper and wet the newspaper once it's wrapped. Now, use a hair straightener and apply pressure to the package for a few seconds at a time until it’s properly compressed. Unwrap the package to unveil a compressed, clean block of kief hash.