one on one

ONE on

with Dave Owens / culinary director, Proper Cannabis

Has your methodology changed since you started making cannabis candies? I really felt that these products – particularly the chocolates and gumdrops – should be delicious and just so happen to have cannabis in them. So, my methodology is just start with ideas of flavors and start a big spreadsheet with those items, noodle on it, narrow it down, talk to the team and see what resonated with them, and then I went back to start making samples after that.

Cannabis products can sometimes have a “green” or “hashy” flavor. Is that the case with Honeybee Edibles? We’re using what’s called distillate, which is a highly refined liquid version of THC, so it doesn’t have as much flavor impact. We’re using flavorful ingredients – chocolate is very flavorful, and the real fruit in the gumdrops is also very flavorful – [which] overshadow any real cannabis taste. So that ended up not being a problem for us.

WrITTen By KASey CArlSOn / PHOTOGrAPHy By SPenCer PernIKOff

Dave Owens has been working with chocolate for years, but his most recent creations have an extra special ingredient: cannabis. After 12 years as chief chocolatier at Bissinger’s Handcrafted Chocolatier, Owens made the move to the medical marijuana industry. Now, as the culinary director of Proper Cannabis, he has developed a line of marijuana-infused edibles dubbed Honeybee Edibles, which offers products that are as delicious as they are therapeutic. The chocolate bars, gumdrops and microdosed mints utilize both THC and CBD from cannabis plants grown at Proper’s St. Louis-area facility to ease patients’ pain and relieve stress. Right now, you still need a medical marijuana card to buy the confections, but Owens is laying the groundwork for chef-driven edibles in Missouri.

How do you determine how much cannabis to put in each confection? Dosing – that’s the interesting part. What happens is, we get a lab test on the distillate, it tells us the concentration of THC, CBD and other cannabinoids, and that tells me how much volume to put in. Then [each product] goes to the lab, where it’s tested for potency along with some other things. That [test] comes back and tells us, OK, did we hit the mark? Patients are expecting a certain amount for their medication, so it’s important that we hit the mark; we’d rather be a little bit heavy than a little bit light.

Right now, what is the most exciting part of your position at Proper Cannabis? Getting these products in front of our patients is what’s really exciting me. At the end of the day, we’re really trying to produce fine confections for folks who have a need for medical cannabis. I really want everyone to have an experience where they enjoy what they’re consuming and it’s not just medicinal. The best thing I’ve heard [so far] is someone said they were so good that they couldn’t eat just the one that they needed.

honeybee-edibles.com

products to try from Proper

Cannabis

Made with real fruit, Honeybee gumdrops are so good that the black cherry cola flavor outsold smokable cannabis at the launch of Proper’s medical dispensary. Other flavors include sour raspberry lemonade and mango-chile. Honeybee chocolate bars come in six flavors. The strawberry crunch with white chocolate, for instance, has 100 milligrams of THC, while the blood orange and candied hazelnut with dark chocolate has 20 milligrams of THC and 100 milligrams of CBD.

Proper’s ratio tablets, or “microdosed mints,” have 2.5 milligrams of THC to help patients achieve a balanced feeling. They’re what the company refers to as an anywhere, anytime solution for those who want to dose low and slow.