The Dank Duchess

We had the privilege of speaking with The Dank Duchess on our podcast; That’s Dope.

The Dank Duchess is an internationally recognized cannabis cultivator and hash maker. She is also a fantastic writer and is the Managing Editor at SKUNK Magazine. We had a great conversation about the cannabis industry, global legislation reform, and of course hash!

Here are the top 8 things we learnt from The Dank Duchess!

1. She used to be anti-weed!
2. You should grow your own weed if you can
3. How you can get involved in the cannabis industry
4. The important responsibility budtenders have
5. Hash can be cured & aged
6. Her favorite strain is …
7. The method used to create hash can affect the outcome
8. We still need much more testing!

Let’s dive right in!

She used to be anti-weed!

Believe it or not, The Dank Duchess used to be anti-weed! Throughout her childhood, The Dank Duchess was exposed to lots of misinformation such as the Nancy Reagan “Just Say No!” propaganda. She was also afraid that weed could make her less intelligent.

It wasn’t until the Dank Duchess was 23 years old that she decided to try cannabis for the first time. After that one experience, The Dank Duchess quickly realised that the information she had been taught her whole life was a lie and this is where her journey began!

You should grow your own weed if you can!

If you can legally grow your own weed, you should! Growing your own weed takes the power away from large corporations that are using their resources to try and control the cannabis industry with substandard (even pesticide sprayed) industrial grows.

When we spoke about this, The Dank Duchess said “Don’t be hemmed up by everybody else, if you live somewhere where you can grow cannabis, grow your own. There is immeasurable wonder in providing your own self, your own medicine”.

How you can get involved in the cannabis industry

There is a common belief, that to get started in the cannabis industry you must work directly with cannabis flower (e.g bud tending, making edibles, farming/ cultivation, etc.) We asked The Dank Duchess what advice she has for people trying to get into the industry and here’s what she had to say

“If you are a lawyer, and want to be involved in cannabis, we need lawyers in cannabis. Don’t decide that you’re going to make edibles, we don’t need any more edible makers, especially if you can’t cook! Be a lawyer. If you care about logistics or if you’re amazing about process, you will find that a lot of people have great ideas and they have been working really well at the small scale but have no concept of how to scale up, so if you do business development, do business development in the cannabis industry”

There are many routes into the industry, you can use the skills you have developed in your previous career and carry them over into the cannabis industry.

The important responsibility bud tenders have

With great flower, comes great responsibility! Budtenders play one of the most important roles in the legal cannabis industry. They are the bridge between cannabis patients and their medicine.

Being a good budtender isn’t as straightforward as knowing THC content, variety, and price. With so many strains out there, it is crucial that budtenders have a wealth of knowledge in order to offer people the right strains for their needs (such as CBD : THC ratios, medicinal qualities, expected effects, predominant terpenes, etc).

Hash can be cured & aged

The Dank Duchess has been mentored by the well-known Hash maker, Frenchy Cannoli. We previously had Frenchy on our podcast and he shared his thoughts on curing and aging hash. Frenchy believes that hash can be cured & aged like weed and is currently undertaking research to prove how this process works scientifically.

We asked The Dank Duchess what her thoughts were on curing & aging Hash. To put it simply, she is a believer and has physical proof that hash can actually be cured & aged to perfection!

“When you have the patience to do it, I believe in that. The very first piece of hash that I pressed, I waited five years and one day to smoke it”.

Her favorite strain is super silver haze

We love to ask all of our guests what their favourite strain is! Before we even had the chance to ask The Dank Duchess, she had already started telling us all about her favourite strain – Super Silver Haze.

Super Silver Haze is a Sativa marijuana strain that was created by crossing Skunk, Northern Lights, and Haze, making a beautiful, sticky strain that boasts an energetic, long-lasting body high. The uplifting effects are great for high-stress levels or when suffering from a lack of appetite or nausea.

Interestingly, when extracted with C02, Super Silver Haze is virtually non smokeable to The Dank Duchess.

The method used to create hash can affect the outcome

There are many different methods to make Hash from the cannabis plant. These include; dry sieve, water extraction, hand rub, bubble hash, water & ice, and solvent extractions such as BHO, PHO & CO2 .

As mentioned above, when The Dank Duchess smoked a version of her favourite strain, Super Silver Haze, that was extracted with CO2, it was virtually non smokeable and made her feel like ice picks were being driven into her eyeballs! OUCH!

This is because the method used to create Hash is very important. Each process can slightly differ in the way that they highlight certain terpenes, this affects the ratios and therefore results in a different experience when smoked.

We still need much more testing!

Legalising cannabis isn’t just about giving people easily accessible (and repercussion free!) cannabis.

Legalising cannabis also creates the opportunity for more in-depth scientific research and analysis to take place. Ultimately, this could help many cannabis patients in the future and improve cannabis medicine. Check out the clip below!

Check out the full episode!

You can follow this link to listen to the full podcast with The Dank Duchess! You can also reach out to The Dank Duchess directly on instagram or her website.

Let us know what you enjoyed about the episode in the comments!