A Crash Course in Hash (From Your Local Massachusetts Dispensary)
Harbor House, your local Massachusetts dispensary, provides clear answers to your cannabis-related questions. If you’re wondering, “What is hash?” or “What is hashish?” read on to learn more.
You’re probably familiar with marijuana flowers or “buds.” The best-quality hash or hashish is the concentrated resin from those flowers. Extracting and concentrating marijuana flower resin harvests those lovely THC crystals (trichomes) you can see sparkling on the best buds.
Loose, dustlike THC crystals are hash. Crystals pressed into blocks or cakes are hashish. However, in everyday language, hash and hashish have become interchangeable.
Because hash is so highly concentrated, it’s extremely potent. A little bit goes a long way, enabling you to get stoned many times on only 1 gram.
Types of Hash and How They’re Made
Different types of hash production have evolved in different social groups and periods. Most hash making takes place in developing parts of the world under less-than-ideal conditions, affecting quality and consistency.
Traditional Hash Making
The two primary traditional production methods result in finger hash or blocks of hash.
The most significant center of finger hash production has been the Kulu/Manali Valley area in the Himalayas in North India. Thick stands of marijuana plants grow wild here. At harvest time, villagers rub the living buds between their hands to collect the highly potent resin on their fingers. They scrape the accumulated resin off their fingers and roll it into balls or cylinders.
To make the blocks or cakes of hash commonly found in the Middle East and North Africa, workers cut the tops off marijuana plants and beat them against a sieve, which is often a piece of silk. The THC crystals go through the sieve and are pressed into blocks.
Mechanical Hash Production
The sieving process can be mechanized. After cutting, workers put the tops into a drum whose outer skin is a sieve. An electric motor spins the drum, and the resinous crystals pass through the sieve.
Chemical Hash Production
Workers soak or cook marijuana tops in a solvent like alcohol or acetone to separate the oils from the plant matter. They then sieve the liquid or spin it in a centrifuge to remove small particles before evaporating off the solvent.
Next, they combine the oil with powdered marijuana that provides a base before pressing it into blocks.
If chemical hash production isn’t done correctly in a good laboratory, solvent residue can easily remain in the finished product. Smoking the contaminated hash can result in headaches, nausea, and dizziness.
Non Chemical Solventless Hash
It’s delightful to experience the clean, pure high from modern hash made using high-tech freezing methods to separate the trichome heads from the trichome stalks to produce pure rosin.
Here’s the process:
- Freeze the marijuana buds
- Wash the frozen cannabis in ice water
- Filter the water through progressively finer mesh
- Freeze dry the water hash
- Use sublimation to dry the hash
- Sift and press the hash
Harbor House Collective is highly focused on bringing you the finest nonchemical hash products.
How to Use Hash
Methods of consuming hash are limited only by your imagination but come down to two main choices: smoking hash or eating/drinking hash. Smoking gets you higher faster, while ingesting hash gets you stoned for longer. The most popular consumption methods are:
- Sprinkling crushed hash in a joint or cigarette
- Smoking hash in a pipe or bong
- Vaporizing hash in a vaporizer or dab rig
- Cooking or baking with hash
- Making hash smoothies or drinks
Hash Dangers to Be Aware Of
Although consuming hash is generally safe, you should be aware that it can be highly potent. Hashish effects are quite powerful. Exercise caution if you need to perform any activities after consumption.
Also, smoking anything may cause lung damage. It may be prudent to ingest concentrates rather than smoking.
Highly Effective Options for Hash
Hash and hashish are the traditional concentrated forms of THC. In modern times, concentrates have taken their place. The Massachusetts dispensary Harbor House offers many potent concentrates and edibles that are today’s equivalent of hash/hashish and may be purer.