Hearst Newspapers participates in various affiliate marketing programs, which means we may earn a commission when you purchase products featured in this content or purchase from vendors featured here. Our professional curators independently research and recommend products and services, with no newsroom involvement. Merchants can pay for a sponsored listing and may choose to rewrite their summary. When that happens, we label the listing as “Sponsored” and highlight it in grey to differentiate the merchant-provided content from our writing.
Don’t you hate it when your grinder gets stuck with that sticky powder in the bottom? Well, before you clean your tools again, let me tell you about the milled gold you are actually throwing away.
This sticky powder is called kief, which can be found on marijuana buds. And what is kief weed? Basically, it’s a natural way to add high potency to your smoking sessions without having to add other extracts or even get more tools from your day-to-day rolling.
If you are interested in knowing where this powder comes from, its properties and legal status, and most importantly, what to do with kief, you are in the right place. You can explore in the article below how kief can be a naturally potent extract that can spice up your routine with extreme highs and little to no effort.
Key Takeaways
- Kief is another word for the trichomes (or crystals) on cannabis buds that can be separated
- This product is considered to be a natural extract and has strong effects
- Kief can be dabbed, smoked with flowers, and even added to bowls or joints.
- Regular kief is only legal in states where cannabis is available, but there are many hemp-derived kief alternatives too.
What is Kief?
Let’s dive into what kief weed is, and for this, we need to go back to how the cannabis plant develops. When the buds start to form in the plant, it also generates trichomes through resinous glands. These trichomes are one of the main places where THC and cannabinoids are stored in the plant.
Trichomes usually look like small crystals, and you’ll find them when taking a good look at a bud. These small crystals usually look as if it was small sugar particles covering the plant or a fresh snow layer.
Now, how does this connect with kief? Well, when trichome crystals oxidize, they turn into kief. This type of concentrate has a powdery-like form, yet it can get sticky and difficult to handle. Sometimes kief is also called pollen as well.
What Can You Do With Kief?
While at first, this marijuana byproduct might seem like plain old dust, don’t be fooled. You can actually spice up any joint, flower bowl, or general smoking experience by sprinkling this magic dust. So before asking yourself again, “what is kief weed?”, you’ll want to know all the possibilities from this magic dust.
Our recommendation would be to use it as if it was a concentrate and add it to milled bud or to infuse other items with concentrates. Since this powdery concentrate is pretty potent, even in small portions, it is best to keep your kief dosage low.
You can also create hash or moon rocks with it by mixing it with other concentrates and flowers. We’ll talk about hash later in the article, but moon rocks are basically flower nugs that have been covered with concentrate and then covered in kief for extra potency.
Some cannabis brands save kief to create infused pre-rolls. They may hand roll the joints, or use special pre-roll machines to boost output and consistency.
What is Kief Weed?
Let’s go with something you’ll want to know: what is marijuana kief like when mixed with flower? We’ll start by stating that this mixture is not for new users or people with little resistance to cannabinoids.
So kief weed is generally just a mix of buds with dried trichomes. By mixing flowers and kief together, you get a similar experience to infused flowers with fewer steps and no extra spending.
You can either cover buds with kief or grind up your nugs and add it directly to the bowl or joint. Some people also infuse their blunts by rolling them over the powder. Just make sure to have your joints fully rolled before doing this.
How Does Kief Weed Make You Feel?
As a strong, natural concentrate, users have reported feeling an even greater intoxicating feeling than with regular weed. That is because the trichomes contain most the active ingredients found in cannabis, such as cannabinoids and terpenes.
Does Kief Weed Get You High?
Definitely yes. If you’ve asked yourself what is kief weed’s main advantage, it is the fact that you’ll be surprised by getting a lot higher with very little product. Kief will get you higher than regular flowers as it concentrates the trichomes of the cannabis buds, so make sure only to use a little when using this concentrate.
The Effects of Kief Weed
Generally speaking, kief weed usually has two extra effects. Firstly, it can accentuate whatever properties the strain and terpenes your flower already has. So if you are already trying a strain with high muscle-relaxing properties due to the synergy between the trichome in kief converted into Delta-9 THC, you might feel what we call an entourage effect.
The entourage effect is basically the synergy produced when two cannabinoids or terpenes work together and elevate the potential of both compounds together.
Secondly, kief can make the general mind buzz last longer than buds do. Since it is a concentrate, it can let Delta-9 THC stay in your system and peak even further than your typical joint.
Pros & Cons of Kief Weed
In general, Kief has very few cons and lots of pros. The main con for this green treasure is that it can get difficult to handle due to its stickiness and general consistency, and of course, you’ll need to collect it from your grinder.
Pros, however, are plenty. It is a natural way to spice up your smoking experience, it is generally cheaper than other extracts, and you can get it from both cannabis and hemp-derived cannabinoids.
Can You Smoke Kief Weed?
Yes, and generally speaking, kief tastes the best when smoked. Since it is a plant byproduct, you’ll enjoy the taste of your strains and the potency of THC if you smoke it when compared to baking with it or dabbing it.
Can You Eat Kief Weed?
Well, generally, Kief should not be eaten. Since it’s not really active until it is heated up due to how THCa works, usually, these kinds of concentrates are better smoked. However, some adventuring magic bakers can use kief as a substitute to concentrate while baking or cooking edibles in general.
You might be asking yourself what to do with kief in the recipe. The best way to do this is to add it to the oil or butter parts of the recipe and mix it with flowers— and don’t forget to decarboxylate both the kief and cannabis.
Kief vs Hash
While both concentrates have similar characteristics and are initially a natural way of creating extracts, they do have a few differences. For instance, hash (or hashish) is a small semi-sticky ball made from rubbing live cannabis plants together.
Kief, on the other hand, is a fine powder made from dried-up trichomes from plants. Both products are naturally more potent than regular flowers, and you can even make hash from kief or cover the hash pieces with it if you want to use them together.
That said, hash is a little more expensive as it can be more challenging to make at home than simply collecting the fine powder from your grinder or using the catcher if your grinder has one.
Is Kief Legal?
Since kief usually comes from cannabis, it follows the same legislation as it contains Delta-9 THC. This means that kief is illegal in states where cannabis is considered a controlled substance, and in states with medicinal marijuana or adult-use cannabis, is considered a concentrate.
Cannabis-based concentrates are legal only if Delta-9 THC is legal in the state. That said, you can also get Kief from hemp flower as well. CBG and CBG kief are growing in popularity.
What is Kief Weed: Frequently Asked Questions
We’ve covered the question “what is Kief weed?”, but if you have more questions surrounding this precious green gold dust, we’ve got you. In the following section, you’ll find some of the most common questions users have asked around the web.
How Much Kief Should I Take?
Unless you are making a lot of hash or having more than a few joints infused with it, a sprinkle or two of kief will do the trick.
How Long Does Kief Stay In Your System?
Kief works similarly to cannabis flower, and can remain in your system for up to a month depending on your tolerance.
Can You Dab Kief?
Yes! And it can actually hit harder if you don’t really like rolling. Just make sure to use heat similar to when you smoke hash, which usually requires constant low heat.
Does Kief Go Bad?
Since kief is a byproduct of weed, it can degrade with temperature changes, humidity, and even sunlight. If you do collect the kief from your grinder, just make sure to keep it in a dry place. And as with most cannabinoids, this extract will lose power with time due to how THC breaks down.
Closing Thoughts
With that said, we’ve established the fact that adding kief to your regular smoking sessions can greatly amplify the high in an affordable way. So, if you feel like the kick you get from your rolls isn’t enough, kief is exactly the product to add that extra something to your cannabis.
Hearst Newspapers participates in various affiliate marketing programs, which means we may earn a commission when you click links in this content. Our professional curators independently research and recommend products and services, with no newsroom involvement. Merchants can pay for a sponsored listing and may choose to rewrite their summary. When that happens, we label the listing as “Sponsored” and highlight it in grey to differentiate the merchant-provided content from our writing.