By Jonathan Lewis Smith
Imagine one of the first beings to ever use fire. Fire would have given the power to clear forests, explore the darkest caves, keep predators at bay… and unlock the benefits of cooked foods. Try to imagine that first bite, maybe of whatever became the modern chicken – grilled and filled with more juiciness and nutrition than any other bite of food had ever been before… It must have been a magical experience and ability to pass on. COOKING One of the oldest known examples of fire-based cooking is WonderWerk Cave in South Africa, where ancient ashes and cooked bones were discovered to be over 1,000,000 years old! It’s so hard to imagine all those different foods and ingredients, and how satisfied how ancestor’s bellies must have been. Across all that time surely the personalities of those magical cooks must have been infused into their food, even if their cultures were only developing and cooked food was rare. That existed in pre-history, and the secrets they discovered must have been treasured knowledge. How many herbs and spices were tested to enhance flavor? How long before someone realized the psychoactive effects of a cannabis bush being burnt over the fire, or tried to infuse these qualities into the food they made? Confirmed evidence exists that shows that humankind has actively engaged with the cannabis plant for thousands of years, with the ancestors of today’s strains originating somewhere in Central Asia presumably around 12,000 BC. Even if cannabis were that young of a plant, it would still have been one of humankind’s first agricultural products and something people would reasonably cook and experiment with. Most sources state that humanity had achieved the domestication of plants and animals by 10,000 BC, along with rudimentary baking, stone-working, and things like sewing, painting, and pottery. The oldest instances of cannabis use I found was in China around 6,000 BC, when cannabis seeds and oil were discovered specifically to have been food. We know the Copper Age was in full swing by 3000BC,” so at some point during this time we can assume chefs became far more advanced in their cooking techniques and experimentations. This edible tradition spread as far east as Morroco where cannabis is still used today make “mahjoum, or mazhoum,, a sweet and delectable postdinner dish that’s well over 1,000 years old. I have included this recipe for you today below. “Mahjoum is very simple to prepare, and there are as many ways to prepare it as you like. I have extracted a basic recipe from many mahjoums tasted here and abroad. Mix crumbled hashish with raw sugar and powdered arrowroot, add sweet butter and mix thoroughly. Then add a little honey and chopped, unsalted pistachios. Adjust proportions for consistency and taste. Mold mixture into bite-size portions and allow to set. No cooking required. If you can’t get hashish, use grass; it doesn’t taste like mahjoum made with hash, but it works.” – recorded by J. F. Burke, High Times writer, 1978 *As always when taking cannabis, always start with low dosages and do not eat too much without giving yourself time to digest and experience what’s coming. J.F. Burke missed a flight home from Morocco after his ‘Mahjoum’ trip lasted for three days and nights. So be careful before over-spicing anything at home. There are more modern variations of Moroccan ‘Mahjoum’ as well as recorded uses of cannabis in food and as an edible medicine as early as 2000 BC, in India. Indeed every indication points towards cannabis being an edible first, and a smokable only after tobacco and the pipe took the “New World” by storm after 1492 AD. Cannabis was even mentioned in a Renaissance Era cookbook called “De Honesta Voluptate et Valetudine” – or, “On Honourable Pleasure and Health” – featured as an edible by the Italian writer and gastronomist Bartolomeo Platina in 1474, the oil recipe was recommended to be added to wine or cake. It’s amazing and difficult to think about all changes that have occurred in just the last few hundred years, let alone the last millennium or centamellenium – yet there’s something reassuring about the progress cannabis and marijuana has made through time and across cultures. It would be easy for any cannabis user to appreciate seeing those lucky and crucial moments when lonely seeds stowed-away or ambitious farmers tried to grow cannabis the crop, slowly spreading the plant through human history. Cannabis’ documented use nearly everywhere around the world is evidence that people have been sharing the unique properties of the plant in earnest.
Today’s world has a multitude of new culinary and medicinal options for people with THC or cannabinoids in their diet, fueled by a transformation in both technology and society. There’s been an advent for industrialism and science, along with an extraordinary amount of progress by chefs and an unprecedented mixture of cultures and ideas – and, there have been wars on alcohol, ‘drugs,’ and non-‘western’ medicine that persist to this day. Its all been accelerating quite fast. As a result, a lot of the innovation that other foods experienced were lost on cannabis, and its only now that the tide has turned and the science has caught on to the ancient magic cannabis has to offer. Today there are tools and implements that our culinary forefathers in Wonder- Werks cave never could have imagined – not at least without cooked cannabis on hand! The varieties of heat, cooking surface, ingredients, and style available in the culinary world is growing larger faster than ever, and the cannabinoid cooks are still catching up; now however the stakes are high and the field of cannabis cooking is paired with a world of scientific research and discovery, with centuries of the scientific method to guide the path, every day delivers new recipes and new opportunities to use cannabis as its meant to be, along with the salt in your kitchen pantry. So even though mankind has been cooking with fire for over a million years, the truth is maybe we haven’t lost that many recipes after all. Truly, its only now in this millennium that cannabis will actually take root on every arable continent. Like the natural life of other plants, animals, technologies, and traditions, marijuana both took its time and was unrelenting in its spread around the world. Still today there are remnants of ancient ingredients to find and combine into new foods no one ever could before – so perhaps its still possible to experiment, and experience that ‘first bite’ again for yourself.
Sources: www.advancedholistichealth.org – ‘History’ www.hightimes.com – ‘psychedlicatessen, A 1000 Year Old Recipe.’ www.hailmaryjane.com – ‘Oldest Cookbook Included Cannabis Health Drink’ www.livescience.com – “Marijuana History: How Cannabis Travelled the World.
