Two widely-used agricultural products - tea and tobacco - are fermented during the curing process for each. Indeed, fermentation is the key difference between green and black teas while fermentation plays an important role in premium cigars. Has anyone tried this and if so how…and what was the result? I’ve got a pretty good crop of White Truffle just a few weeks away from harvest and I’ll have enough to experiment a bit. Chemistry wise, there’s no way to increase the THC content - that’s genetics and growing conditions - but it might do something to aroma and flavor.
Curing is basically fermenting as it is aged through a step down process of environment that improves the overall taste, smoothness, flavor profiles… we all cure our smoke
Malawi cob is a traditional African technique where semi-moist cannabis buds are tightly wrapped in banana leaves or corn husks and left to ferment and cure over weeks or months.
The Traditional ProcessHarvest & Prep:
Freshly harvested, still-moist cannabis flowers (traditionally tied to famous landraces like Malawi Gold) are stripped of large fan leaves.
Wrapping: The damp buds are tightly packed and compressed into a compact cylinder or “cob” using corn husks or banana leaves, then secured securely with string.
Fermentation: Historically, these wrapped packages were buried underground or kept in warm, dark environments to undergo a slow anaerobic fermentation phase. Modern home-curing enthusiasts sometimes replicate this by vacuum-sealing damp buds and regulating warmth.
Drying: After the fermentation period, the cobs are unrolled and slowly dried out before consumption.
Benefits and CharacteristicsFlavor and Aroma:
The breakdown of plant material yields a rich, sweet, and tropical-fruit-like terpene profile (resembling fermented papaya, guava, or golden raisins) rather than a sharp, grassy scent.
Smoothness: Fermentation and aging break down harsh chlorophyll, resulting in a much smoother smoke compared to standard rapid-dried flower.
Potency and Storage: Practitioners note that a proper cure enhances the perceived potency and partially decarboxylates the cannabinoids while compressing the herb into a dense, space-saving block ideal for long-term preservation. Up
Reminds me of a rusty old tobacco tin I found when fishing. It was sealed tight, took some opening, inside was some very dodgy looking weed, but it really was something else.
This maybe the way to trial the method, being an old beer brewer. I would say the vacuum sealed buds should be held at a holding temperature between 60F to 70F.
Speaking of fermination I might have to get the home brew up and running!
UC Berkeley synthetic biologists have engineered brewer’s yeast to produce marijuana’s main ingredients—mind-altering THC and non-psychoactive CBD—as well as novel cannabinoids not found in the plant itself.
Feeding only on sugar, the yeast are an easy and cheap way to produce pure cannabinoids that today are costly to extract from the buds of the marijuana plant, Cannabis sativa.
Fascinating…and my home brew days extend back to college in the '60s - which were not always ‘successful’ (Originally a chem major, our watchwords were “better living through chemistry”.) But there’s a fine line between flat beer and hand grenades…
My favorite cigars are maduro - specifically Padron from Nicaragua. Maduro tobacco is made by placing the best, partly-cured leaves flat and tightly wrapped in bales to encourage anaerobic fermentation - typically at 140-150 F. Unknown is these temps are achieved through the environment (a hot, tin-roofed shed) or the fermentation itself. This can go on for a year or more, twith he the bundles occasionally unwrapped and re-arranged, with the outer-most leaves moved to the center of the stack.
Nor quite sure how to do that, though I do have sous-vide equipment for cooking. I may try packing some buds along with some ‘trim’ for volume, sealing under vacuum, then submerging them in the cooker. I can maintain any temp from 120 to boiling for days. I once cooked a corned beef brisket for 36 hours at 130F and found it transcendant…
This would certainly be something to check out as well. I have never really believed that fermentation could have much effect on the potence, but the opportunity to alter the aroma and taste is intriguing. The impact of the process after harvesting in tea and tobacco is obvious, and therefore it is understandable that one wants to experiment with part of the harvest.
Something like this comes up quite often when working on plant-related gardening articles for YourHomify, and as I learn more about the process of curing, it becomes clear that it can be as exciting as growing. Would definitely be interested to see how it will turn out for the White Truffle.
WRT fermentation, what yeasts would one use? A local craft brewery sourced yeasts from the trunk of a Union Civil War general: Benjamin “Beast” Butler who was famous for stealing spoons from wherever he went. .I seem to recall something from the late 1960’s of claims to turn ordinary ditch weed into prime smoke using blue-green mold found on oranges. It never worked and my 50+ year old orange tree is bereft of fruit right now. Got a plethora of bread yeasts…
Interesting topic! One thing worth considering is that fermentation and curing aren’t quite the same process. With cannabis, introducing too much moisture during fermentation could increase the risk of mold and potentially affect the terpene profile. A proper dry and controlled cure might be a safer way to preserve aroma and flavor. Would be interesting to hear if anyone has actually compared fermented buds with traditionally cured ones from the same harvest.
Roger that… I was wondering about the ‘source’ of the yeast. A local craft brewery sourced a wild yeast from the exterior of a Civil War trunk. Another used the ‘bloom’ off organically-grown apples. AFAIK, the wild yeasts in tobacco and tea survived the drying process. A half-century ago, I was a hospital lab tech and chemistry major (before that was derailed by the required calculus) so maybe I’ll try to place a sample in a petri dish and see what grows… That’s how penecillin was invented.
Mold cannot grow without oxygen because most molds are obligate aerobes, meaning they require oxygen to power their metabolism and complete their life cycle.
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