How to Make Cannabis Tea From Leftover Stems

If you suffer from severe and chronic pain, nausea, or even asthma, we might have found the perfect remedy for what ails you: cannabis tea. It is easy to make (don’t throw those stems away!) and just what you need after a long day at work. Follow our step by step directions below for both hot and cold tea.

Never let good weed go to waste. Or stems for that matter! Leftover cannabis stems are perfect for brewing delicious pots of cannabis tea.

If you’ve never made weed tea before, no worries. Not only can you make it yourself, but you can use it to treat severe and chronic pain, nausea, and even asthma.

Ready to drink up and not toke up? Follow along as we show you how to make cannabis tea from scratch.

Traditional cannabis tea with honey

1. Grab Your Ingredients

Your first step is to gather all the ingredients you’ll need. To make traditional weed tea, you’ll need the following:

Anywhere from a quarter to a half-cup of leftover cannabis stems
3 cups of water
Any tea bag of your choice (for flavour)
Coffee filters
At least 2 to 3 teaspoons of your favourite alcohol

If you don’t want to use alcohol, you can use either a 1/2 cup of milk or a half teaspoon of butter. You can also go vegan by using soy, coconut, or almond milk and replacing the butter with coconut oil.

Cannabis isn’t water soluble, so a fat is needed to separate THC from the cannabis plant itself

2. Prepare Your Leftover Stems

When learning how to make cannabis tea, one of the first questions people ask is whether or not to grind up the stems. This is up for debate.

While some people believe grinding increases potency, others have found little difference in terms of strength for this recipe. You can also choose to break up your stems instead of grinding them down.

For this recipe, we’re going to skip the grinder altogether and head straight for the teapot.

3. Fill the Kettle

Once you have gathered up your stems, add your three cups of water to the tea kettle. Saucepans also work well when learning how to make cannabis tea from scratch.

After adding your water, proceed to add either your alcohol, milk, butter, or a recommended substitute. These “binders” also improve the overall potency of the tea during the natural decarboxylation process.

To decarboxylate any cannabis, you simply need to heat it up (carefully follow our decarboxylation instructions though, otherwise you could ruin your entire stash).

If you choose to use alcohol as your binder, it’s recommended that you add it after your water comes to a boil. This way, your alcohol binder won’t evaporate away.

4. Infuse Your Cannabis Tea

Now that your water is boiling, it’s time to infuse your tea. Slowly add your leftover stems to the boiling water and stir continuously for 10 minutes.

While not mandatory, you can also put your stems in large tea bag before adding it to the water. This just makes the straining process easier.

Reusable tea bags are also great if you want to add any extra kief, plant trimmings, ground weed nugs, or stem grindings.

5. Strain Your Weed Tea

After 10 minutes, your tea should be fully infused.

If you’re using alcohol as your binder, remove your kettle or saucepan from the stove and add your three teaspoons of liquor.

If you want to know how to make cannabis tea with some serious flavour, we recommend adding your favourite rum to the mixture.

If you opted for a reusable tea bag, all you have to do is remove it from the water and the straining is complete.

Otherwise, do the following:

Step 1: Get your coffee filters out
Step 2: Place a filter inside of the kettle or wrap one around the spout
Step 3: If you used a saucepan, simply place a filter over a mug and secure it.
Step 4: Gently pour your tea through the filter, separating your tea from the loose stems.

Voila!

You just learned how to make cannabis tea from scratch. But we’re not finished yet. Let’s take a look at a few more recipes to try:

How to Make Iced Cannabis Tea

Now that you know how to make traditional hot cannabis tea, let’s cool it down a bit with some refreshing iced cannabis tea.

We’re going to make a basic iced cannabis tea recipe with honey. To start, you’ll need the following ingredients.

1. Iced Cannabis Tea Ingredients

At least 2 to 3 grams of hash or leftover kief. To save money, we recommend using kief.
At least a quarter ounce of your favourite cannabis dried.
A full pitcher of any tea. Choose your favorite!
A bag of ice
3 to 4 tablespoons of water
At least 4 ounces of honey, no more than 6.
Any filter of your choice. However, a cheesecloth is preferable.

You can change the measurements as necessary, depending on how much tea you want to make.

Now, let’s get started.

2. Mix Your Water and Honey

For this step, we recommend using a saucepan to combine your water and honey.

Add all your water and honey to the saucepan and bring to a simmer while stirring consistently.

You know it’s ready when your honey and water are completely mixed, leaving a thinner, watery honey.

3. Add Your Kief or Hash

Next, you’re going to add your first cannabis ingredient, the kief or hash of your choosing. Make sure to remove any and all kief from your leftover stems. If you do decide to use hash, make sure it’s the powdered kind. If not, it will be harder for the hash to dissolve.

Add your kief or hash to the simmering honey and stir for at least 10 to 15 minutes straight.

Keep stirring and simmering until your ingredients completely dissolve into the honey mixture.

Once dissolved, run your honey through the cheesecloth and squeeze out the filtered honey back into your saucepan.

Let your honey rest for a bit to regain its thickness.

4. Serve and Enjoy

Put your honey aside to set, and brew a pitcher of your tea of choice and let that cool.

As you learn how to make cannabis tea, have fun with your flavours!

The following teas pair great with cannabis:

Lavender
Blueberry or mixed berry
Black Tea
Lemon
Ginger
Chamomile

Once all your ingredients are cool enough for a hot summer’s day, you’re ready to serve your tea.

Simply, fill your glasses with your favourite tea and add at least 1 to 2 tablespoons of cannabis honey to each. Stir in your honey until it’s completely dissolved and serve with ice.

Now, these aren’t the only weed tea recipes we’re crazy about. Let’s take a look at how to make cannabis tea chai lattes.

How to Make Cannabis Tea Chai Lattes

When you think of lattes, one of the first things that come to mind is chai. And that’s exactly where we’re making.

1. Cannabis Chai Latte Ingredients:

3 cups of water
Roughly 1 gram of your cannabis of choice, including kief from leftover stems
2 tablespoons of butter
Any tea bag of your choice or at least 2 tea bags of chai
Cream and sugar for flavoring

Like the previous recipes, if you want to go vegan, simply substitute your butter with coconut oil and replace your cream with soy, almost, or coconut milk.

2. Prepare Your Cannabis and Stems

Unlike traditional cannabis tea, weed lattes require that you grind up your cannabis and remove any leftover kief from your stems.

Next, finely grind up your cannabis ingredients as much as you can.

After using your grinder, transfer your ingredients to a mortar and pestle to create a fine powder. While not mandatory, using a mortar and pestle will give you the consistency you need when you learn how to make cannabis tea lattes.

3. Boil Your Ingredients

After grinding your cannabis and stem kief into a fine powder, put your cannabis ingredients aside and boil your 3 cups of water in a saucepan.

Once your water is boiling, add your butter or vegan coconut oil.

As your fat ingredient melts, stir in your ground-up cannabis ingredients. At this point, toss in your tea bags and stir those in as well.

As you stir, make sure to scrape off any excess cannabis stuck to the saucepan and stir that back in too.

Keep stirring and scraping the sides of your saucepan for at least 30 minutes. Stop before any water starts to evaporate away.

4. Strain and Serve

Once your tea is completely brewed, pour your tea through a strain and into your favourite mug.

Don’t forget to add some cream and sugar to make a true chai latte.

And speaking of lattes…

It’s time for a little pumpkin spice.

How to Make Pumpkin Spice Cannabis Tea Drinks

Starbucks isn’t the only way to enjoy a pumpkin spice latte during fall. You can make your own at home and with your stem kief and favourite cannabis strain.

1. Pumpkin Spice Weed Tea Ingredients:

At least an 1/8 worth of cannabis and leftover stem kief
1 cup of half-and-half or vegan soy half-and-half
A half teaspoon of vanilla extract
1 tablespoon or sugar or honey
Either of a 1/4 cup of espresso or strong brewed tea
1 tablespoon of canned or freshly made pumpkin puree
1 teaspoon of pumpkin spice powder

Now, let’s start brewing!

2. Combine and Boil Your Ingredients

First, add both your ground-up cannabis ingredients and chosen half-and-half to a saucepan.

Keep mixing your ingredients as you bring them to a soft simmer, not a boil.

As you stir, gently add your sweetener, vanilla extract, strong brewed tea or espresso, puree, and loose spice to the simmering mixture.

Use a whisk to make sure all ingredients are completely dissolved. Do this continuously for roughly a half hour until your mixture is ready to strain and serve.

3. Strain, Serve, and Enjoy

After 30 minutes, remove your saucepan from the stove. Make sure your mixture doesn’t boil over in the process.

Place your strainer of choice over your mug and gently pour out the latte mixture.

Of course, no pumpkin spice latte in complete without toppings. Feel free to add whipped cream, walnuts, and a dash of leftover pumpkin spice.

How to Make Cannabis Tea Drinks for Chocolate Lovers

Last, but certainly not least, is our favourite cannabis tea recipe for serious chocolate lovers.

This is one of the most delicious ways to reuse your stem kief.

1. Cannabis Chocolate Tea Ingredients:

1 cup of your milk of choice
A half a cup of strongly brewed tea (or coffee if you prefer)
Two teaspoons of sugar or a packet of alternative sweetener
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
A half tablespoon of cocoa powder. 100% cacao is preferred for this recipe.
A pinch of table salt
1/2 tablespoon of organic coconut oil
1 tablespoon of fresh cannabutter

Now, let’s get cooking.

2. Combine Your Ingredients

First, add your chosen milk to your saucepan and bring it to a low simmer. Make sure not to boil your milk.

Gently add your sweetener of choice, vanilla extract, cocoa, and a dash of salt to your saucepan and mix.

Keep stirring your ingredients until they’re dissolved. Once the milk is hot enough, go ahead and remove your saucepan from the stove.

Transfer the hot milk to a large mug of your choosing and mix in your 1/2 cup of strong brew tea or coffee.

Once mixed, stir in your tablespoon of cannabutter and the coconut oil and enjoy.

What’s Your Favourite Cannabis Tea?

Thirsty yet?

Let’s recap what we’ve made so far:

Traditional cannabis tea with honey
Cannabis iced tea for summer
Cannabis chai tea lattes
Pumpkin spice cannabis tea
Super chocolatey cannabis tea

Your leftover stems and trimmings have a lot more culinary potential than you think, so don’t toss them out just yet. Bookmark these drink recipes to impress your cannabis connoisseur friends and relax on your downtime.

But we want to hear from you. What are your favourite cannabis teas and drinks? How do you like to reuse your leftover stems?

Sound off in the comments below and check back often for new recipes!

How to Make Cannabis Tea From Leftover Stems