Making Frankenstein Oil With the Magical Butter Machine

Frankenstein oil capsule Copyright 2015 BeyondChronic.com

My dear wife Felicity has been having more than the usual amount of trouble sleeping lately. Although her daytime cannabinoid requirements have not changed (one or two capsules still get her through the day), she’s been needing higher doses at night due to higher amounts of stress. Since we generally make our capsules fairly “light”, this means she’s been gulping 4 or 5 at a time, though spread out among strains. A few times, she’s had to use some of our rare and specialized Black Mamba capsules (those will be a story themselves one fine day).

So I decided to look around the cupboard to see what I had in stock. I found a jar of coconut oil that had been infused with some LA Confidential strain when I was putting the Magical Butter Machine through testing. Although the contents of this jar would make lots more usable capsules, I wanted to see if I could increase the strength of what was in there by processing it again and adding some more cannabis. I rummaged around some more and located a jar of tincture I had once made from LA Confidential. Eureka!

I carefully poured out the liquid tincture and now had quite a large handful of somewhat damp marijuana. Even though a certain amount of THC had been dissolved into the alcohol and now was in the tincture, that much weed added to the oil should be enough to make it much stronger…and it was the same strain too!

Alas, it was too good to be true. While my logic was impeccable, there was only one cup of oil in the jar, and as everyone knows, the Magical Butter Machine needs two to tango. What to do?

I went more carefully through my goodies drawer. I found 1/4 ounce of Mr. Nice, 1/8 ounce of Afgoo, a gram of really hard GDP hash, the few odd grams of Skywalker, and even a half-eighth of OG Kush. You know. The usual.

But it was all indica, or at least indica-leaning hybrid…just what Felicity needed.

So I threw it all into the Magical Butter Machine, after first melting the coconut oil in the microwave (and adding another cup of fresh coconut oil, of course). For the hash, I cut it into little pieces with a paring knife, and crushed the pieces as much as possible. Then I had a bit of a heating problem to figure out.

Some Like It Hot…But How Hot?

See, I had two competing desires here. The marijuana from the tincture was damp due to the alcohol all over it, and I wanted that to evaporate. It’s drinkable ethanol (Everclear), of course, but Felicity is now sensitive to alcohol, and besides we might want to cook with some of this oil. Alcohol boils at around 170°F. As I’ve mentioned many times, you must decarboxylate your cannabis before cooking, which takes temperatures anywhere from 200°F to 315°F. But heating ethanol to those temperatures could create flammable alcohol vapors to come out of the non-sealed MBM at high pressure…not my idea of a safe scenario for the kitchen!

Here’s what I did. First, I set the MBM to 160°F for an hour. Even though we don’t know much about the internal workings or processes in the MBM, we do know that 160° shouldn’t cause the alcohol to get too hot. But I’m cautious, so I stuck around and paid attention.

The MBM program starts off by heating the mixture, presumably to melt anything that’s still solid in there (for instance, when you make butter, you can just throw sticks of butter in, although you’re probably better off melting them in advance). After a few minutes, I saw quite a bit of white alcohol vapor coming out from under the top of the MBM. I’d expect some of that, but I heard some rather frenetic boiling, so I unplugged the MBM at the outlet (do not just take the top off, because that could cause a spark when you break the electrical connection) and checked things out. The contents were boiling merrily, and my laser infrared thermometer claimed the liquid was around 145°F. I put it back together, plugged it in with the same settings, and ran it again for awhile. Same thing happened, and then I repeated it a third time.

The third time, I heard no more boiling, so I let the Magical Butter Machine continue running its one-hour program at 160°F. Done! But I still wasn’t finished, so like I’ve told people before, I ran another hour at 220°F to decarboxylate the mixture. When that was done, I thought some more.

How Do You Know It’s Decarbed?

From getting lots of reader responses on the previous MBM articles, I knew that the newer versions of the Magical Butter Machine have a decarb setting, but they still recommend decarboxylating separately. I wanted to make sure this was strong enough, especially because we aren’t adding lecithin anymore due to health concerns, so I wanted to make sure this mix was fully decarboxylated. So I had one final idea.

I know that decarboxylating cannabis gives off carbon dioxide as well as boiling off residual moisture, and I was aware that some good folks up in Oregon talked about seeing it happen directly in oil, so I decided to give it a shot. I turned up the temperature all the way to 250°F, and set it for one hour.

But I was thinking way outside the box here. I convinced myself that my own brain was way more powerful than the microprocessor inside the MBM, and I had decided to be in control of things. So I set the handy-dandy timer on my phone to 7 minutes (a wild guess based on published decarb times of around 21 minutes at 250°F and easily divisible into 3 periods), and when the time was up…I simply unplugged the MBM. If I could do it in an emergency, I could certainly do it at my own convenience!

I took the top off, and bubbles were merrily coming to the surface. But this time the liquid was not boiling. The ethanol had long since evaporated, of course, and there was no water in there, only oil, and we were a good 100 degrees below the smoke point of coconut oil. What I was seeing was either residual moisture from the cannabis, or carbon dioxide, or both. Since I don’t have a $250K gas sampling apparatus laying around, I didn’t care which, so I put it back in for another 7 minutes at 250°F, and after that there were no bubbles. So I concluded that, at this point, everything was finally and properly decarboxylated.

I gave Felicity about a capsule’s worth of this stuff (which got her to sleep just fine, BTW), and she made up about 100 capsules herself while waiting for it to kick in. It’s much darker and stronger than the original oil, and because it was made from recycled “spare parts”, I think I’m going to call it…Frankenstein Oil.

http://BeyondChronic.com

Old Hippie is a father of two boys and thankfully living in California where all this kind of thing is legal. He started smoking marijuana in 1967 in high school, experimented with mind-expanding drugs of all kinds, and then straightened out 15 or so years later to become an airplane pilot. After being diagnosed with depression in 2000, he lost his job and most of the following decade to prescription medications (such as antidepressants) which sapped his energy and will. Finally, a chance conversation with a friend led to a doctor’s recommendation for medical marijuana (MMJ). This changed his entire life, health, and outlook for the better. BeyondChronic.com is his continuing story. It’s also his way to provide experienced advice on using medical marijuana effectively and responsibly, as well as advocacy, activism, and support for others. Old Hippie teaches about safe use of cannabis edibles, Canna Caps, vaporizers, dosing, and even microdosing.

22 comments

Thanks for the great article. It got me to thinking about cooking up a Frankenstein Tincture. I have a few “so so” VG tinctures made prior to getting my Magical Butter Machine. They’re just barely more effective than … soap. I’d been wondering if there might be some way to liven them up until reading your article. It got me to thinking about pouring these less-than-stellar tinctures done the old way (Grape Ape, Golden Afghan Skunk, Mr Nice) in along with the new batch of VG tincture I plan to brew.

You’re probably better off doing that one at a time or it will take a lot of weed and effort. You learn more every time, too. Glad you liked it, nugs and hugs!

Good suggestion. I’ll save a “Frankenstein” run for later and do my first tincture run today as a straight high CBD batch so I can see how it comes out … as a benchmark. But have to use the MBM out in our trailer as when using it in the house, the whole place reeks like Cheech and Chong’s personal party hideaway …. definitely not a low odor device unless mine is a fluke unit.

How did the Frankenstein Oil work out? Also, I was wondering if you usually add both glycerin and glycol in the magical butter machine, or if you add the glycol after as i believe you said you did in an old post. Thanks OH!

The Frankenstein Oil worked out great, and just in time, because Felicity had a stretch of a few weeks of very bad problems trying to sleep and this was about the only stuff we had strong enough to help!

I have only made the glycerin tincture in the MBM, and then added some propylene glycol to that to see how the mix worked as e-juice. It’s safer to do that in smallish batches in case you make it too weak…and there’s no real reason to do it in the machine because the liquids mix pretty readily.

I have heard many, many comments re: the MBM stating that it is smelly and noisy so yours must be a fluke, Old Hippie.

I’m not sure which version these other ones are referring to (there are at least three I’m aware of), but my MBM2 passed my son’s smell test and it only makes noise every once in awhile.

I thought they were two and similar except for the settings. Maybe I have been hearing of the original MB will notice. Am still unsure myself so haven’t bought yet.

To me the MB2 sounds like a very quiet blender. It’s not a constant sound, and most of the time it’s very quiet. Every few minutes I’d hear it for 10 seconds – at the most. I went into the living room – 20 feet away – and could not hear a thing.

Amazing. I’m speechless. Think i’ll stick w/ the first oil recipe first….
Thanks for the journey…that was enlightening!

Since this I have done more research and you are the only person that says that they are not noisey. I am curious as to why you do not allow message without you filtering them? It appears that this is a public forum but in reality it is not.

I literally have no idea what you are talking about.

I do not consider the MBM to be especially noisy, because it only “revs up” every once in awhile. I posted a video, by which people can hear it for themselves. I allow messages that even tell me I’m wrong about stuff, but I filter out spammers and trolls and haters and attackers.

And I’m not sure what your problem is.

Somehow it must have gotten attached to the wrong memo. The !agic Butter Machine Is said to be very noisy and smelt by everyone except people on your blog. People have to go thru you to have A statement published and don’t know why that would be. How often does it turn on before it is done? Every couple of minutes, I believe. I am also an old an smart Hippie and so,ethic just doesn’t gel with what I rea blog and what I know from others.

Got news for you folks. I DO own and HAVE used my MBM2 many times. It’s is about as loud as a blender. I also own a Ninja Blender which is WAY louder than the MBM2. Is it silent? No, but it certainly isn’t loud either…YMMV. As for the smell. The only time I can smell anything is when making actual butter. Glycerine and ethanol tinctures barely register a smell and its significantly less than my PAX gives off. The MBM2 is the fastest and easiest way to make butters and tinctures.

I’m glad I saw this. About a month ago I ended up with two cups of Jenny Kush (1oz) and coconut oil which was, for me, extremely light. I could tell I had a capsule, but barely. I considered it a complete loss. However, this article says I can run the oil again, it’s in the fridge, add another oz and maybe salvage it all. I made a small batch via the crockpot method of qtr oz of the Kush and qtr cup oil, so 1-1 ratio and they were fine. The mbm2e at two cups or eight qtrs to four qtrs of Kush was 2-1, so half strength the crock pot. That splains it, I hope and think!

Ok so I used a qtr cup of the very weak cocunut oil described above and a fresh qtr oz of Kush. The results….moon shot….need I say more. Thanks old hippie.

I just bought a MBM and it isn’t noisy at all! It makes a slight grinding sound about every 7 mins or so that I can’t even hear while watching TV in my living room, about 20 ft away. Otherwise no noise at all. Not sure where you are getting your info about the noise but it isn’t correct. I am just now making my second batch of oil for baking and I LOVE it. Cupcakes turn out amazing. Haven’t tri3d butter or tincture yet.

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