February 15, 2021 • 35:00 minutes
#123 – Jamie Hall, Author of Alternative Alchemy and Cooking with CBD and Cannabis
Jamie Hall is the founder of Alternative Alchemy, a California-based baked goods company specializing in vegan, gluten-free, and free-of-refined-sugar treats.
Show Notes
Want to learn to cook with CBD? Join Host Jenn Procacci and Alternative Alchemy Author Jamie Hall as we explore her new publication, “Alternative Alchemy: Recipes and Mindful Baking with CBD, Herbs, and Adaptogens”.
Jamie gives us a glimpse into her own journey with CBD and cannabis and shares important tips for cooking with CBD.
Highlights
- Motherhood and a journey to CBD
- Favorite CBD and cannabis recipes
- CBD and adaptogens – long term positive effects
- Cooking temperatures and keeping it simple and clean
- CBD holiday recipes
Links of Interest
Alternative Alchemy: Recipes and Mindful Baking with CBD, Herbs, and Adaptogens on Amazon
Jamie's Alternative Academy website
Follow Jamie on Instagram @altalchemy
Summary Keywords
cbd, cannabis, recipes, thc, book, adaptogens, plant, latte, absolutely, ashwagandha, baking, hemp, sauces
Speakers
Jenn Procacci – Host, CBD School Podcast
Jamie Hall – Author of Alternative Alchemy
Podcast Transcript
Table of Contents
- Introduction
- Motherhood: A Journey to CBD
- CBD Recipes: From Cakes to Lattes and Sauces
- CBD and Adaptogens – Long-Term Benefits
- Cooking Temperature – Low and Slow
- Less is More: Less Tampering, Less Refining
- CBD Holiday Recipes
- Wrap-Up and Contact Information
Introduction
Jenn 00:11
All right. Thank you for joining us. I'm Jenn Procacci. And I'm joined today by Jamie Hall. She's the founder of Alternative Alchemy, a California-based baked goods company. She first started experimenting with CBD baking when she experienced postpartum depression. She has an amazing publication. It's called Alternative Alchemy: Recipes and Mindful Baking with CBD, Herbs, and Adaptogens. We're gonna be talking about her book and about her journey with CBD and cannabis. But first, I just want to let you know that if you think the CBD School Podcast sounds great, thanks the guys at The Base Sound Creations. Whether you're thinking about getting into podcasting or you already have a show, I highly recommend getting in touch with them. They'll help you with stuff like sound editing, publishing, distribution, promotion, content analysis, tech support, and so much more. They can do production aspects, and they can really take your show to a another level of quality and visibility. So if you're interested in checking them out, you can email them at [email protected]. And make sure to use the coupon code MYPOCASTNOW because you'll get a free 30-minute consultation. You can also visit thebasesound.com/podcasting and start podcasting the right way now.
All right. Jamie, are you here with us today?
Jamie 01:42
I am.
Jenn 01:44
Thank you so much for joining us. Where are you broadcasting from this morning?
Jamie 01:47
I'm in Los Angeles.
Jenn 01:49
Oh, great. I'm up here in Northern California. So same state but two worlds away.
Jamie 01:54
Where are you in Northern California?
Jenn 01:57
So I'm up in Mendocino County and in a small town called Covelo. I actually live outside of that town up in the mountains.
Jamie 02:05
Oh, wow. That's awesome. Okay. We've done like Arcata, stuff like that.
Jenn 02:09
Oh, Arcata. So that's up in Humboldt.
Jamie 02:12
Yes. My sister in law went to school in Humboldt County.
Jenn 02:16
Oh, nice at Humboldt State University?
Jamie 02:18
She did. Yes. It's very beautiful there.
Jenn 02:21
They're an amazing place. We're very lucky up here. Lots of natural splendor. And lots of cannabis, that means lots of CBD.
Jamie 02:30
Yep.
Jenn 02:30
And that leads me to my first question for you. It's something I like to ask everyone, which is just what's your personal relationship with cannabis?
Jamie 02:36
That's such an interesting question. I mean, it's kind of difficult to answer in some ways for me, so I think of myself as a little outside of the box. I mean, certainly I, you know, as a kid, recreationally, tried cannabis and things like that, and on and off throughout my adulthood. But it's never been my preferred thing, traditional THC. I like wine. But I've really developed quite a relationship with CBD and sort of trying to point out the differences has been an interesting journey for me. So, a very dedicated CBD user and occasional THC user, but much more of a relationship with CBD, I guess.
Jenn 03:19
Well, there's no problem there at all because CBD is a huge component of the cannabis plant. I'm a cannabis cultivator. I have a legal farm up here in Northern California in addition to doing podcasting and another radio show called The Cannabis Hour up here on public radio. And we grow everything from THC-rich strains, all the way to strains that are so low in THC and so high in CBD, that they're like borderline legal. I definitely would consider you a member of our cannabis community. So thanks. And I really appreciate people like you that do the work of sort of taking cannabis more into the mainstream with your cookbook. It's a really beautiful publication. You’re kind enough to send me one. And I just want to tell our listeners how absolutely gorgeous it is. It's so tastefully designed and the photographs are beautiful. I'm also an artist. So I really appreciate just how visually pleasing this book is. It's very bras.
Jamie 04:18
I worked with a really talented photographer, and beauty sort of exudes from everything she touches. And we did that styling of the book together. And it was such a wonderful experience. And she's a fellow mom and we have sort of similar mentality as in children that are roughly the same ages, and so it was such a nice experience. We shot it at her house and a lot of it is her stuff and we just had a wonderful time.
Motherhood: A Journey to CBD
Jenn 04:43
Oh, that's great. You mentioned motherhood. And I know in your book in the introduction, it talks about how becoming a mom actually led you on the path to this journey that you are on now with CBD. Would you mind telling us about that?
Jamie 04:57
So I had my first first child in 2012, my daughter. And I think that sometimes when we're really in something, which I would also classify this pandemic time in my life to be very similar to that, you don't realize that it's hard, that It's troublesome. It's just kind of your day to day. And so when my daughter was a few months old, I started to realize that I wasn't unhappy. So I wouldn't have noticed it as depression. But I was very, very anxious, which is a component of that. And I started to realize that if I could just chill out a little bit, and be more present, I would really be this better version of myself. And so I became, you know, very dedicated to trying to get back to that and figure out how I could do that.
And I was very shocked to realize that, you know, after having a natural childbirth and everything else, I was very fortunate to be able to do that, and you know, spend tons of money learning how to naturally nurse my child and everything. Because it's one of those things that despite it being natural, at least for me, it was not easy, that the doctors and everyone else were so set on, “Okay, well, if you're feeling any way except, great, here's the pharmaceutical, antidepressant that we prescribed to everybody.” And that just felt for me really counterintuitive to everything I had been going for up until that point. And it was really scary at that point, like I wasn't eating dairy because I was afraid it would keep my baby up at night, because maybe her stomach couldn't handle dairy. I mean, you're just in such a weird spot as a new parent. Just to the idea of, you know, putting a pill in there and not knowing, you know, whether or not it was going to just destroy her or make everything better. It was really scary.
And so I became very committed to this idea of finding something that was a little bit more natural that I could really keep closer to me than then I felt like a pill, a prescription pill, would have allowed me to do. And my husband really, he was the first one that suggested THC. And so when we moved back to California, it had just been legalized. And that's kind of where I started. And I would do tinctures at night, but I respond to, like, barely any THC. And it's like, I've had a lot of it. And that's just something I've learned about myself. And not everyone is like that. But I didn't feel comfortable being, you know, alone in the middle of the day with my baby, and you know, not knowing how I was going to react on a given day, even though I was really working on dosing myself, you know, micro-dosing with THC in an effective way. It just was always a little bit too much.
And we ended up finding out about CBD. Was pretty early at that point. I knew very little about it. And we ended up reading a lot about Charlotte's Web, because that was the one that we could kind of find the most information about at that point. And I felt really comfortable with it because I didn't feel like it had a stigma around it. And I don't have — again, certainly, recreational use of THC is great. But I just really felt comfortable with CBD. And it ended up being exactly what I needed. I mean, we all are different. And for whatever reason, CBD was exactly what I was looking for. I mean, it, you know, turned off all the right switches and turned on all the right ones. So that's how I got here.
Jenn 08:16
That's fantastic. Thank you for sharing that story of your journey with us. I think a lot of people can relate to struggling with using cannabis trying to find relief from mental stress or health problems. And really, there is a lot of kind of experimenting that you have to do before you find something that works for you. And something that I really love about legalization is that people have more resources for products that are —
Jamie 08:43
Yes, I could not agree with you more. I am actually really looking forward now that I don't have infants that are completely dependent on me for every single part of their day in life, to be able to experiment with, you know, things that are, you know, a little higher in THC. I'm really excited about that. Having the ability to do that now in a way that I feel comfortable. So that's one of the things that I'm actually putting on my New Year's resolution list this year.
Jenn 09:09
Oh, that's wonderful. Do you mind if I asked you how you did find out about CBD? You mentioned that your husband's sort of brought up cannabis and THC wasn't the right thing for you. But then you sort of found out about CBD.
Jamie 09:21
So my husband's family is all from Mexico. He is first-generation American and actually we talked to his dad and his dad brought up the idea of without knowing the specifics of it, but you know, referenced that his grandmother had always had hemp-based versions of tinctures that she used, you know, in Mexico and and that that was something that he had grown up with, like if he couldn't sleep and whatever. And he gave us just enough information about that for us to start looking into what that would have been and that was kind of how we got to the Charlotte's Web of things. Because initially we were trying to figure out, you know, how we could create something like that ourselves and what would go into that. And that's something that I would maintain an interest in trying to get better about, like, you know, actually like growing and making things myself in the way of like oils and tinctures. But we haven't gotten there yet. But that was kind of how we figured out that CBD was where we wanted to go with this. We started to read about it and found out about Charlotte's Web.
Jenn 10:26
Wow, that is fascinating. What you have to say about your husband's family using the CBD tinctures in Mexico.
Jamie 10:34
I know.
Jenn 10:3
It's decades ago.
Jamie 10:35
It was very timely. And given my, you know, I mean, that everything, I really was fascinated by the natural at that point in my life. Like that was a really where — and I think I've chilled out a little bit, I still love it. But that was really where I wanted to go and be at that point in my life. And now it's funny to look back on it. And you know, we were in the middle of New York City, and it was wintertime, and whatever. And I'm sure I was, you know, at some level, like yearning for nature in California, and so many things that I didn't realize were also going on behind the scenes, but everything sort of fit together. And it was exactly what we wanted for that.
Jenn 11:12
I actually traveled to Oaxaca several years ago. And while I was there, I got some cannabis, and it had a bunch of seeds in the bag. And I brought them back to my garden here in Northern California. And I grew them for some personal use. And they were totally… the plants were completely different from anything I've ever grown. And I realized that just because I procured the seed in Mexico, it doesn't mean that strain is from Mexico or anything like that. But the plants wound up being very low in THC, and I haven't had them tested for CBD. But now that you're bringing up this tradition of hemp in your husband's family, in Mexico, I'm curious to test those plants and see if they are high in CBD. And I just really look forward to the way the stigma is breaking down around cannabis. And I think we're going to be finding out histories of cannabis use from all over the world that sort of haven't really been brought forward much more than just in local knowledge because of the statement that's around it.
Jamie 12:14
Right.
Jenn 12:14
It's really great because it winds up people like yourself.
Jamie 12:16
I mean, I have my Master's in library and information science. So I'm an archivist. So history is definitely something that has propelled me through most of my life. And I really think like just so many parts of this were just opportunities to get back to myself. I mean, away from the “Oh, I just had a baby. And all I'm focused on is this baby and keeping this baby alive.” And you know, this gave me an opportunity to research something and get back into history and back to nature, like I said. And it really… I'm super interested, by the way. When you do test your plants, please let me know. Because that's something I would really love to look into more like the relationship between high CBD and low and everything with the plants of different regions.
Jenn 13:02
I have to say I definitely let you know. And I don't think I even would have thought of that if you and I hadn't had this conversation. Because I look at it from, you know, I cultivate cannabis for the legal market. You know, I love cannabis. And I look for certain things for personal use. But in terms of a commercial product, I look at it through a certain lens. And then I definitely saw that sort of went well, you know, probably not going to grow that again next year. It just didn't have certain components that would be… I would need to have in order to bring it to the market and have it be successful. But it might have a little special something that I just didn't anticipate.
Jamie 13:39
Right. Well, I mean, when we started looking into the American history of CBD, that's kind of what happened with CBD, anyway. They were trying to grow something else, a different strain. I can't even think of the name that they were initially calling it — Oh, Hippies Disappointment or something. And they were like, “Oh, man, this is not what we wanted at all.” And then, you know, in hindsight, people have looked back and they're like, “Oh, yeah, that was CBD.”
CBD Recipes: From Cakes to Lattes and Sauces
Jenn 14:10
And it is so powerful. It's so helpful for so many people. And I would love to dive into your book with you now and talk with you all about this wonderful publication. I'm actually sitting here with it in my lap right now. And I just want to tell our listeners, this is an amazing cookbook. I also love to cook so I appreciate this on so many levels.
Jamie 14:31
Oh, good.
Jenn 14:31
And there's everything from drinks to sauces to sweets and breakfast and the recipes are really healthy. They're plant based. They're gluten free. You know, they mostly do not contain refined sugar. And Jamie cooks with CBD but she also cooks with other herbs and other adaptogens. So for people who might not know, an adaptogen is a type of compound that can help your body in many different ways. You know, you take it in and it sort of looks inside your body and scans you and determines where you need assistance and goes and assists you in that place. Jamie, do you want to talk to our listeners just a little bit about some of your favorite recipes and some of your — what’s your favorite parts of this book, whatever you'd like them to know about.
Jamie 15:16
So some of my favorites are definitely the latte recipes. There's turmeric latte, and one that I called the black sheep latte. Those are great. They're easy to do. If you have a high speed blender in particular, you don't even need to soak the cashews that I use first. And you can use any nut milk for them. Those are the ones that I get the most requests for around my neighborhood. And you can kind of spot like a friend of mine or a customer, they all like — or well, when my kids were in school, you'd see them all at like the kids' school in the morning for the Monday morning assembly carrying the glass jars that I put them in and they would all like return them and I would fill them back up. So I had like a nice little daily situation going with the lattes and if you really dedicated customers on that front. But like the peanut butter bars. That's one of my all-time favorites. There's definitely a lot of peanut butter recipes, you know, things that include peanut butter in there. I'm a huge peanut butter fan. We do all our own peanut butter. And I mean, all the recipes can be made without the CBD if you want them to. So I mean, my kids are huge peanut butter bar fans. That's a big lunchbox favorite without CBD usually for them. I mean, the carrot cake is an amazing one. We usually do that for Easter. And there's something really special about a CBD cake. People get really excited about it. I love making them for people and being able to deliver them to people because it's always really fun. We've made them for Writers Rooms in Hollywood and all kinds of stuff. The ice cream cakes are really great, too. I mean, I think of those as kind of like a quintessential thing that we're always asked for, those like freezer cakes. But there's a lot of good ones.
Jenn 16:55
I personally absolutely love ice cream cakes. So I was really happy to see some recipes in there for something I could make that's a little bit healthier but it's still gonna, you know, scratch that itch. When you talk about your customers. It sounds like maybe you got started making these things for your friends and neighbors.
Jamie 17:12
Yes, absolutely. This has very much been a neighborhood endeavor. I’m very fortunate. And we live in an area of Los Angeles, Mount Washington, Highland Park area. And so it's very neighborhood. I am originally from Missouri, and very much, you know, small-town vibes kind of person. And I really never thought that I would have an opportunity to live in an area that feels this tight-knit in LA. So it's been wonderful. I mean, we know lots of business owners and lots of parents and the playground scene is definitely something that we have a big presence in when we're not in the middle of a pandemic. And yes, we moved back when my daughter was a baby and didn't know anyone and bought a house here and kind of made all our friends based around this — providing lattes for people and bars for people to pick up. And I did like a meal delivery thing for a couple working moms that we were pals with that wanted gluten free and vegan options throughout the week. So it's definitely been a fun neighborhood thing.
Jenn 18:19
So at what point did that turn into this cookbook?
Jamie 18:23
So the cookbook, the idea was originally suggested by a friend of ours, that was a food writer for the LA Times. And he and his wife ended up moving to Maine, which I really loved watching all of that unfold. Because that's kind of my other dream, is the idea of having dual homes and whatever. But he and his family came back and we did a dinner where, you know, he made the dinner and I made the dessert. And so I ended up bringing a CBD cake. And throughout the whole thing, he’s just like, “You have to talk to my cookbook agent, you just have to, Because this is so timely. And this is so amazing. And you've got to pitch this to her.” And I did and we made up a proposal. And it's sold within, you know, a couple of months. And it was definitely one of the easier things that's ever happened to me in my life, which is crazy. But it's been a wonderful journey.
Jenn 19:17
It sounds like it was pretty meant to be if that was the path. And I also just want to assure our listeners that if you are interested in picking up this book, I can see from reading the introduction here that Jamie actually began her baking career as an assistant baker. So that's absolutely wonderful. Because you know that the recipes you're going to find in this book are going to be successful recipes.
Jamie 19:40
Yes. And they're very intuitive recipes. And I'm definitely not a person that likes to add superfluous things into the recipes. All the ingredients are very easy to find. And you know, I'd rather have a recipe that doesn't need to have a shelf life of several days, so there's no additives in there to make anything. It’ll hold strong longer than it should. Foods need to be eaten.
Jenn 20:03
So I wanted to ask you. Is Alice your daughter? I noticed at the beginning of this book, it says that it's for Alice.
Jamie 20:10
It is. Alice is my daughter. And the book is very much for Alice. She loves that it's dedicated to her. She has been showing everyone that she sees — yeah, now I got to write another one for Savory, so I can dedicate it to my son.
CBD and Adaptogens – Long-Term Benefits
Jenn 20:25
Oh, that's beautiful. That's wonderful. I noticed that you use two adaptogens frequently in your book, and one is ashwagandha and the other is blue butterfly pea. And I have some experience myself unsuccessfully trying to grow blue butterfly pea in my garden last year. But I don't really have a lot of experience in ashwagandha and I was wondering if you could talk a little bit about how you find it benefits you.
Jamie 20:52
Yes. I really have had great luck with sleep regulation and ashwagandha. Sleep has been something that I have struggled with since the birth of both of my children. The anxiety issues have dissipated now that they're older, and I think my hormones have had a chance to kind of balance out. But sleep, I've kind of gotten onto this path where I’m just a very light sleeper and I'm prone to waking up like usually around 2:30 or 3:00, and you know, up until maybe 4:00. And I have found that ashwagandha seems to really — when I'm taking it every day, that goes away, and I'm just more prone to a deeper sleep. So that's for me why I have revered it so much, and you know, never miss an opportunity to get it in there. There are a few other adaptogens like mucuna that I use. I really like the taste of mucuna. But ashwagandha, specifically, I really do feel the benefits of that.
Jenn 21:51
And it sounds like those benefits are more cumulative. It's not like you take ashwagandha and you feel a certain way within an hour, but just that if you regularly use that, you would notice the benefits. Is that accurate?
Jamie 22:03
That's a very accurate representation, I think, of all of this stuff. I mean, including CBD, at least for me. I really feel like it's the absence of what you feel rather than some, you know, immediate thing. And that's what I really was drawn to about CBD. And I would say the adaptogens are a similar situation. Nothing is a bull you over, you know, knock you off your feet type of brain change immediately. It's a slow build, but it's really there.
Jenn 22:35
That's great. Very important to keep that in mind when you're using these sorts of compounds is that you really have to stick with it so that you can see the long term effects. It's not like popping an Advil or something like that. The effects are definitely cumulative for your body. And as stress and inflammation and those things start to release in your body, you're going to notice these more long term effects. So it's not like a quick fix, but definitely worth it to stick that through.
Jamie 23:01
I think sometimes it's also easy to forget that. I mean, I definitely think of that as like an antidepressant situation almost where, you know, after a while, you can start to feel so much better that you're like, “Oh, I don't need to keep doing that regimen that I was doing.” But I will definitely feel the effects within, you know, seven days if I stopped taking all of these things religiously. And it's the craziest things, I mean, like you can really tell that hormones were being regulated, that you were sleeping better, that you were just a little nicer throughout the day. It matters.
Cooking Temperature – Low and Slow
Jenn 23:32
Absolutely. We all need all the niceness and sleep we can get these days with all the stress that's going on in the world. So something that I wanted to make sure that I asked you about was: Is there a certain temperature that's important to keep in mind when people are cooking with CBD? I know I've coped with THC in the past and I know that there's certain temperatures that you want to hit but not exceed in order to decarboxylate the CBD but not destroy it. Is that similar with CBD?
Jamie 24:01
Yes. So whenever possible, I mean, because my recipes are using it as an oil, anyway, I added in at the end in an effort to not compromise the integrity of the CBD. There are a few recipes where just to get it distributed evenly within the cake or the brownie or whatever, you know, it needs to be added in before baking but when we do that I never exceed more than 350 as a baking temperature. So, you know, as a result, it's usually kind of a low and slow cook time and it's kind of the same situation for the adaptogens too. Like ideally, you wouldn't want to go too high and you certainly never want to do any kind of like a pan searing situation. You never want to use CBD oil like, you know, you would with avocado oil or something to put in a frying pan or anything like that. If you're going to add it in, best to think of it like an olive oil that you're kind of supplementing on top and trying to avoid the heat.
Less is More: Less Tampering, Less Refining
Jenn 25:00
I also notice here in your book that you stress the importance of using full-spectrum CBD oils. And I think that's really great that you believe in that. I've done a lot of business as a legal cultivator selling CBD-rich strains to companies for extracts. And I make sure that it's a company that's only going to use that plant for a full-spectrum extract. Because there's so much going on there. Terpenes that we just don't really understand how much they affect the medicinal properties of that tincture yet. It’s so important to not exclude all of the little compounds that are in the plant. They're all synergistically working together. And something that is unfortunate about the hemp market is that there is the opportunity for people to buy what's called “CBD isolate”, which is pure just CBD, with none of the other stuff in there. And I do want to make sure our listeners know that that's just really not the best way to consume CBD. You do definitely want to make sure that you look for a full-spectrum oil when you're cooking or in any way that you're using CBD.
Jamie 26:04
Yes, I like to reference the idea of an egg yolk and an egg white. Like you can absolutely have an egg white omelet, and it might be, you know, less calories or presents some other benefit potentially that you see is meaningful. But the reality is, you know, nature gave you the white and the yolk and they really do work in synergy together. And in order to really enjoy that, I think you should be eating both parts of it. And likewise, I think it's a very similar thing for CBD. We're going for less. Less tampering, less refining as a whole for everything about this book. So I definitely wanted to hold strong to that idea with the most integral component involved the CBD.
CBD Holiday Recipes
Jenn 26:47
Absolutely. So are there any good recipes in your book that you would recommend for people to use during the holidays? I could see CBD being really beneficial in a stressful extended family situation or something like that.
Jamie 27:02
Initially, we, my agent and I, made a lot of jokes about how it would be very timely given the September publication because the book came out in September like in the election and everything else. But we had no idea it was getting released at the most stressful time ever. So there's a CBD Spiked Cider that is particularly festive in there. There's a Vegan Eggnog that is really delicious, a nice healthy non-egg alternative. My husband would never dream of indulging in any kind of liquid egg experiment. So we've been doing a Vegan Eggnog for quite some time. And then just cookies, so many cookies, which ship really well and make a nice holiday gift too.
Jenn 27:46
I also when you bring up the topic of shipping, I want to remind our listeners that CBD is not a controlled compound in the same way as THC. They're both parts of the same cannabis plant. But they're regulated differently. It's one of the great ironies of the way that we deal with cannabis in this country, that you can be assured that buying CBD online or you're sending some wonderful cookies you made with Jamie's cookbook to your family members across the country, you're not breaking any laws. CBD is totally legal in all 50 states.
Jamie 28:19
That's such a great thing to remind everyone of. Because yes, even when I got started with this, I remember kind of going to the post office and being like, “Is this okay?” “Or is it not okay?” But yes, you are correct. I fully support that. It is legal. I've looked.
Jenn 28:36
It's so funny. I have a friend who has a hemp farm in upstate New York and I have a cannabis farm here in California. And it's so ironic for me to think about it, you know. They're the same plant, they're literally exactly the same. I think people have this misconception that plants are somehow different looking, or maybe they grow different or something like that. But they're exactly the same plant, they just have different levels of certain chemicals in them. They look the same, they grow the same, and if you put two next to each other, you wouldn't be able to tell them apart without scientific tests. So hopefully, we can move to a point in our legal system in our country where we're accepting the whole plant and not just certain parts of it.
Jamie 29:14
I think until — yeah, until something gets mainstreamed and destigmatized, that is the American way, right? If it's taboo in any way, we just won't educate ourselves, we won't find out about it. So hopefully we can just continue moving toward a space where this is just accepted and we can really educate ourselves. Because it's a shame how basic knowledge of CBD and THC and everything else — it's crazy.
Jenn 29:39
Absolutely. And it's another reason why I love speaking with folks like yourself. It sounds like you had experienced cannabis in your life prior to becoming so involved with CBD but you weren't super into weed or anything like that. This is something that you came to medically for your own mental health and well being and the well being of your family. And If it was something that hadn't recently become destigmatized, you might not have become aware of it or been able to access it in the same way that you have. And that would be a terrible shame. I mean, no one should be suffering from mental distress or health issues that could be easily helped with a plant. That's very easy for anybody we grow.
Jamie 30:23
Exactly.
Jenn 30:24
Thanks for the work.
Jamie 30:24
Thank you. That's a nice way of putting it. It has been very interesting. Because, you know, I mean, even my mom has been, of course, giving people the cookbook, and she, you know, has been really excited about it. But even that has been interesting to try to explain. Like, it's not a weed cookbook. I mean, that's not what I did. There are really beautiful ones that are THC-oriented and they're great, too. But to l explain to people, they're not the same thing.
Wrap-Up and Contact Information
Jenn 30:52
Right. They're not the same thing. That's a very good way to put it. So we're sort of reaching the end of our show today. So before we wrap up, I just wanted to ask you, if there's any last thoughts that you wanted to share, or any topics we didn't discuss that you wanted to bring up?
Jamie 31:09
I think we covered kind of most of the things that I really try to get to. I mean, like cooking temperatures, and the destigmatizing of CBD and I think THC as well. So the book has eggs in it. I think that's like the only dairy and that that would be like the only other thing I guess maybe I'd toss in there. So we have backyard chickens. The book is just really, I mean, they're my recipes. So I was creating it based on the way my family eats. So I think just the idea of l coming back to, again, that nature thing. And you can certainly omit eggs. A lot of the recipes, I have talked about how you can use a flax egg as a nice substitute if you're not an egg eater, but we definitely eat some eggs here and have a lovely garden. And actually, Jennifer, I think I'm gonna have to talk to you a little bit more about your experience in growing because we're looking to do that too.
Jenn 32:05
Oh, awesome. Well, I am fully available. I love to talk about that. And I always love to encourage people to cultivate their own cannabis. So definitely reach out to me and I can guide you in any way that you need. I would be so happy to do that.
Jamie 32:19
Oh, great. Thank you.
Jenn 32:21
So if you started a little late in our podcast here, I just want to let you know that I'm Jenn Procacci. I'm host of the CBD School Podcast and I also host The Cannabis Hour. That is a public affairs radio show where we discuss all things cannabis on KZYX up here in Mendocino County. You can find more information on that at kzyx.org. I've been speaking today with Jamie Hall. She is the author of a wonderful publication called Alternative Alchemy: Recipes and Mindful Baking with CBD, Herbs and Adaptogens. Jamie, where can folks find copies of your book if they would like to get it for their own well being?
Jamie 33:00
You can get it on Amazon. You can get it at Barnes & Noble. You can be ordered through your independent bookseller if, you know, that's a route you want to go. My mom is in Missouri, and she is asked that my neighborhood bookstore carry it, which I think is really sweet. So you can find it pretty much anywhere.
Jenn 33:18
Wonderful. Do you have a personal website or anything that you would like to share with our listeners before we wrap up today, or a way to get in touch with you or just find out more about the book?
Jamie 33:28
Totally. I do have a website. It's alternativealchemy.com but I am much more of an Instagram person. So my Instagram handle is @altalchemy. And I, you know, try to populate that and keep up there too.
Jenn 33:43
Great. Thank you so much, Jamie, I really appreciate you joining us today. Tune in next time. We'll have another episode coming up for you soon. If you would like to find out more about The Cannabis Hour, you can do that on kzyx.org. Or I know I've mentioned my cannabis farm if you want more information about that, you can visit wildlandcannabis.com or we're also on Instagram @wildlandcannabis. And if you think that CBD School Podcast sounded great today, I'd like to say thank you to the guys at The Base Sound Creations. Whether you're thinking about getting into podcasting or you already have a show, I highly recommend getting in touch with them. They'll help you with sound editing, mixing, publishing, distribution, promotion, branding, content analysis, tech support and many more production aspects. So you can email them at [email protected]. That's thebasesound.com. Making sure to use the coupon code MYPODCASTNOW. That's one word. So you get a free 30-minute consultation. All right. Thank you, Jamie. I look forward to seeing what you come up with in the future and please stay in touch.
Jamie 34:49
Thank you.
Jenn 34:50
Have a great day.
