Personal Injury Law

It's 4:20 somewhere: dinner and a buzz at Denver's Ganja Gourmet

By Doug Powell

The Los Angeles Times reports that one of the latest "Dinner Buzz Specials" at the Ganja Gourmet, was described as,

"Start with our ganjanade [ganja tapenade], bread and a fat dank joint! Then choose from a slice of pizza or LaGanja [lasagna]. Then top it off with a Ganja Gourmet dessert, your choice, $30."

Technically, the Ganja Gourmet is a medical marijuana dispensary, one of many that have sprung up this year throughout Colorado.

Nine years after voters approved a constitutional amendment legalizing medical marijuana, state health officials decided in July to end a five-patient limit for marijuana suppliers. The numbers of both registered patients and dispensaries have exploded.

At least 15,000 people have applied to join the 15,800 already on the state registry of patients. Although no official tally exists of the number of new dispensaries, dozens have opened -- so many that Westword, a Denver newspaper, hired two critics to review them.

Ganja Gourmet owner Steve Horwitz, a 51-year-old Long Island, N.Y., native who said he has used marijuana since his teens to cope with attention-deficit disorder, said,

"I already knew I loved to eat pot."

His chefs "medicate" the dishes by cooking them with butter or olive oil infused with marijuana. The infusion process can take several days of simmering an ounce of marijuana in one pound of butter or one cup of oil.

Horwitz remains convinced of a bright future; his pipe dream is to eventually ship his creations all over the country.

"I'll be the Omaha Steaks of medical marijuana.'

Full post as published by BarfBlog on December 28, 2009 (boomark / email).