Today's update is... I am giving half my kingdom harvest to try Malawi Cobbing as inspired by Tangwena 
We're in the post harvest stage of the journal, and in this update I want to share an experiment I am currently doing, something I first saw some years ago by
@tangwena over on another site. And then 3 years ago, a thread was started here on 420mag by Sweet Sue dedicated to Malawi style cobbing which Tangwena has been giving much appreciated help and input to folk who are keen to know more.
So I am making this update just to introduce what I understand of this cobbing process. I will be documenting my efforts to cob half of my recent harvest. There are many folk here on 420 who have already done cobbing, so for them, please don't hesitate to chime in and correct me where I have introduced mistakes. I do get high from
time to time frequently, so when typing, errors do happen!
So what is Malawi Cobbing?
This is an approach to curing cannabis that Tangwena saw when he lived in Africa. The buds were partially dried and compressed into a roll and then wrapped in something like maize husks/corn husks/banana bark and tied up tightly. Then they were left sometimes buried in the warm heat of compost, or in the thatch roofs of the huts where the sun slowly heated and sweated the tightly bound/compressed cobbed cannabis inside, different villages had different approaches which mostly were kept secret. Because it was pressed/rolled tight, mold was less likely to grow and the pressed buds would undergo a kind of slow anaerobic fermentation/cure process.
So why did they Cob?
It seems to me that for practical reasons cobbing would give greater ease of processing the harvest, and storing it (cobs are densely packed and therefore smaller, which all makes it easier for transporting it. Cobbed cannabis was what they saw as cured cannabis, something that energised them that they could do tasks and feel good. I gather too from a spiritual standpoint the cobbed cannabis was viewed as a higher quality level to smoke, that uncobbed cannabis was seen as not good for the lungs whereas in Malawi cobbed cannabis is seen as being much kinder and giving no problem to the lungs. Curious isn't it. I think Sweet Sue who originally started the 420mag Malawi cobbing thread commented that when it was burnt, it did so white, not black or grey ash.
So why would we be interested in Cobbing?
There seems to be something special about Cobbed cannabis that occurs from it being cured with fermentation. At first it sounded terrible to me, fermenting our precious buds! But then I read how tobacco leaves are put thru a fermentation process too, and if they weren't, the resulting tobacco would be deemed very low grade. Some cobbing enthusiasts have even suggested that when curing of cannabis is done by drying and not fermenting that then the cannabis is really more dried than cured.
There is something that seems to occur in this fermenting/curing process that makes people feel that the cobbed cannabis is stronger or smoother, or the high is different, some effects have been described as lysergic, some as euphoric, trippy. Not only is it of course subjective to the user, but it is also relative to the strain used, the timing and temperatures of the sweat/ferment/curing stages.
Hallucinogenic fungi have been known to produce LSD type experiences, could the anaerobic fermentation of the cobbed buds be producing something along these lines as Lab tests I have seen posted show no apparent explanation for a perceived cob difference in high, yet one can chew these non decarbed cobbed buds and be potently high for hours...
It's weed Jim but not as we know it.
I have seen posts speculating on the possibility that during the stage of anaerobic fermentation that a potent conversion can occur of the most prevalent cannabis terpene, myrcene. From Sweet Sue;
"It turns out that under certain conditions - conditions that come into play almost exclusively in the making of hash - myrcene converts to another, more potent terpene named hashishene. Myrcene is the most prevelant terpene found in just about every cannabis plant grown, and as a result, hash has incredibly high levels of hashishene."
Pressed Columbian Gold, Acapulco Gold
In the 1980's when living in Sydney Australia. A builder friend used to 'score' weed for us. Mostly it was local grown and mostly very good. We would be in stitches during and after a session on the bong. But one time he arrived holding something he was told to be Columbian. The weed had a pressed/squashed appearance and was golden in colour, dryish where the solid pressed bits would fragment off to be smoked, it was one the best highs I have ever had, then or since, there was something different about it but I was too young and inexperienced to know, but now I presume this as a sort of 'brick weed', that it may have had an element of fermentation in it's processing that made it so special, I had always assumed it was purely the strain that was special, now I wonder
. I have since read posts of other people on both Columbian Gold and Acapulco Gold pressed weed who have reflected back on their experiences of it giving a special appealing high and also wondered from awareness of cobbing whether this was due to a cure that incorporated fermentation, which does make me very curious about cobbing.
The Cobbing process is variable and relative to the conditions
There are a lot of factors that can produce unique cobbing results. I have seen folk with experience posting how even cobs done in the same batch are different. But I saw in a post by Dajerm noting a message on some bottles of Kombucha that stated:
“Fermentation is an art so slight, that variations should be celebrated” which seems a wonderful statement for the art of cobbing!
How can Cobbed cannabis be used?
It can be ground up/broken up and combusted in a joint or bong. It can be ground up and infused into oil or soaked into high strength alcohol for a tincture. Some folk say they can vape it fine, and others find their vaporizers struggle. Some have made cob rosin. A very curious thing is that cobbed cannabis apparently doesn't need to be decarbed. A small piece/slice can be chewed and held in the mouth for a period for sublingual absorption and swallowed. This is Tangwena's preferred way. Just 0.25g (quarter of a gram) or less can be plenty as a dose. But with all edibles it pays to work up from small to establish what does works best and safely for you. Personally I am interested in using it as an edible too, as when getting older it can be asking a lot of your lungs to always do the job of taking it in.
An overview of the Cobbing process
Basically, cobbing begins with preparation
- Drying the buds while leaving them sufficiently moist to be able to create a fermentation process
- Rolling the buds into a tight roll (using a sushi roller helps) and wrapping/tying them
- Vac sealing the cobs (Vac sealing is recommended to help avoid mold, if used then can skip wrapping the cobs)
Once the cobs are prepared, the basic cobbing process consists of
- Sweat stage; 6 - 24 hours or more, at around 40C (altho can be less/more).
- Ferment/curing stage; 1 to several weeks at around 25C-30C.
- Ageing stage - drying to begin ageing, the longer the better at room temperature
Once in the fermenting stage the idea is to regularly unseal them and smell them, when the smell is really good/how you want them, then let them dry and re vac seal to begin ageing them. Wetter more moist buds will generally produce darker cobs while drier buds will produce more golden and aromatic terpy cobs.
Summing up
Anyway, that's my rough understanding of cobbing. For people who've never heard of it, in a sentence it may seem like an alien idea, so this post is to give a bit of an explanation about it before I update on how my own cobbing experiment is going. I've heard great things about cobbed sativas, which I have my recently harvested 80% sativa dominant Strawberry Cough to see how that goes, as well as 2 indica dominants, the Mango Sherbert and the Godfather OG. I have read of folk enjoying the cobbed indicas too, so it seems all down to personal preference. It's all new to me and I'm looking forward to what the experience brings.
For those who are interested and want to read more, we have on 420mag, an ongoing thread dedicated to cobbing, this is
Tangwena's Malawi-Style Cob Cure: Fermented Cannabis. By documenting and sharing his research and experiences he has really been doing a wonderful job opening up cobbing for everyone. Cheers and thanks to Tangwena, wishing you well brother!
Harvest Day!
Hi Stunger! Congrats on the harvest, the JotM nom, and a really great journal! 
nice one!
Stunger! I'm looking forward to watching you go through the cobbing process.
