An introduction to hash

If flower is all you’ve ever bought, hash is the natural next question. Here’s the short version.

What it is

Cannabis flower is covered in trichomes — tiny resin glands holding most of the plant’s cannabinoids and terpenes. Hash is what you get when you separate those trichomes from the rest of the plant and press them together.

That’s the whole concept. It’s concentrated because the leafy material got left behind, not because anything was added to it. No lab, no magic.

Where it came from

People have been making hash for centuries across Asia, the Middle East and North Africa, long before anybody had equipment to do it with. The old methods are still in use: rubbing fresh plants by hand, or sieving dried ones over cloth and screens.

The word comes from the Arabic hashish, meaning grass or herb — a fairly modest name for it.

How people use it

• Smoked — usually broken up and mixed with flower so it burns evenly. On its own it tends to smoulder rather than burn.
• Vaporised — in a vaporiser built for concentrates. Not a dry herb one; that ends badly for the vaporiser.
• In food — hash needs gently heating in a fat before it will do anything in a recipe. This is the step people skip, and then blame the hash.

Each behaves differently, and if it’s your first go the method matters every bit as much as the hash does.

Worth knowing before you try it

Hash is more concentrated than flower by a wide margin, so however much you’re used to is not a useful guide here. Start with a small amount and give it time. You can always take more later — and we are happy to talk it through before you buy.

Want the differences between the specific types? We wrote those up separately in hash: varieties, differences, and how to identify them.