If anyone can pull the edible (you know, the cannabis kind) into the artisanal food moment, it’s Jody Hall, who worked her way up the ranks at Starbucks before launching Seattle’s Cupcake Royale empire. Her latest project: the Goodship Company, a line of THC-infused chocolates and cookies (sea salt chocolate chip and Saigon cinnamon snickerdoodle, anyone?) that put the high in high style. So I set out to try one for myself.
It seemed a little too fitting that “Still DRE” came on the radio as I pulled up to Uncle Ike’s in Seattle’s. These days, the weed-related music of my adolescence plays on the throwback station and edibles are for grownups that appreciate good branding and GMO-free corn syrup. Once inside, the tattooed woman behind the counter handed me a foil packet with a gilded dirigible on the front. No Rasta-style lettering, no pot leaves. “One serving of THC,” it said, in clean, sans-serif font.
The snickerdoodle inside was soft, smaller than I’d expected, and cinnamon-dusted. It smelled greener than it tasted, which is to say that once I got past the first whiff, I probably could have eaten a bunch of them. But, because I am ostensibly one of those grownups, I ate half, waited what felt like a responsible amount of time, then ate the other half. Chalk it up to a rookie mistake (and not reading the back of the label), but let’s just say I took a mild trip to Maureen Dowd-town aboard the Goodship. Here, Hall’s take on the cookie—and tips on how to avoid a half-day spent sinking into your couch.
A CREDIBLE EDIBLE: “The packaging and branding are meant to be fun, but also to give people a sense of trust. It’s not a Ziploc with a sticker on it. We wanted it to look like it could go on a Whole Foods shelf.”
WHAT’S INSIDE: “We worked with a pastry chef to build a cookie that’s soft, stable for 60 days, and still true to our commitment to local ingredients. It’s way different than cupcakes: It’s hard to make sure that the THC is evenly mixed without making the cookie feel like a brick.”
DON’T GO DOWN WITH THE SHIP: “Ten milligrams of THC—the standard serving in a cookie—is like four really strong cocktails. It used to be, you didn’t know if you were eating a brownie that was like a shot of tequila or a fifth of tequila. Our packaging helps people avoid that edible roulette. I only eat half a cookie in one sitting. I think a quarter of a cookie is a great place to start. We want you to curl up with a good book, not curl up on the floor wondering what’s happening.”