Hello everyone, long time lurker making a first post here. Several years ago I started decarboxylating cannabis concentrates and mixing it with coconut oil for an easy edible option. Then I started using MCT oil (~ 1:1 mix of C8 and C10) instead of coconut oil and noticed that the cannabinoids absorb better with MCT. Then a couple of years ago I stumbled on a research paper explaining why C8/caprylic acid might offer better cannabinoid absorbtion than MCT. After experimenting with MCT and C8 and I’ve discovered that C8 is much more effective than MCT.
Has anyone here tried C8 or other carriers which might be more effective than C8? I’ve also read that lecithin can help with absorption, does anyone here have experience using soy or sunflower lecthin in cannabinoid/terpenoid tinctures?
Anecdotally, I’ve found that C8 aids in absorption when vaporized with THCd9 but I don’t know if that will translate to the gut digestion. I’ve also found that 90% of sellers claiming to sell pure C8, are selling “refined” MCT at best(heavy contaminate with longer chains). If you buy the real deal from sigma, please be careful. 99.9% can burn up your skin and eyes.
I’m curious about whether terpenoids emulsified in purer C8 would be absorbed more than when emulsified in a less pure C8 solution. I’m also concerned about potential for injury in terms of skin contact and eye irritation.
I might experiment with something from sigma’s C8 inventory which is food grade to anecdotally determine if there is a difference. If there does seem to be improved absorption, then I might try blending the purer C8 with the stuff I acquired at a nutritional supplement outlet to lessen the tincture’s potential to burn skin and eyes. I’m also wondering if simply adding lecithin to the purer C8 would help it to be less acidic while maintaining greater terpenoid absorption.
Have you ever tried it with lecithin and if so, was there a difference in effect? I like the idea of longer shelf life and less potential for separation when emulsified in a gummy or a tincture. I’ve seen a lot of reports about lecithin improving terpenoid absorption for edibles like gummies and pastries and I am wondering if adding it to tinctures would help absorption when it reaches the lower digestive system, especially if it’s taken with a full stomach. I am considering trying sunflower lecithin powder. I’ve read that liquid sunflower works too, but that it has an unpleasant flavor.
Yessir we have and it did seem to have a positive influence on the psychoactive effects of our gummies but we used liquid sunflower lecithin so the taste carried over. We ended up just using the C8 which our test group seemed to approve of over the standard MCT oil.
Thank you so much, I appreciate the feedback and encouragement to pursue it further. I baked cannabis flower into brownies a few times in my younger years. I tried synthetic THC I found it to be an unpleasant experience and lacking in terms of medicinal benefit. I now understand that the medicinal and recreational experiences with cannabis should perhaps be more correctly viewed as terpenoid experience rather than just cannabinoid experience. The term terpenoids encompasses cannabinoids along with terpenes, whose differences in respective contents account for a variety of effects within the scope that the species is able to produce. Up until a few years ago I thought of terpenoid ingestion as a novelty. Now it is my preferred mode of consumption, with inhalation becoming secondary. Tinctures are very expensive and still relatively unknown, and I feel that people have not caught on to how much better they can be compared to vaping and smoking. Whether you’re into solventless like rosin or customizing your own dabs from isolate source material, you can do any and all of that with tinctures. One easy option would be to use a pre-decarbed full extract cannabis oil, perhaps a 1g or 2 g syringe plunged into warmed 15 mL of C8. Instant tincture at a fraction of the cost of buying a premade tincture off the shelf. I’ve been advising people who are just getting started with tinctures to find products like this to mix with caprylic acid- https://www.veteranschoicecreations.com/product-page/feco
Thank you for your feedback about the test group preferring caprylic acid over MCT. It would be great to anecdotally confirm it further. I found a world of difference between coconut oil and MCT and then another world of difference between MCT and caprylic acid. The next step is for me is mixing in more pure caprylic acid and experimenting with powdered lecithin. I want to do it slowly in methodically, measuring out cannabinoid content so that each batch is on par with one another content wise, and perhaps take notes to help discern subtle or not so subtle differences in onset, intensity, and duration. My first step might be to mix lecithin with what I have on hand now and see if there is a difference.
