Not only can you drink hops, but you can also smoke it.

Everyone has tasted hops. Almost nobody has smoked it.

What it is

Humulus lupulus is a climbing vine, and the part used is the cone: the papery green flower of the female plant. It is what makes beer bitter, and it has been farmed for brewing for well over a thousand years. It's also a close botanical relative of cannabis, both sitting in the family Cannabaceae, which surprises people.

What's in it

Hops is unusually well studied because brewing cares about it. Alpha acids give the bitterness. Essential oils including humulene and myrcene carry the aroma, and myrcene is one of the compounds hops shares with cannabis. Flavonoids like xanthohumol are found almost nowhere else in nature.

Taste and smoke

Resinous and bitter, with the same aromatic character you get off a freshly opened bag of hop pellets. It is not a subtle herb, and it is nothing like the floral things it usually sits alongside. In a blend it needs a light hand.

In our blends

Hops is in Lunar, with blue cornflower, blue lotus, marshmallow, raspberry leaf and red clover. It is the reason Lunar has an edge under all those soft flowers. Also as a loose blend.

Tea Tokes blends are tobacco-free and nicotine-free. 21+.