Next month, the country’s first legal cannabis restaurant licensed to serve both weed and food will open in Los Angeles.
Lowell Cafe is opening on N. Le Brea Avenue in West Hollywood on Oct. 1, “serving farm fresh food, coffee, juice, and cannabis daily,” according to the cafe’s website, which features thumbnail black-and-white photos of celebrities smoking, presumably pot, but who knows, the pictures are really small.
In 2017, the City of West Hollywood created a licensing process to allow restaurants to serve marijuana. The 220-seat Lowell Cafe will be the first to open under the license, but certainly won’t stand alone for long as hundreds of applicants have sought licenses, according to a recent piece in The Washington Post.
However, California state law still requires all cannabis products be prepackaged and tested, meaning Lowell Cafe won’t be able to serve cannabis-infused fresh foods as originally planned. Instead, guests will be able to order cannabis goods like flower and concentrates on a bill that’s separate from their food order — a dispensary and restaurant under one roof. Staff will be able to guide guests, from beginners to pros, through their experience.
According to The Guardian, Lowell head chef Andrea Drummer is still finalizing the menu but it includes “traditionally healthy dishes like baby kale salad” as well as fancy shmancy (Drummer calls it “elevated”) mac and cheese bites, grilled cheese, fried chicken, and stoner dream desserts like ice cream sandwiches and s’mores.
While Lowell caters to the recreational user, Mint Dispensary near Tempe, Arizona, has been slinging fresh, cannabis-infused foods to medical card holders since fall 2018.
In June, AZ Central reported that Mint was serving an all-vegetarian menu of weed-infused burgers, cheese fries, hot wings, pizza and hatch chile macaroni and cheese
“Customers can then choose to have their food made with anywhere from 25 milligrams to 1,000 milligrams of THC,” AZ Central writes. “Pricing varies according to the amount of THC added to the dish; a pizza dosed with 25 milligrams of THC, for example, costs $12.50, while the same pizza dosed with 1,000 milligrams of THC costs $75.”
Not a bad price, particularly if the pizza is good. We wouldn’t recommend eating the whole thing in one sitting, but if you know your limits, godspeed.
While there are some awesome edibles being made in Colorado (Wana, Love’s Oven, Cheeba Chews, Coda), there are no licensed marijuana restaurants in Boulder or Denver… or anywhere on the Front Range. While social-use lounges are legal as of earlier this year, there aren’t many of those, either.
However, Summit County-based Cultivating Spirits will cater a custom cannabis pairing dinner party for you, either in your home or at a venue. You can drop by a number of establishments in Boulder and enjoy CBD-infused coffees, cocktails and juices (Precision Pours, River and Woods and Wonder, to name but a few options in Boulder County), but if it’s a THC-laden meal you’re looking for, Colorado’s not quite there yet.
