CBD has become very popular over the past decade due to new research that has found a number of potential benefits to our health and wellness. As a result, you are seeing more products than ever which use CBD in new ways. You can get CBD skin care products, soft drinks, protein powder, and more.

Arguably the most popular use of CBD is to infuse it with food. Products like CBD gummies are very common, but you can now find other food products or recipes to infuse it with all kinds of other food, including cheese.

Infusing CBD into cheese is relatively easy. In order to mix CBD with any food, you need some kind of fat or oil, and cheese comes with fat to spare. You can use this same process to infuse CBD into almost any kind of cheese, and use that for your favourite cheese-based dishes: grilled cheese, mac and cheese, and more. Here’s a general process for making your own CBD-infused cheese.

Step One: Mix Your CBD With Milk

To start, fill a small pot halfway with water, and place a bowl on the pot so it sits on top. Fill that bowl with two cups of whole milk or cheese (to melt) and mix in your desired dose of CBD. Bring the water to boil and cover the bowl, and leave it for at least two hours.

Two hours is enough time for the CBD to fully infuse with the fat of the milk. This indirect heat, or “double boiler” method, allows the milk to cook at heat without breaking down the fat, protein and CBD. If you use CBD oil, can start the next step. If you used hemp flower, make sure you strain the milk with cheesecloth first to remove any bits of the leaves from the milk.

Step Two: Add Buttermilk

Pour the infused milk into a saucepan and set the stovetop to medium-low heat. You want the milk in the pain to reach 175F, which is just before it starts to simmer. Once it reaches that temperature, pour half a cup of buttermilk into the pan and mix it with the infused milk. This will add some additional fat, which further helps the infusion process.

At this point you can add other secondary ingredients to flavour the cheese how you wish. You can add things like lemon juice for more acidity, which will help the curdling process as well. After about 10 minutes, your mix should have separated into cheese curds and whey — whey is the liquid of residual milk that gets separated from the cheese.

Step Three: Separate the Curds and Whey

Put a few layers of cheesecloth over a strainer and slowly lift the cheese curds from the sauce pan into the strainer. This will help you remove the whey from the cheese. Next, wrap all the curds into the cheesecloth and tie up both ends tightly.

You can tie or hang the cloth over a bowl and let it stay there for around 30 minutes. This will help further separate all the whey from the cheese. Do not mash the curds together just yet, this process is just to make sure you are left with the cheese and whey completely separated.

Step Four: Final Touches

You can save the whey for use in things like coffee, baking, smoothies, and more. It won’t have the same level of potency for CBD, but it will still have around 10% of it. The cheese can be unwrapped from the cheesecloth, add some salt and other spices or garnishes (nuts, berries, herbs) and put it in a covered bowl or container. Put it in the fridge overnight.

The next day, your cheese will be fully infused with CBD and ready to serve. The above recipe makes a nice white cheese, but you can follow a similar process where you replace the first two steps (milk, buttermilk) with your cheese of choice that can be melted in the double boiler bowl to be infused with the CBD. It won’t work for all kinds of cheese, but will with some of the more common ones.