Madame Cannoli: Frenchy Stories, Hashish and Concentrates, and NEW Frenchy Doc

Episode Links:

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/6HuqBOXHZBRs84h3uuK8LE
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=koLGays_MDs&ab_channel=JordanRiver
iTunes: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/madame-cannoli-frenchy-stories-hashish-and/id1077793493?i=1000606159891

Jordan River 0:00
Greetings cultivators from around the world! Jordan River here back with more GrowCast, or you see this. Today we have Madame Cannoli on the line. I’m so so honored to speak with her about the upcoming Frenchy Dreams of Hashish documentary and so much more. This was a very insightful and in depth and personal interview. I thank Madame for being so open and awesome. And I know you’re gonna love what we have to talk about from hash to the cannabis culture to Frenchy and the film itself. So I know you’re gonna love this one. Before we jump into it with Madame though, shout out to AC Infinity. ACinfiniti.com code GROWCAST15 to get your savings and keep the lights on here at GrowCast. We appreciate your support. And we love AC Infinity. They make the best grow tents around extra thick poles. They’ve got nice durable, thick siding. Now they have the new side ports. People have been asking for those and AC Infinity listen, plus, they’ve got everything else you need to grow. They’ve got lights, and pots and fans. And they’re oscillating fans, the cloud race system, check out their humidifiers, the CloudForge. How nice is your humidifier, maybe it’s time to replace that. The cloud rays are my favorite oscillators on the market. And of course, their cloud Line series what they got it all started with all those years ago when we were partners with AC Infinity. All they made were those inline fans and they’re the best in the game. So shout out to the entire AC Infinity suite. They’ve got everything you need to get grown from fans, to tents to lights. Code GROWCAST15 works at ACinfinity.com. You support us and you’re getting some badass durable growth gear while you’re doing it. So thank you to all your listeners using code GROWCAST15 and thank you to AC Infinity. Alright, let’s get into it with Madame Cannoli. Thank you for listening and enjoy the show.

Hello, podcast listeners. You are now listening to GrowCast. I’m your host Jordan River. And I want to thank you for tuning in again today. Before we get started, as always, I urge you to share this show, turn someone on to growing. Tell a grower about GrowCast. Spread the show. It’s how we grow everybody. And of course see everything we are doing at growcastpodcast.com/action. There you’ll find all the action, the seats, the membership, the classes, whatever we’re doing, you’ll find it there. Today I have a very, very esteemed guest that I am honored to have on the line. I know there is an incredible documentary that’s about to drop that a lot of you have been excited about. And I cannot wait to talk about this today. Many of you know and love Frenchy Cannoli, who made a huge impact on this show. And on me personally one of my favorite figures in the cannabis industry of all time. And I’m very, very proud to have on the show today. Madame Cannoli with us right now. How’s it going, Madame? How are you doing? Thank you for coming on the show.

Madame Cannoli 2:46
Oh, thank you so much for having me. It’s a pleasure to be here.

Jordan River 2:49
Like I said, I see Frenchy is one of these people that people really look up to. Right. And he was so full of passion. And he made such an impact everywhere he went. So I want to thank you. I know that. I know that a lot of his attributed success. You know, he talks about of course, the great Madame Cannoli. So I want to thank you, I want to thank you for for all you’ve done. I want to thank you for coming on the show today. And thank you for creating this amazing documentary that’s about to drop. So thank you, Madame Cannoli.

Madame Cannoli 3:22
Oh, my pleasure. Thank you again for having me. But Frenchy used to say that people made too much of him, you know, that he owed so much to the farmers that he worked with both those, you know, people that originally shared their traditions with him and producing countries. And then these last few years in what he called the third chapter of his life to the farmers of the Emerald triangle, the outdoor organic regenerative farmers who have been fighting the good fight for multiple generations in California to protect the plant and to legalize it and normalize it more importantly, because that was another area that Frenchy had a lot of passion around because he had really experienced so profoundly the stigma of being a cannabis consumer. You know, he used to say, in France, there was this idea that if you consumed cannabis, that you were going to bring this great shame to your family and ended up kind of penniless, and, you know, in a terrible condition in the street. And that, in his experience, it couldn’t be farther from the truth. You know, he said, I have a quote in the book that basically he said, cannabis consumers are the creatives in the population and they’re the future of humanity, and that we just haven’t been acknowledged correctly yet.

Jordan River 4:50
That is really, really well said. And you’re absolutely right. I think that one of the reasons that people looked up to Frenchy so much is because he was truly humble. And he passed, you know, credit along so many people are just in this industry to grow this plant like a commodity, and to make some quick money and get that green rush money and Frenchy couldn’t have been further away from that, which leads into the artist angle, like I do see him as an artist of hashish. And I guess that’s, you know, this documentary Frenchy Dreams of Hashish. This is a perfect example of that, that correlation, which was he was in it for the art. He was, you know what I mean? That’s what it felt like to me, do you think that’s a fair assessment?

Madame Cannoli 5:33
Oh, absolutely. Frenchy was always about the quality of it. And I think all artists, to the degree are chasing quality, you know, whether that be the perfection of the expression in the painting, or music or dance, or in his case, really understanding what he called the science behind the process, you know, feeling that, by truly understanding the science of what you were working with, that would allow you to have better control, to better manipulate the outcome. And if you’re, you know, an artist as a hash maker, that gives you so much kind of power to create products that are designed for different parts of the population. It’s not a one size fits all scenario. And he was very, very interested, as we were having more and more science about what the individual cannabinoids do in terms of both the therapeutic and psychological impact to humans, along with the terpenes, that a true artists would be able to manipulate those in a way that served the population. [Wow!] Like you said, above and beyond just somebody growing, you know, whatever flavor of the month strain. And, you know, batch processing it with little love or care, really focusing on spending the minimum amount of manpower to make the maximum amount of profit, which is what we’ve seen in both California and Canada, as the downfall of the industry. [Right.] You know, we had these big money people come in, with no background in cannabis, most of them have never smoked and continue to acknowledge that. I mean, when you look at it, one of the largest cannabis companies in the world is owned by a couple of Mormons who are not consumers. And somehow they think they’re going to teach us to do it better. Frenchy had a famous line where he was like, the reason that all those big companies in Canada have lost so much money is none of them employed a dope dealer to sell their dope.

Jordan River 7:41
So true. That is so true. And of course, that’s what’s going to happen is the patients are going to suffer from that. But I do see that I do see Frenchy as an artist, he needs to he tapped into that artistic, creative side of cannabis so well, really exemplifies that. Before we get into, I mean, we’re just we’re already riffin. I love this. But this does bring together this, this does bring a question to mind. Before we get into all these questions we have prepared, was Frenchy a fan of other types of art? Was he an art lover, or a music lover or film lover, what was what other types of art did he engage in?

Madame Cannoli 8:17
He was a watercolor painter. When he was younger, he also was a designer, he had a line of handbags that he had manufactured in Thailand, they were sold in Japan. He was an antiques dealer at one point. He loved, he loved anything historic and detailed, that celebrated somebody else’s passion. I spent about often on 20 years in Japan, I went to university there, and I worked there, so he’s to come and visit me and stay with me for for a few months, you know, when he was kind of wandering the world doing all of his stuff. And he just loved that Japanese tradition around apprenticeship, and how you could take simple crafts and turn that into art. There’s this understanding in Japan that if you practice the craft long enough, you become a national living treasure of that, that history, that technique, you know, and it’s not the 10,000 hours that they talk about in the West. It’s the 30 years that you know, so it’s just that, that whole thing of, I think cultures that have long history, have more of an understanding of the patience that it takes to really perfect something like that. As Americans, I think the good part of us in our usefulness is that we’re very inventive and creative and inquisitive. The downside of that is we don’t quite have the patience to you know, so you’re like, well, we been good at like, we’ll invent an idea. But then somebody like the Japanese will take it and perfect it and really fine tune it and do it to a better degree than what we could have done.

Jordan River 10:10
That is so funny. The 100 year deal. We’re like, Yeah, sure. 100 year deal. Absolutely. You’re right. It’s a different. It’s a different approach. And I love that I can’t believe Sukhoi, I can’t believe you’re so involved in Japanese culture. That is so cool. How long did you spend over there, did you say?

Madame Cannoli 10:26
About 20 years.

Jordan River 10:27
What! Oh, I think that yeah, this had come up. This had come up before. I didn’t know it was 20 years. Oh, my goodness. That is so cool. So there’s a real connection there. For the you know, this this documentary Frenchy Dreams of Hashish. That makes sense. It’s all coming together now.

Madame Cannoli 10:44
So and that was kind of a riff when we so you know, Frenchy had in 2013 subcool gave him a dedicated page on his roll it up forum because so many, I think some feeling was so many people are asking him questions in other parts of the forum that it was almost like it’s taking up too much space, almost like when you go to see Frenchy at the Emerald Cup. You never wanted your booth to be next to his booth. Like the spillover would be insane. [That’s wild.] So gave him a dedicated page. And so far, and she was kind of fine tuned his teaching methodology through answering those questions for a couple of years. And then in 2015, there was an opportunity he had been writing for you for Weed World Magazine in the UK for a couple of years at that point, I think, and Weed World wanted him to do a smoke report. And he didn’t want to do that. He didn’t want to get bogged down in that. He was really focused on perfecting his understanding of the science behind and he had met the Dank Duchess a little bit before that. So he approached her and said, Miss Frenchy was always about wanting to promote more women in the industry, would you like to take on this small report. But if you want to do that, you need to learn to make hashish because in order to evaluate hashish to a good degree, you need to understand how it’s made. So he taught the Duchess. And then very shortly after that, almost simultaneously, I remember he came home and he’s like, I’m going to start teaching to people, the Duchess and his apprentice bill and it feels like it was within weeks of each other. And Belle was very young at that time, I’ll always remember she wasn’t old enough to rent a car. Because one time I wanted her and Frenchy to go somewhere, she could rent the damn car. But so she came and lived with us for seven years in a very traditional Japanese format, like a formal apprenticeship where you live and you work with the person who’s teaching you. Because she had also been in Japan, she was a military brat. And so at one point her father had been stationed in Japan during the same time we were there, but we didn’t know each other because you know, the age difference and everything. That kind of led to then more and more people through the roll it up and other kind of environment asking Frenchy you know, originally meeting him in cannabis events and saying what do you do and Frenchy would be like, I’m hashishing. And they would be like what is hashishing, because, you know, the war on drugs. by the US government had been so successful, the Feds had put all of the big smugglers, the brotherhood of eternal love, the people who were, you know, kind of controlling that pipeline of traditional hashish into the US, they had busted all those people. So we had a couple of generations of people who had no exposure to traditional concentrates in the US, you were just getting either the weed of the speed world in the hills of the Emerald triangle or stuff coming overland from Mexico. [Right.] So Frenchy kind of took it on himself, almost like his little mission was going to re-educate everybody on traditional hashish. And so he started going to all these events. And for him, the best way to do that was he called it I’m gonna smoke them out. So he would just share hashish with all the young people and people really enjoyed it. And so then they started naturally saying, Okay, where can I get this? And he was, you know, it was limited what he could do in terms of, you know, providing to people because it was the whole script situation with patients in California at that time. So he decided to start teaching and started going all over the US. We went to Europe a number of times, Canada, and at one point, he came home after a trip up north where he had went to visit his farmers. And he was so excited. He said, You know, I spent part of that, that time driving from the Bay Area to Humboldt talking to a guy from Lebanon. And I was like from Lebanon, what were you guys talking about? And he said, Well, this young man approached me, his family had been in the hash making business at one point. But due to the war and other constraints, the tradition had been broken. And this young person wanted to, you know, was trying to revive. But he was missing some details. So he spent about an hour of the drives talking this Lebanese person through the details of what he needed to do to make traditional hashish again. And he was so inspired by, you know, this ability to give back and to kind of return what had been given to him. He said he wanted to do a series of hash making videos, because people had been saying to him, people who were in countries, or for whatever reason, were not able to come to a workshop that they needed the knowledge to. So he wanted to have his workshop filmed, and that we would make this available for free online so that everybody, anywhere who could get access to our website could have this information. So that led to that my daughter was in Performing Arts in New York, so I reached out to her I was like, Hey, do you know anybody anybody doing my video filming that, you know, could do this video of daddy’s workshop that we’re trying to put together. And she introduced us to Jake Remington. She had just been in as a dancer in a video that he had done for some rap musician or something. And it was a couple of weeks before cenovus. So we told Jake, okay, meet us. And in Barcelona, it’s so we’ll see if we if we live if we’re going to do this thing together. So talk about baptism by fire for Jake. Because Barcelona before Spannabis is just like this insane schedule of going to these cups and going to the social clubs in the evening and the Spannabis during the day. And that year, there was some special soccer game that occurred in the city that like historic on top of it. [Oh man!]

So they had a great time together. So Jake came out to California and well, already we did a workshop in Barcelona. So he filmed that one, we did a couple that he filmed. Then he came out to California so that he can have more footage just with Frenchy, and as they were doing all that I kept thinking of Jiro Dreams of Sushi. And at one point in the movie Jiro Dreams of Sushi, there’s a scene where they’re talking to his son who’s, you know, kind of like his apprentice. And at this point, the son is in his 60s because Jarrell is in his 80s when they’re doing this film, and the son is in the hallway, they have their sushi restaurant is in the underground of the Ginza train station. And he’s in the hallway with a little burner, and he’s toasting the sheets of seaweed paper, the nori and he’s just moving his wrist back and forth, while he talks about this idea that, you know, anybody can learn the technique, that that’s just a question of time. But what really makes somebody what really makes somebody an artist, what really makes somebody great, is not only the discipline to put in the time, but it’s the talent, and that that talents, really the elusive piece and that, you know, it’s not something that is calculated, some people have it or some people don’t. And that talent is, in a way also manifested, I think, for those of us who are observers of it as passion. And that’s exciting. There’s something for humans to observe passion, that kind of kindled something in you as well. And I think for a lot of us is it’s like, oh, I don’t have that talent, but I could I have a passion for what you produce. And that the in that way, I kind of vicariously participate in your talent. [Absolutely!} So for people who are like winemakers or hash makers, we’re lucky because we get to physically sample those things and kind of then go, Oh, I get it, I get why we’re excited about what you do as comparison to the person who’s making the mids and who is just running it through, you know, machinery to produce a product, but we as Okay, so you produce it, and but I’m not going to pay, you know, big bucks for that. And it’s that, I think it’s that thing that we’re all trying to come back to, especially after the pandemic, where the value of a human life is about experience. It’s about connection. It’s about exchanging meaningful things together. And that’s why like having a great meal slowly is so you know, important or, you know, going on little trips together where you just have quiet moments or maybe just share meaningful, something really meaningful to you. And that’s enhanced by smoking, you know, and you look at traditional cultures, and they had ceremonies around that, you know, when we look at the Hindu culture, and the Saturday smoke, and that each time you’d like to Shillong, you make a benediction to the gods and you bless the people that you’re sharing that with, or traditional indigenous culture of the people that were here, in the native lands of the Americas, they had a lot of tradition around smoking together, and bringing conflicting sides together to smoke and to explore conversations or explore challenges. And they would all kind of locked themselves in the room, so to speak with the smoke, and it could go on for weeks, and sometimes months when they were dealing with a difficult issue.

Jordan River 20:53
It’s a threat throughout humanity. That’s a really incredible perspective. And you’re right, like I’ve given a lot of thought to like, happiness, right, and the meaning of life and, and all these things that go deeper than just being happy, like satisfaction, and providing value and contributing to those around you. And having a connection with nature, like you’re saying, when you really boil it. Yeah, when you really boil it down, though, I think that at its extreme core, is exactly what you just said, which is fine food and fine smoke, and sometimes a little fine drink among friends and loved ones. Like that is the meaning of life. And I think you’re right, that idea that we can all enjoy what the artist has talently crafted, you know what I mean? A talent fully crafted through their passion. Yes. And it creates that value. It connects us together, it creates a value to our culture and our spiritual well being. And I know it’s getting pretty meta, but at the end of the day, like those moments, like you said, eating slowly, laughing with friends and family. That’s, I mean, that’s the meaning of life. That’s what we all loved about Frenchy was his laugh,

Madame Cannoli 22:02
That proverbial thing of like, okay, you could have, I don’t know, bunch of fancy cars or a bunch of fancy clothes. And I don’t know, when I think about the most beautiful moments of my life. Frenchy and I were pretty poor. [Yeah.] And we had each other and we were on a beach where there was nobody else for six months.

Jordan River 22:25
That is so cool. Best things in life are free. [Yeah!] Totally something that I agree with. And you have to kind of live your life by. I love that though. And Frenchy just embody that spirit. So so cool that this is crazy, though that Japanese connection and that documentary Jiro was so good. So that’s cool that it inspired you so much. And yeah, I just want to I just want to hear more. I don’t want to cut you off. Tell me more about the production process of this movie and what we can expect from it, right? Like I know you’re going to show we’re it’s going to be a celebration of his life, I’m sure and showing his craft and things like that. But is there like an overarching message that you want to convey or something like that?

Madame Cannoli 23:03
Well, I you know, I’m not gonna I won’t do any spoilers, but..

Jordan River 23:07
Can’t spoil, true.

Madame Cannoli 23:08
Quintessential Frenchy and that, you know, he was an activist for the plants. He loved the plant. He loved the community. And he really, really loves the farmers who have been fighting the good fight all these years in Northern California, and the San Francisco gay community that led the fight to legalization that we owe so much to and he was very acknowledging of these elements. He always used to say you know that I don’t make this quality. This quality is given to me by people who really care about the planet, care about the planet, care about the interaction of humanity with this, you know, environment. So the film celebrates all these things. [Wow!] And we’re using the film as a vehicle to help support something that was near and dear to Frenchy’s heart. Some of the farmers featured in the film have created a nonprofit called the Lost Coast Farmers Guild, and they’re working also with another nonprofit called the Origins Council, and the Origins Council helps, they lobbying for over 900 legacy farms and businesses in California. And the project that the Lost Coast Farmers Guild is doing a specific to studying cannabis terroir. This was something that Frenchy felt was really important for the farmers up there to gain control of is this legacy, this heritage around the fact that some of the best cannabis in the world is grown in Northern California and this is an acknowledgement that existed before legalization, and that we should look to the Bordeaux Chamber of Commerce at the turn of the century in France when they sought to establish legal protection for the farmers of their region. Because they felt that the wine that was grown there had a recognition for being among the best, if not the best in the world, and they were going to use that as a benchmark to start judging quality in other products.

Jordan River 25:27
I remember talking to Frenchy about that and that’s exactly right. I would love to get involved however I can and supporting those organizations.

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What can you tell us? What can you tell us about Frenchy’s like, like what he was working on in this area of terroir? When you say it, it’s so much more that sounds so much more beautiful. But, but like I would love to know more about what you heard him talking about when it came to this like obviously, this idea of your environment playing into your product, it makes sense, right? You grow think something in one place, taste different than when you grow somewhere else. Did he attribute that to primarily microbiology? Did he attribute that to or he’s like, general, his general philosophy?

Madame Cannoli 27:35
Frenchy is French. So the traditional way of approaching this in France is very multifaceted. They look at seven different sciences. And I don’t know all seven off the top of my head. But basically, yes, the soil microbiome is one aspect. So that’s not only the microbes that are in there, but the minerals, you know, kind of what’s been created by the planet surrounding that area. But this concept of terroir is also looking at the atmospheric conditions. So when we look at Northern California, while we don’t have huge rainfall all year long, there’s a very lush forest up there that’s fed by activity of fog that comes off the Pacific Ocean that’s very cold. And so you know, we just get this fog that rolls anybody who’s lives in North County, you understand just the fog rolling in.

Jordan River 28:29
Right off the bay right before you get into Eureka on the 101. A huge wave of fog. The fog plays into it. That’s crazy.

Madame Cannoli 28:38
Absolutely, yeah, that’s part of the whole tastes of Humboldt. And also that area has rich mineral deposit, very clean water, in part because of all the vegetation they have up there. So in the French traditional concept, all of these things, and including very importantly, the soul of the farmer who is kind of hosting or nurturing, if you will, that environment is very, very important. And so almost like the psychological, the emotional maturity, the psychological attitude of the person in their dealing, you know, how they approach to growing the plants, the types of inputs that they use in their environment, obviously have an impact on the end product, but have an impact on the overall microbial life of what’s going on there. So I think as the farmers have, you know, most of those people started out as kind of back to the land hippies and didn’t know what they didn’t know but over the years have studied so much about how to be good stewards of the land, how to practice regenerative agriculture, and have really had a huge influence on other areas of people doing more traditional agriculture, you know, not growing just Cannabis, but growing other things have been very much involved in, in that movement. So all of this knowledge has accumulated into the amazing products that they grubbed today. And the award winning, you know, cannabis that that produces over and over and over.

Jordan River 30:18
It was so, so cool how he was so passionate about that region. And I know, I know, it’s just gotten harder and harder. I left Humboldt in 2015. I lived there for five years. And it was rough at that time. And I’ve only heard that have people been reaching out to you, I bet people have been reaching out to you probably a combination of grateful that you’re doing this and you’re highlighting this right? And then also probably pretty woeful, that they’re dealing with like rolling brownouts of the power, right? And it’s just hard to be up there.

Madame Cannoli 30:45
Yeah, they I mean, I, you know, both Humboldt and Mendo. I think actually Mendo when it comes to the permitting is in a much worse place that then Humboldt, but ya know, things. It’s, it’s very troubling how it you know, the whole legalization was rolled out, the adult use was rolled out in California. And just some of the, I guess they don’t refer to them as promises. But there were things that were said that were supposed to protect the farmers for five years, you know, to give them an opportunity to establish and stabilize that weren’t quite honored, that created a lot of the situation that we have now. I just helped in part, I mean, while the film is a celebration of the farmer, it’s also a cautionary tale. So I hope that, you know, some of the legalization that’s going on, and other states that are a little bit behind us that they step back, and they, they look at these things a little bit and have some thought to their local communities, because a bunch of big money coming into establish the industry has not proven to be a good thing, by any means. I mean, again, just look to Canada and California, to epic failures in the rollout of what should have been, I mean, especially in the case of California, we had so many people who were really experts at what they were doing in terms of their legacy business. And it’s just criminal that, you know, some of that expertise wasn’t leveraged to the greater success of the existing community.

Jordan River 32:23
That’s really, really well put. I feel like other states are, some states seem to be changing it up and learning a little bit, whereas other ones are just modeling themselves after that progression, right.

Madame Cannoli 32:35
I think that the problem is that some of the same bad players that have failed in Canada, in California, so just being allowed to go and you know..

Jordan River 32:45
Do the same shit. Just do the same f***ing thing. And now it’s in Massachusetts, and in a few years, it will be ruined there, too. Yeah, it’s, it’s incredible what you’re doing. It’s very important work. Honestly, I mean that. So let me just give out the URL. Jeez, it is frenchydreamsofhashish.com for the film. And then, of course, frenchycannoli.com for all the resources and the DIY stuff. And you got the hash making course in six different languages up there. Really love your message. So that

Madame Cannoli 33:18
So that was a beautiful thing that happened after Frenchy’s passing. I was approached by a group who their day jobs are working in cinema in Brazil, and but they’re also big hash aficionados. And so they said to me that they had, you know, they themselves who were good, had good English skills have learned so much from the films that they knew that there were a lot of people in Brazil, who loved hashish, who didn’t have very good English skills. And so could they do the subtitles in Portuguese for the DIY videos? And I said, Oh, that’d be amazing. And they offered to do it. And the volunteer effort, wow, support for our open source project here. [That’s amazing.] So when they did that, we have a group on Facebook where we support education around hash making and so I posted it there and I was like, Hey, everybody, you know, overgrows shop in Brazil has made subtitles available in Portuguese. Well, then somebody came up and they’re like, Oh, I’ll did Spanish. And then somebody was like, well, if we have Spanish in Portuguese, we have down French. Italians were like, well, if there’s French, then we can have Italian and then some nice person from Germany also did it so we ended up with the subtitles in six languages for the DIY videos. And right now we have them in five languages from all the same amazing people for the film. And currently somebody is translating the Danish which I just think it’s fabulous.

Jordan River 34:49
Hell yeah. I love that. It’s International. It’s an international effort. That is absolutely incredible.

Madame Cannoli 34:56
It has been very much so yeah. So when people when we So we’re going to do the worldwide online premier April 29. And we’re kind of making a big celebration out of it, virtually, people will be able to choose from probably six languages with the Danish, so we’ll have English because Frenchy he needs subtitles in English. And then we’ll have Portuguese, Spanish, French, Italian. And if all goes well, the Danish so that gives people you know, a lot of options to really feel comfortable with watching the film. And then we are planning to have three different sessions, online live streams, some people are going to be holding in person events, a lot of people are going to be doing, you know, like little group viewings at home, that we’re going to hook up with some of the people in the social clubs and whatnot in Europe first, 8:30pm there, and we’re gonna do a live stream and talk to them for a little bit. And then a few hours later, we’ll go and we’ll do another one at 8:30pm for all of the east coast of the Americas. So including Canada, US, Mexico, Brazil, talked with people who are holding, you know, public celebrations, the video together and just meet with some of the farmers meet with a filmmaker. And yeah, explore the film details a little bit. And then finally, we’ll do the same thing on the West Coast. And we’ve got some friends in Canada who are going to be doing a little something, we’ve got a group in Humboldt and another one in Mendo, that are going to be having in person events. And then Green Street in Los Angeles is also going to be doing an in person, situation, [Oh, it’s awesome!] I’m looking forward to, you know, kind of spending the 20 Nights celebrating the film and having a bunch of people watch it and helping me make a bunch of noise over it. Because one of the big things about the film for me, is emphasizing that not only people in the cannabis community should see it, other people should see it’s so that we can really get over the stigma. It’s so frustrating how much stigma still exists around cannabis use. But when we look at, you know, some of the dangers of consuming alcohol, for example, I think adults should be able to consume alcohol. I don’t think they should drive when they’re drunk, and you know, have car accidents because of it. But we don’t see that same kind of social stigma.

Jordan River 37:35
Exactly! It’s the hypocrisy.

Madame Cannoli 37:38
This whole thing like, you can have bars and consumed together, what is the big deal about consumption lounges? You know, why can’t the US maybe look to the Barcelona model of having these consumption spaces that are not visible to the outside world. When you go to Barcelona, none of the consumption spaces are in buildings that have windows at the level of where there’s assumption spaces are. They’re all in windows that are in buildings that have like a almost like a double facade, and you go in and there’s an empty chamber before you’re actually in the space where the consumption lounges, or they’re in a basement. So as you’re walking along the streets, you have no idea that there are normal adults doing adult things in the privacy of this space, not bothering anybody with family, with children, who are not of an age to be exposed to these adult activities, even more than you would bring children into a bar.

Jordan River 38:40
Exactly. Or a game of poker or whatever it may be. It’s the hypocrisy that drives people mad, right? It’s it’s exactly what you’re saying, which is, okay, we can’t legalize cannabis, because it has no medicinal value, you know, it doesn’t have it. Well, what about cigarettes? Those are legal.

Madame Cannoli 38:55
Well, and we do have the science now. You know, thanks to so much work that’s been going on for some time now that actually, yes, it does have medicinal, therapeutic value, you know.

Jordan River 39:08
Well of course, no. Well, well, hold on. They’re, they’re hypocritical about that too, which is they say, oh, there’s no medicinal value, but we’re going to patent Epidiolex, which is a CBD derivative, seizure medicate, if they want it both ways. In every single case, like you said, they say it’s dangerous. Well, what about alcohol? Alcohol is dangerous. Well, that, it’s bad for society. What about gambling, gambling is that you can say the moral degeneracy argument could be applied to it. There’s no argument that they make that they’re not double handedly applying in a different way somewhere else, you know what I mean? It’s it’s, it’s a total like bait switch and it’s a complete hypocrisy.

Madame Cannoli 39:43
I just wish that more of this science around the endocannabinoid system that exists in all mammals would be acknowledged, you know, because then if you start to do that Frenchy used to say, you know, he didn’t believe in God, but when you think that, so humans, you know, we have like this kind of common single cell origin between plants and ultimately, you know, mammals, but that the plants came before us, like 26 million years. [Sure!] And so here we are, we have this plant that evolved 26 million years before us. And somehow we have a system in our body that is like a lock and key mechanism with this plant that was, you know, evolved from much longer before us. He used to say, I don’t believe in God, but I definitely believe in some kind of divine intelligence. And when I understand this, this connection between the plants and humans that is, yeah, at a cellular level, he’s like, that takes hash making to a whole new level.

Jordan River 40:55
Right. Yeah. I mean, we can talk about the passion of the flavor and the connoisseur aspect. And all of that is its own kind of conversation. But I love that medicinal pursuit. I know Frenchy was very passionate, like you said, and learning more about the…

Madame Cannoli 41:12
All annabis use is therapeutic. Yeah. Whether you are aware of it, whether you kind of consciously acknowledge it, or not all cannabis use is therapeutic.

Jordan River 41:23
That is so true. I’ve had that same sentiment recently, which is I have an extraordinarily hard time distinguishing recreational cannabis use for medicinal cannabis. That line doesn’t exist. The you know what I mean? You speak to anyone, even who even people who claim they use it recreationally and they say, well, I I use it to relax at the end of the day. It’s like that’s medicinal use, or even better, what you just quoted, Frenchy’s saying is therapeutic. That’s a perfect way to put it actually,

Madame Cannoli 41:47
Yeah, he needs to make a clear distinction. He’s like, leave the medicine to the pharmacists and the doctors, no problem with that they should control that, they should develop the drugs to treat the illnesses. But therapeutic use that’s like aromatherapy, that’s like your you know, so good you have a mild tea when you had an upset stomach traditionally, you know, when he was a little boy,

Jordan River 42:15
Totally! Some bone broth, some real like, it is a plant medicine at the end of the day. [Yes.] But I love that term, the therapeutic aspect of it, because that’s what it is. It’s it’s homeopathic, it’s therapeutic. It’s all of those things. [Yeah!] That’s really cool. I do want to speak about hashish specifically though, because this traditional temple ball method that Frenchy was such such a master of and such a proponent of, I feel like it’s going to come back in a huge way. I really, really do. Like, it’s always been this niche aspect of cannabis. I’m sure you would agree with that. And it’s certainly been growing because of the efforts of people like you. But I have a feeling that it’s going to pop off in like mainstream culture. And because things are progressing that way, right? Everyone going from BHO to rosin and solventless, do you feel that there’s like a kind of trendy explosion that’s waiting to happen around temple balls, like coming to the forefront?

Madame Cannoli 43:15
So the things for us, could be myself with the Europeans now is that we always only saw the resin. So this kind of phenomena of looking at the plant and seeing the flower. This is a very North American thing. And I think this really dates to you know, the success of the Feds war on drugs is that to a degree because, you know, North America is almost like a big island to a degree from some of the rest of the world. When we look at cannabis tradition in Europe, this is something that, you know, couldn’t travel overland, you know, from this first place now that we understand is probably a North northern Tibet 28 million years ago. And then through animal migrations through humans, looking to the plant and touching it, and realizing it was a source of food and fiber, and nutrition, you know, and then taking that with them as they traveled the silk road into the Mediterranean. You know, more recently with Napoleon’s army and joining, Hashish smoking in Egypt and bringing the tradition back to them like good military always do all over the world they bring, they bring home the drugs with them good or bad. You know, just thinking of the poor guys in Vietnam that brought heroin back with them, but that’s a less illustrious story. So in Europe, there was always the tradition of seeing the concentrate, not seeing the flower. That smoking of the flower is a pretty new, I would say last 15 years phenomena in Europe. And so this tradition of, Frenchy really used to say that for him hash smoking, not rosin, and I think it’s important to kind of clarify definitions, because in North America also, there’s this tendency to use the term hash, almost as if you we were talking about dairy products, you know that everything made as a candidate concentrates [Oh, true.] you know.

Jordan River 45:28
Yes. That’s how we like, and you’re right, that comes from a land of prohibition like that. I grew up in the Midwest, where it was illegal. And it’s hash is the overarching term like dairy. You’re right. And then you got your cheese and your milk and your cottage cheese and you got your bubble.

Madame Cannoli 45:46
Yeah, no, and I, I keep having this. I had some kind of really ugly confrontations with have told me basically, back off old lady, this is our culture, and we’ll call it whatever we want. And part of me is like, okay, you can do that, but the rest of the world is not going to understand you. And Frenchy used to say, you know, this is kind of like the American tradition of football. Here, you took this term, and you kind of appropriated it from another game, ie soccer. And he’s to say, and the funny thing is your game, you hardly touch the ball with your foot. So maybe

Jordan River 46:27
So maybe a couple of times a game yeah, with the pontoon with the field goal, you touch it with your foot, otherwise football is not, you do not want to touch it with your feet.

Madame Cannoli 46:35
Not to create conflict. It’s an effort to create clarity, because, you know, language is, is limitless, we can create as many nouns as we want. So I don’t understand why we’re kind of insisting on using this one term, to cover traditional hashish to cover loose resin to cover rosin to cover scrim. Ben, you know?

Jordan River 47:06
Yeah, refuse.

Madame Cannoli 47:07
Kief is another word don’t even get me going. Because that’s that one has a precedent that goes back 200 years in North Africa, where Kief is actually chopped black tobacco with chopped mixed with chopped cannabis flour smoked in a long, thin pipe known as a sebsi in Morocco.

Jordan River 47:27
Oh, is that true? I didn’t know it involves tobacco. See? [Yeah, black tobacco.] I had never heard that before. Yeah. And then where I grew up, a spliff was either half tobacco, half weed, or it was just a term for a joint of cannabis. Just cannabis. So it’s very confusing.

Madame Cannoli 47:45
Yeah, all of these things, I think this kind of misuse of language has, of course, people are going to do whatever they’re going to do with their local slang and whatnot, that’s fine. But at some point, if you want to do commerce, even, like let’s say, they opened up interstate commerce. And if we, you know, when you’re talking about hash in the Midwest, it’s this Smorgasburg of products. But if we’re talking about it, you know, from Frenchy’s perspective, in California, it’s this very specific, this resin trichome heads that have been gathered either through a dry sift or an ice water sieving process, and then press into a mass with a source of heat. And all of the material from those trichome heads remain together in that mass. And that resulting mass is traditional hashish. Whereas then, if you take that mass, and you use a much greater pressure, using a rosin press, to extract, to press the resin, the pure resin from those trichome heads, you know that the cellular membrane, and so the cellular membrane is left behind that resulting product is rosin. And I don’t know, I don’t understand why there’s such a resistance to using that term for that product. I’ve had a number of people say, No, that’s how she should I’m like, well, but how can this previous product that you acknowledge is the product? How can it be the same thing that would almost be like if I told you here, I have some applesauce, and I have some apple juice, and you’re continuing to call the apple juice apple sauce? Why would you do that?

Jordan River 49:28
Well, so a couple of things. First of all, those just sound like people online, go f***ing argue there’s probably just some trolls out there. But the second thing I’ll say is people who genuinely don’t know it’s because of the dispensaries and I’ve experienced this before, which is the MSO f***ing cultivators, the ones who don’t know what they’re doing and and aren’t from the craft world. They create concentrates that come out vastly different consistencies. So they start making up names for these things, whether it’s wax or butter or sauce or diamonds in sauce or whatever. So they create such a smorgasbord, because they’re where’s the regulatory body to say, oh, no. Wine there’s a definition for wine. I’m sure there is some alcohol fuckin board of regulation that defines what you can and can’t call what. That doesn’t exist because of illegal immigration. So it’s just wild.

Madame Cannoli 50:23
You know, when you look at this terminology, it comes from published pharmacy texts that, you know, most countries have. And so when you compare some of these lexicons from one country to the other, there’s even a great deal of difference in how how this has been approached, historically, so it’s not going to be an easy thing to clean up by any means. Because you have the history of the culture, you have the science that, you know, to a large degree has been made up by a bunch of people who don’t know what really truly what they’re dealing with. You can see this there was a big study done by the English around the turn of the century in India. And they went out and they surveyed, they were wanting to determine, does cannabis consumption cause insanity. Because it caused insanity, they were going to make it illegal, because they wanted to be able to, you know, control the population, they wanted a peaceful society, right. But if it didn’t cause insanity, then they wanted to be able to process it in such a manner that it was easily to, it was easy to calculate taxes on it, because if a bunch of people were consuming this, well, they wanted to have a piece of the pie in terms of the profit. [Right.] And so they interviewed all these pharmacists, all these traditional cannabis growers in India, hash makers, there’s a big tradition there of edible type consumption in the drink called Bong, and in some other edible products. So they, they have recipes of this. And the final, you know, outcome of this. I think the research took like, four or five years, and there’s seven volumes. It’s it’s open source, it’s online. But it’s a wealth of information about no, it does not cause insanity. And here are traditional recipes. And here’s how it’s involved in the traditional culture and has been around forever. And they haven’t had any problems with it.

Jordan River 52:28
Wow. Yeah, it’s just another we see these patterns throughout human history. And sometimes you take a step back, it’s nice to take a step forward. And alcohol being a legalized coffee was a illegalized throughout history and several different nations. And eventually people are like, No, I really fucking like this thing you don’t understand. This is this is a this is a plant medicine. It’s extremely healthy. And I like this thing, whether it’s coffee or cannabis.

Madame Cannoli 52:52
Well, but you know, it always came down to a financial motivation on the part of the government because when you look at the legalization of coffee or tea, there’s, you know, the taxes associated with that were huge. I mean, look at, you know, some of the challenges between the US and England took off.

Jordan River 53:13
The Boston Tea Party.

Madame Cannoli 53:15
It was all about tea taxes.

Jordan River 53:18
That’s right. You absolutely nailed it. Can we get this money? Or can we use it to to like oppress people and use it as a as a kind of sledgehammer? So? Yeah, it’s crazy. I really liked the philosophy that you and Frenchy have carried. I can’t say it enough. Well, wait a second, though. Before we move on from this. Did Frenchy drink coffee? Was he a tea drinker? Or did he drink a ton of did he drink like a pot of coffee a day? I bet he did.

Madame Cannoli 53:45
Yes. Yeah, Frenchy was a huge. Caffeine being huge sugar being we used to joke with Bill that he drink coffee is an excuse to consume sugar. Yeah, he was pretty much mainlining caffeine in the morning.

Jordan River 54:03
Coffee with a bunch of sugar. Okay, that’s that makes so much sense with Frenchy personality. That’s beautiful. Madam, please anything else that we can talk about here before we wrap it up? We already this hour absolutely flew by you are an amazing guest. Of course the website. Check it out everybody. You can find everything Frenchy Cannoli only at frenchycannoli.com. And then the documentary, frenchydreamsofhashish.com Any any parting words?

Madame Cannoli 54:27
So the only other little tiny thing that I would say is that if you would like to receive an email on April 29, with the link to the Vmail Vimeo page where the film will be available, just visit that www.frenchydreamsofhashish.com and then put a forward slash streaming and that’ll just put your name on the email list and on the day of the event, I’ll send you out an email with the link to make it easy for you to find the film. [Absolutely wonderful!] I hope that you’ll join the livestream. So we’re going to be streaming at 8:30 in those three time zones, and it will be on Frenchy’s YouTube page, on our lost art Facebook page on Frenchy’s Instagram and on his LinkedIn account, so you don’t have to sign up for a new app or a new account. Most people have one of those are on one of those platforms as well. Yeah, 8:30 3 times on that day, we’ll be joining some of our friends worldwide to talk about the film, pass the hookah around virtually. And yeah, just spend a little community time together.

Jordan River 55:37
I will be there. One more time, thank you so much, Madame. This was a lovely interview. And it’s really cool for you to do this and to be so candid and open and awesome. So thank you for everything.

Madame Cannoli 55:48
Thank you very much for making the time for me.

Jordan River 55:50
Of course anytime and everybody one more time, frenchycannoli.com. And then of course, frenchydreamsofhashish.com/streaming, if you want to sign up to that email list. Thank you, everybody, so much. Appreciate you tuning in. And we will see you next time. Make sure to hit that subscribe, that follow Spotify, wherever you’re listening to go ahead and subscribe, follow us and stay tuned for some awesome content. This is Madame Cannoli and Jordan River signing off. Wishing you an extraordinary day everyone. Be safe out there and grow smarter. Bye bye.

That is our show. Thank you so much to Madame Cannoli and thank you for tuning in today. Come and see us we have a bunch of events coming up community cup, Oklahoma City may 7, I’ve told you all about it. It’s a day of education. It is stacked with speakers like Brandon Ruston, OK Calyx and Farmer John and myself and everybody. It’s worth the drive down everybody. You do not need a medical card to enter general admission, only $20. Grab those tickets at growcast podcast.com/communitycup. Now we also have our classes PestaPalooza coming to Long Island and coming to San Diego. That is an all day pest fest with me and Matthew Gates. Don’t miss it, everybody. Don’t miss it. That one’s going to be huge. We’re in Long Island in June. And we’re in San Diego in July. I can’t wait to come and see you. So stay tuned, everybody. We’ve got all sorts of stuff find all of our events at growcastpodcast.com/classes. We put everything on up there. And I want to come in smoke your home grown with y’all. Bring some peach dosi we can swap and I love shaking hands with the fans and the growers meeting new people one on one. It’s my favorite thing. I made a pledge after the lockdown ended that I was going to do as many in person events as I can. And now look at us. We’re doing masterclasses. We’re doing members cultivators cups, community cups. Skim big, everybody. We’re doing it every day. I will continue to work tirelessly for the GrowCast audience and for the members of the Order of Cultivation. Membership is open, growcastpodcast.com/membership. All right everyone, we’ll see you next time. Stay tuned, everybody. You know what to do. Be safe out there!

Transcribed by https://otter.ai