A new medical marijuana dispensary in Soquel is offering its customers a tasty alternative to smoking: enjoying a bowl of pot-infused ice cream.
At Crème De Cana, the half pints of ice cream have titles that may have Ben and Jerry taking notes.
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The current flavors owner Jonathan Kolodinski offers at Creme De Canna, which opened last week, are Banannabis Foster, Straw-Mari Cheesecake and TRIPLE Chocolate Brownie. Kolodinski said more flavors are in the works.
Kolodinksi said he is offering the ice cream as a healthy alternative to patients who do not want to smoke medical marijuana, and so far, business is off to a smoking start.
"Everybody who's tried it has said they absolutely love it. A lot of people come back for seconds, thirds and fourths," Kolodinksi said.
At $15 a piece, the half-pints of ice cream are potent.
Klodinski said there are about two to four doses of cannabis for each half-pint, which means finishing one would be similar to smoking an eighth of high-grade marijuana, the equivalent of eight joints.
Klodinski said that critics of his pot-laced ice cream shouldn't worry if the concoction is grabbing the wrong sort of attention, because in the end, his goal is to help his patients.
"We very explicitly label all our products with a marijuana leaf that says 'Keep out of reach of children'. We have been very mindful," Klodinski said. "I've got a daughter. I come from a very conservative family." Also, the card-carrying marijuana patients cannot eat the ice cream at the collective.
While the city of Santa Cruz has banned more dispensaries from opening up in the city, the county of Santa Cruz does not have any laws currently in place.
County Supervisor John Leopold has been trying to put an ordinance in place that would regulate marijuana retailers.