Chances are you’ve had a glass of Champagne at a wedding or a graduation by now. You’ve also probably tried Ireland’s famous Guinness beer at least once in your life. However, have you ever thought of combining these two drinks? While it may sound weird to mix French Champagne with Dublin’s darkest draught, bartenders have been doing it for decades. In fact, there’s a cocktail named for this unlikely pair: Black Velvet.

If you’re thinking of giving the Black Velvet a try at your next get-together, check out how Tribe CBD mixes this beverage. Oh yeah, and since this drink is partially Irish, don’t forget to add a little “green” with Tribe’s CBD oil! It’s only fitting, right? 

Tribe’s CBD Black Velvet Recipe

While the Black Velvet has been keeping drinkers happy for centuries, it has a tragic origin story. Apparently, bartenders created the Black Velvet cocktail shortly after Prince Albert’s untimely death. 

For those who know their British history, Prince Albert was Queen Victoria’s husband from 1840 – 1861. Tragically, Prince Albert was only 42 when he died of typhoid fever. Amazingly, Queen Victoria would survive Prince Albert for another 40 years—and she would stay in mourning for the rest of her life. 

Bonus trivia: Did you know Prince Albert could have died much sooner due to an accident near Buckingham Palace? Apparently, the prince was skating on thin ice when he fell into a frigid pond in 1841. Luckily for Prince Albert, Queen Victoria rushed in at the nick of time to save him. Had he died in this incident, Prince Albert would have been just 22. 

Ingredients 

• 4 oz Champagne 
• 4 oz Guinness black lager
• 1 dropperful of Tribe CBD oil

Directions

• Pour Champagne in a pre-chilled flute or a clear beer mug
• Pour black stout over the back of a bar spoon into your mug
• Top with Tribe CBD oil

It’s always important to keep your cocktails well-chilled for the best drinking experience. However, as you probably noticed, there’s no ice in a traditional Black Velvet cocktail. So, how are you going to keep this drink cold for guests? Simple: plan ahead! 

Please be sure to put your Champagne and Guinness in the fridge at least a few hours before preparing this drink. You should also put your serving glasses in the refrigerator to get them nice and frosty. 

However, don’t worry too much if you forget to put your glasses in the fridge. There is a neat trick you could use in case you forget to pre-chill your Champagne flutes. Before grabbing all your ingredients, put a handful of ice in your serving glass and let it sit for a few minutes. When you’re ready to start mixing, just dump out the ice and follow the recipe above. This quick-fix may not be as good as putting your glasses in the fridge, but it’s better than nothing. 

Sleep Tight With Tribe CBD Sleep Shots 

Considering all the alcohol in a standard Black Velvet, it’s likely this drink will make you snore within a few hours. However, it’s not a great idea to rely on Black Velvets to combat insomnia. For all-natural sleep relief, we recommend trying Tribe’s CBD Sleep Shots. With a combination of hemp extract and melatonin, our CBD Sleep Shots should put you in a sleepy state of mind in no time.

Please find out more about Tribe’s CBD Sleep Shots here. 

The news and editorial staff of the Bay Area News Group had no role in this post’s preparation.

By ALASTAIR BLAND |Marin Independent Journal
PUBLISHED: May 5, 2021 at 5:19 a.m. | UPDATED: May 5, 2021 at 5:20 a.m.

Ethanol contains 7 calories per gram. That’s almost two times the calories of carbohydrates and nearly as many of fat. So, if you want to drink beer without the calories, sorry — it’s not going to happen. It can’t.

That may be why, as breweries strive to minimize their beers’ caloric value, cannabis beverages are taking flight. With THC-infused drinks, consumers can attain that buzz they’re after without the caloric baggage. In a sense, they’re required to, since it is illegal to combine alcohol and THC in the same product.

Cannabis-infused drinks have been on the market for several years now, but I didn’t have a taste until last week, when I was delivered a sample pack of a lime-and-basil-flavored bubbly water infused lightly with the compounds of interest from marijuana — namely, and chemically, tetrahydrocannabinol and cannabidiol. These are better known in daily dialogues as THC and CBD.

CBD is the miracle molecule that cures all ills, or nearly so, according to high life advocates, while THC is the compound that messes with people’s heads.

The product I tasted contains both. It is on shelves now and emerged from collaboration between Sava, a local online cannabis vendor, and Cann, which makes a variety of all-natural, low-dose “social tonics,” as Cann’s website calls them.

The drink was spritzy, and the flavor combination was light and wonderful.

My drinking companion claims to have gotten almost immediately, and very mildly, stoned. I felt only a slight touch of a giddy lightness, but it was real and clear — a genuine high. It was the first time I had used cannabis in a measured way (the 8-ounce can contains 2 milligrams of THC and 4 of CBD, and just 35 calories) and now I know that a little extra might be perfect for me, and next time I may double my dose. The Lime Basil Cann Social Tonic is widely available in the Bay Area and should run about $12 for a four-pack.

Cann’s website calls social tonics “the future of drinking.” Whether brewers believe this or not, they are certainly listening to such claims. Indeed, as more states legalize marijuana — as California, Alaska, Maine and many more have done – brewers are dabbling in this sector. Lagunitas, for one, has done so. In 2017, the Marin-born, Sonoma-based beer giant made an alcoholic cannabis beer — what the brewery claims to have discovered only after the fact was illegal. For combining alcohol with THC was and remains against federal law. Currently, Lagunitas offers a drink called Hi-Fi Hops — an IPA-inspired bubbly water, sans alcohol, and infused with 5 mg of THC.

Other non-alcoholic THC “beers” include High Style Brewing’s Pale Haze, with a whopping 10 mg of THC; the same brewery’s Blood Orange Haze, with 10 mg of THC; and Flying Dog’s IPA-inspired Hop Chronic, with an unmeasured amount of THC.

Combining CBD with alcohol is allowed, and we see an example of this in Coalition Brewing Co.’s Two Flowers IPA, which contains 6% ABV, 0 THC and 10 mg of CBD.

Reports recently emerged from Canada that beer sales declined markedly when marijuana became legal — a clear sign that many beer lovers aren’t beer lovers at all; rather, they just want to have fun — minus the calories.

Alastair Bland’s Through the Hopvine runs every week in Zest. Contact him at allybland79@gmail.com.

The drink, named Hi-Fi Hops, only will be available at licensed cannabis dispensaries in California starting July 30. It will come in two varieties, including one containing 10 mg of THC, a principal psychoactive chemical in marijuana. The other will have 5 mg of THC and 5 mg of cannabidiol, or CBD, a cannabis compound used to treat pain. The drinks do not contain alcohol.

The product comes on the on heels of last year’s Lagunitas SuperCritical Ale, which contained aromatic compounds of essential oils extracted from marijuana plants but had no THC in the beer. Both drinks were produced with Santa Rosa-based CannaCraft Inc., a cannabis-extract manufacturing facility led by William Silver, former dean of Sonoma State University’s business school.

Lagunitas was founded in 1993 by Tony Magee, an avid cannabis user whose marketing long promoted a stoner-friendly culture. So the push into the cannabis drinks market is not a surprising for one of the nation’s largest craft brewers, now wholly owned by Heineken International.

It also not the first or largest foray by alcohol-beverage makers into the expanding cannabis market.

Wine giant Constellation Brands Inc. which owns Clos du Bois in Geyserville, Simi Winery in Healdsburg and Robert Mondavi Winery in Napa, took a 10 percent stake in a Canadian medicinal cannabis provider in October, gaining more insight into the sector.

“Hi-Fi is not the first chapter in the love affair between cannabis and Lagunitas, but it is one of the most exciting,” Lagunitas CEO Maria Stipp said in a statement. “The idea of having a no-calorie beverage infused with cannabis seemed like a perfect next step in our product innovation, and a natural way to marry our past with our future.”

Most beverage producers so far have steered clear of cannabis, especially over concern such blends could jeopardize their federal license to make beer, wine, or spirits because marijuana still is illegal under federal law.

But the lure of a new market is strong and many are exploring ways to enter the sector, valued at up to $7 billion California.

“I think alcohol industry is very much paying attention to cannabis and finding out ways to get involved,” said Rebecca Stamey-White, an attorney who represents alcohol beverage producers who want to enter the market. “Most folks are avoiding products containing alcohol and finding ways to leverage their brand in cannabis.”

Lagunitas found a way around potential legal snags by brewing the hop-flavored water at its Petaluma facility. It was then trucked it over to CannaCraft, where the THC and CBD were added and then canned. CannaCraft will use its own distribution network in California to deliver the product to as many as 250 dispensaries in the state.

To comply with a new child-safety law, CannaCraft worked with its vendor to design an aluminum can that would require two maneuvers to open instead of the traditional pop-top, said spokeswoman Kial Long.

Lagunitas said the new drinks will be full of hops, like its beers. But they’ll also feature fruit aromas, such as grapefruit, and floral fragrances, including lavender.

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©2018 The Press Democrat (Santa Rosa, Calif.)

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