- Category
- PRODUCTS / CULTURE
- Where
- Bemmel, Netherlands
- When
- Published Oct 9
Inside a legal Dutch grow: a hash lab and a chef from a starred kitchen
A video shows the inside of Hollandse Hoogtes, one of ten companies growing cannabis legally for coffeeshops in the Netherlands. Strain selection, hash making and gummy production are each handled by a different team within the facility.
In the Netherlands, only ten licensed companies now grow cannabis legally for coffeeshops. One of them is Hollandse Hoogtes in Bemmel, in the province of Gelderland. The Dutch cannabis outlet CNNBS presented a video tour of the facility.
Strain selection is in the hands of Karma Genetics, a breeder with many cup wins. The company holds more than 200 strains and keeps 20 to 25 in production at a time. A candidate plant does not move into full production until its harvest has actually been tried.
Each of the roughly 400 mother plants carries its own QR code, so flower can be traced from the plant it grew from to the shop it reached. Harvested flower is trimmed by hand and bagged by hand.
The facility also has a hash lab. Frozen flower is washed in ice and cold water to collect the resin, which is sorted into four grades, and rosin is made as well. The lower grades go to the kitchen, where a chef with experience in a Michelin-starred restaurant turns them into THC gummies in 5 mg and 20 mg doses.
A single harvest runs to 180 to 220 kilograms, yet the work looks more like a craft workshop. One person selects, another washes, another cooks. It shows the inside of the coffeeshop country shifting toward a division of labor among craftspeople.