Minimizing or Controlling the Flavor of Infused Butter
When making a butter which will be infused hot, are there any ways to minimize or control the flavor compounds which will be extracted? I would like to make a cannabis butter, but to maximize it's culinary versatility, I'd like to extract as little flavor as possible, or at least be able to control the levels of specific flavors that are extracted (herbal, fruity, citrusy, etc).
(In case this is a touchy subject for anyone, this is legal where I live.)
Best Answer
Flavour infusion is mostly a chemical process and without some serious tools, chemistry, and knowledge you'll have tough time dictating what you want infused. Sort of like sending a bunch of kids to a Smarties jar and hoping the blue ones are left behind.
As time progresses more and more compounds that can dissolve in butter do, and with more concentration.
The best suggestion I have is to experiment with different lengths of time at different temperatures (freezer even) in the hopes that the ones you'd like to keep away are bigger and take longer to dissolve.
Your other option is to do the opposite and dissolve the stuff you don't want in water or another butter batch and once you have a good base, infuse a fresh batch of butter with the remaining (good flavours). Though given your base herb this may be undesired.
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Answer 2
This might be getting a little too far into chemistry, and it's more a 'what to try' than a usable answer, as it's going to be different for specific herbs & flavors to extract.
When extracting / infusing, there are chemical compounds that may come out faster or slower than the others in a given solvent. And some may be slowed down more significantly. This is why you can brew iced tea in the fridge for days without concern, but you have to pull the leaves after 8 hours or so when it's been in a warm room (or you start extracting the nasty flavors).
So, you either have to find a solvent that will extract what you want, and not what you don't (or very slowly for those that you don't) .... or you find a solvent that will extract the stuff that you don't want, and use that first, then dispose of it and use the herbs in the infusion that you will keep (this is how we get 'decaffinated' tea).
You can also try different pre-infusion treatments to help with extraction, to see if they affect some compounds more than others -- blanching, bruising the leaves, freezing (so moisture in the leaves will form ice crystals to damage the cell walls), microwaving (although be careful if it's too dry), etc.
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