Bhang in chocolate? A kick for everyone

Onion bhajis (pakoras, to most of us) and chicken tikka masala (a sort of butter chicken) have already taken over Great Britain. Will the Indian takeover of American tastebuds come from bhang chocolate? A chocolate-maker in the US has asked for a trademark for his product called Bhang: The Original Cannabis Chocolate, which will, of course, be chocolate laced with cannabis.

Bhang is liberally used in India, especially during festivals like Holi, and is often put into samosas or drunk with the flavoured milk-drink thandai. Cannabis sativa indica, which is where bhang comes from, is a narcotic, and depending on how it can be processed, is also known as marijuana, hashish, grass, and so on. As bhang-filled samosas intoxicate people in India, so do hashish-filled brownies in the West. Either way, the idea is to get a kick or a high. The marriage between chocolate and cannabis — whatever you want to call it — is a joining of great flavour with intoxicating after-effects.

It will be interesting to see just how the West — which is usually paranoid about narcotic use — reacts to this drug and chocolate mix. As for India, we could just as well start mixing bhang with chocolate milk shakes next Holi to see how we like it, since consumption of cannabis is allowed in small amounts at certain times. Let the good times roll?