An increasingly popular and versatile ingredient used in a wide variety of recipes, MCT oil is quickly catching on as many a cook’s favorite. Full of fats beneficial to our health, MCT oil also has some cool qualities that make it particularly useful for DIY CBD tinctures. If that sounds like something you’d like to try and you want to know more about how it works, read on.
What is MCT Oil?
MCT stands for medium-chain triglycerides. Not exactly the kind of vocab you come across every day – unless you’re a lab chemist, that is. In plain English, MCT oil is a specific kind of fat extract. The reason why MCT is so special is that its medium chains are physically smaller than the long chains that make up most of the dietary fat we consume every day.
Many foods contain some amount of MCT, but the highest concentrations are found in palm seeds and coconuts. This is why store bought, 100% MCT oil extract will usually be made from these kinds of plant-based sources. Because our bodies find the fats in MCT easier to digest, it also means that the oil gets metabolized and absorbed into our system more quickly.
This makes MCT extremely useful as a supplement, and it is often prescribed to people with digestive problems, certain nutrient sensitivities, or allergies, as well as part of weight loss regimens.
MCT Oil Benefits
Thanks to its digestive properties, MCT oil can help you feel satiated for longer. It also holds plenty of nutritional value since it supplies you with the kinds of fats you’re least likely to already be getting enough of through your regular diet.
There is some evidence to further suggest that MCT might have a positive effect on our gastrointestinal system. Specifically, MCT oil seems to encourage the growth of healthy bacteria in the gut while also improving energy levels, certain immune properties, and much more!
But far beyond that, MCT oil also serves another important role – as a liquid base for tinctures. As you might know, tinctures are one of the most convenient ways to (literally) infuse your day with a little bit of smooth, relaxing CBD. The only problem is that tinctures only really kick in once they’ve been metabolized, and that can take quite some time.
This is where MCT oil comes to the rescue: by using MCT as the “carrier” of your CBD tincture, you can reap its metabolic benefits and allow your CBD to kick in that much sooner.
Sublingual Use of MCT Oil
The same applies to the old trick of putting a drop of CBD oil under your tongue. This increases absorption speed considerably – and even more so when using MCT oil.
While even just adding a tiny drop of MCT to your afternoon tea can make a noticeable difference, power users will want to reap the extra benefits of combining MCT oil with CBD and applying it sublingually for super-smooth highs that come on quickly and last.
MCT Oil Vs. Coconut Oil
Many people conflate MCT oil with coconut oil; in fact, you might sometimes see the one advertised as the other on store shelves! While there is a relationship between coconut oil and MCT, it’s not exactly one-to-one.
MCT oil is a compound that appears in many plant extracts and resins, and that includes coconuts. In fact, coconuts are among the best sources of MCT and are often used to make bottled MCT oil products! That is precisely where all the confusion originates from.
While coconut oil is about 50% MCT by volume, MCT isn’t coconut oil, nor does the reverse hold true. Coconut oil namely also includes plenty of other fats and beneficial compounds, including for instance the more common LCTs (long-chain triglycerides) and various unsaturated fats. In the end, if you’re looking for a good, organic source of MCT, coconut oil is it – but MCT oil supplements will give you far more bang for your buck.
How to Make CBD MCT Oil Tincture
Now, let’s talk about the really exciting part: making your own CBD MCT Oil tinctures! MCT-CBD tinctures can be used just like any other tincture. You can apply them sublingually, store them in a little dropper and dose them just like you’re used to.
Technically speaking, a CBD MCT oil tincture is not actually a tincture, but an infusion since the process involves infusing our CBD isolate with the MCT oil. There are actually a handful of DIY-friendly methods you can use to make such an infusion, but today we are going to go over one of the most widespread and accessible of them all.
In commercial applications involving high volumes, infusing MCT into CBD tinctures can be quite an involved process. However, for the average home user, it doesn’t have to be complicated at all and you should be able to achieve great results without the need for much practice.
How to Make CBD Distillate Tincture With MCT Oil
Requirements:
- Sealable container (jar, pitcher, etc.)
- Refrigerator
- Mixing Bowl
- Slow cooker
- Blender (optional)
- Strainer
- Cheesecloth
- 2 grams pure CBD isolate
- 1 cup pure MCT oil
Procedure
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Assemble your CBD isolate and MCT oil and blend them together in a small mixing bowl. Feel free to use a blender, though mixing by hand for a few minutes should be more than enough to allow the two ingredients to combine.
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Next, transfer your ingredients from the bowl to a crockpot set on low heat (the ‘warm’ setting will probably do the trick just as well). Keep covered for at least 2 hours – more is better – and don’t forget to stir every now and then.
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When ready, prepare a sealable container of your choice, such as a glass mason jar, and cover it with a strainer, lining the opening with a cheesecloth to prevent things from getting too messy.
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Pour out the contents of your crockpot into the strainer. If some plant matter separates from the oils, that’s normal! Let the liquids drip into the jar and catch all the solids with the cheesecloth. Squeeze it all out over the opening to really get those last few drops of MCT.
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When you’re done, cover and seal the jar and store it cold in the fridge. If refrigerating is not an option, any cold, dark place free of excessive moisture should be fine.
Equipment:
- Sealable container (jar, pitcher, etc.)
- Refrigerator
- Mixing bowl
- Slow cooker
- Blender (optional)
- Strainer
- Cheesecloth
Ingredients:
- 1 - 2g pure CBD isolate
- 1 cup pure MCT Oil
Serving Size: 16 average servings
Estimated Cost: $10-15
Prep Time: 5 minutes
Cooking Time: 5 minutes
Total Time: 10 minutes or less
Nutrition: Up to 100 calories total
Cuisine Type: Supplement or ingredient
Instructions
- Assemble your CBD isolate and MCT oil and blend them together in a small mixing bowl. Feel free to use a blender, though mixing by hand for a few minutes should be more than enough to allow the two ingredients to combine.
- Next, transfer your ingredients from the bowl to a crockpot set on low heat (the ‘warm’ setting will probably do the trick just as well). Keep covered for at least 2 hours – more is better – and don’t forget to stir every now and then.
- When ready, prepare a sealable container of your choice, such as a glass mason jar, and cover it with a strainer, lining the opening with a cheesecloth to prevent things from getting too messy.
- Pour out the contents of your crockpot into the strainer. If some plant matter separates from the oils, that’s normal! Let the liquids drip into the jar and catch all the solids with the cheesecloth. Squeeze it all out over the opening to really get those last few drops of MCT.
- When you’re done, cover and seal the jar and store it cold in the fridge. If refrigerating is not an option, any cold, dark place free of excessive moisture should be fine.
Bottom Line
Making your own CBD tinctures with infused MCT oil is not just really easy – it can help you unlock a completely new domain of health-boosting ingredients that you can use for nearly any occasion!
While we wrote today’s recipe with beginner-friendliness in mind, remember that even the best CBD-MCT oil tincture won’t cut the mustard if you don’t have a good base of ingredients to use. Finding good CBD isolates can be hard, to say the least.
That’s why we’ve cut out the hard work for you in designing our Live Resin CBD Tincture. Among the most potent, highly-concentrated, and purest products on the market, a single 1-ounce bottle contains a whopping 1,500 milligrams of pure CBD! We based our tincture on the award-winning Sour Space Candy strain, a funky hybrid with an amazing cannabinoid profile rich in CBD.
To further maximize yields, we harvest our flowers about a week early and flash-freeze them to prevent loss of potency or nutrients. What that gets us, in the end, is just about the most well-rounded and powerful CBD tincture you can buy today!
If you’d like to experiment with something beyond straight CBD, take a look at our Live Resin Delta 8 THC Tincture instead. Containing the very same full-spectrum CBD extract as above, but further infused with fresh Delta 8, this is a higher-octane variant for those for whom the pure, calming relaxation of less potent extracts just isn’t enough. Infuse this with some MCT oil and you’ve got yourself a near-instant ride to euphoria.
Making your own CBD extracts and isolates from your favorite flowers is also an option. Though it requires more work, as you can imagine, the rewards are self-evident – the process allows you to really fine-tune every aspect of the resulting CBT tincture, including the taste, cannabinoid concentration, terpene profile, and more.
For an easy, yet extremely fun flower that lends itself to this purpose quite naturally, we recommend our longtime favorite Bubba Kush. Stemming from one of the cannabis world’s longest-running and most successful Indica family lines, this is a potent and very funky couch strain that’ll knock you back without breaking a sweat.
For fans of Sativas – and those looking for more active excitement – Shaolin Gleaux is another contender worth mentioning. With funky, multicolored buds and an equally vibrant flavor profile, this strain is just a pure joy to use, and its high-CBD effects will have you in an entirely zen-like state for hours on end.
