Space Cake: What It Is and How to Make It

A space cake is a cake made with cannabis, usually by replacing some of the butter or oil with a cannabis-infused version. Etymologist Barry Popik finds the term in print by 1985, in accounts of cannabis coffee shops, and notes that space cakes have been popular in the Netherlands, where they resemble pound cake. The "space" comes from "spaced out".

The fat does the carrying: THC is highly lipophilic, meaning it is drawn to fats and has low solubility in water, according to the European Union Drugs Agency.

Federal law lets adults make cannabis food at home as long as no organic solvents are used to make concentrates, says the Department of Justice; provinces can add their own rules on age and where you can consume.

Cannabis makes its THC mostly as THCA, an acid form that converts to THC with heat from smoking or cooking. A 2016 lab study in Cannabis and Cannabinoid Research found THCA in cannabis extract was almost fully converted after 30 minutes at 110°C (230°F), while runs below 100°C had not finished after an hour.

The study heated extract in a vacuum oven, not buds on a baking tray, so use its numbers as a guide. It also recorded a loss of about 8% of the combined THCA and THC at 110°C. Our guide to decarbing weed walks through the oven method.

Warm the decarbed flower gently in butter or oil, then strain out the plant matter. Our step-by-step cannabis butter guide covers the method, and our coconut oil vs cannabutter comparison explains how the two behave in baking.

Note three numbers as you go: grams of flower, its Total THC from the label, and how much fat you ended up with.

This is a one-bowl, egg-free chocolate cake. The fat is a fixed 6 tablespoons, so work out how much infused fat you need first (see the worked example below), then make up the rest with plain butter or oil.

Allow about 35 minutes in the oven, plus cooling time.

The basic sum: THC per piece = grams of flower × Total THC (mg per gram) × share of the infused fat used in the cake ÷ number of pieces. Legal Canadian labels must show Total THC in milligrams per gram, a figure that already accounts for THCA converting to THC, under the Cannabis Regulations. A label that reads 15% means 150 mg per gram.

Worked example (illustration only). Assumptions: 1 g of flower labelled Total THC 150 mg/g, all of it infused into the fat used in this one cake, no THC lost along the way, perfectly even mixing, and 16 equal pieces.

One piece in that example holds almost as much THC as a whole package of legal edible cannabis, which Health Canada caps at 10 mg.

Real cakes come in under that ceiling and less evenly: decarbing loses some THC, some infused fat stays in the strained plant matter, and batter never mixes perfectly. Take the figure as an upper limit, not a promise that every piece matches.

Weighing a quarter of a gram is fiddly; it is easier to infuse a bigger batch of butter and use only part of it, multiplying by the share used. Our edibles dosage guide has more worked numbers.

Edibles catch people out because of the delay. Health Canada's consumer information sheet says effects begin 30 minutes to 2 hours after eating, can take up to 4 hours to peak and can last up to 12 hours, some as long as 24. It warns that eating more within the first 4 hours can cause adverse effects that may need medical attention.

A practice article in CMAJ calls this "dose stacking" and names hard-to-divide edibles as a common reason for overdose. In an emergency department study it cites, people who had eaten cannabis were more likely than those who inhaled it to have psychiatric or cardiovascular symptoms.

A homemade space cake looks like any other cake, which is the problem. CMAJ notes that edibles account for about three-quarters of cannabis exposures in children, often because they look and taste like ordinary food or candy. Wrap and label every piece, keep it in a sealed container in the fridge or freezer, and store it securely out of reach of children and pets, as Health Canada advises. Our guide to edible shelf life covers how long they keep.

Rather not bake? Browse GasDank's edibles menu. GasDank offers same-day delivery across Toronto and the GTA, usually within one to two hours, and mail order across Canada. Local orders are paid by cash on delivery or Interac e-Transfer, and customers must be 19 or older (21 in Quebec), with ID checked at the door.