Edible Dosage Math: Your Milligram Guide for Home Cooks

Why Your Edible Math Might Be Way Off

You made 20 cookies with infused butter. Each could contain anywhere from 5 mg to 25 mg of T_C. The cause is two compounding losses most home cooks ignore: decarboxylation efficiency and infusion efficiency.

Precise math matters more for edibles because your liver converts ingested T_C into 11-hydroxy-T_C, which is more potent and longer-lasting than the delta-9 T_C you get from smoking.

Step 1: Know Your Starting Potency

Raw flower contains T_CA, a non-psychoactive precursor, not T_C. Check your dispensary label. If you don’t know, assume 10%. 15 to 20% is above average, and 21%+ is very strong. When in doubt, estimate low. Remember: 1 gram = 1,000 milligrams.

Step 2: Account for Decarboxylation Loss

Heating removes a CO₂ molecule from T_CA, so even a perfect decarb converts only 87.7% of the weight. That’s the 0.877 factor.

Home ovens lose more, converting about 65 to 75% in practice, while precision devices reach 85 to 95%. Use 0.70 for an oven or 0.85 to 0.90 for a precision device.

Step 3: Account for Infusion Loss

Home infusions capture about 60 to 80% of the available T_C. MCT and coconut oil generally bind better than butter, and dark green butter doesn’t mean stronger butter. Use 0.70 as a default.

The Formula, With an Example

(Grams of flower × T_C% × 1,000 × decarb efficiency × infusion efficiency) ÷ servings = mg T_C per serving

Say you infuse 2 g of 10% flower into 2.5 cups of butter:

2 g × 1,000 × 0.10 = 200 mg T_CA
× 0.877 = ~175 mg
× 0.70 (oven decarb) = ~123 mg
× 0.70 (infusion) = ~86 mg in the full batch

If your recipe uses only 1 of those 2.5 cups, that’s 86 ÷ 2.5 = ~34.4 mg. Across 20 cookies, that’s about 1.7 mg per cookie. Skipping this partial-batch step can make cookies five times stronger than intended.

These are estimates, not lab results, but they get you in the right ballpark.

Dosage Targets

1 to 2.5 mg: Microdose, ideal for first-timers
5 mg: Standard dose
10 to 15 mg: Experienced users
20 mg+: High-tolerance users only

Smoking tolerance doesn’t fully transfer to edibles. Effects start in 30 to 90 minutes, peak at 2 to 4 hours, and last 4 to 8 hours. Re-dosing too early is the most common cause of overconsumption. To cook with intention, work backwards from your target dose.

Potency Shelf Life

Butter infusions keep 85 to 95% of their potency for 30 to 40 days in the fridge, and coconut or MCT oil infusions last 60 to 75 days. At room temperature, potency drops to 70 to 80% within 7 to 10 days. Label each batch with its date and calculated mg.

Do the Math Once

Skipping either efficiency factor can throw your estimate off by 30 to 50%. Run the formula before every new batch, especially when you switch strains or fat types.