Thailand’s largest fast food chains have been advertising a ‘Crazy Happy Pizza,’ a relatively unknown product that features a marijuana leaf and is legal.
But it doesn’t appear to be able to get customers high. Veterans of the backpacker trail, familiar with the legendary pizza parlours of neighbouring Cambodia´s capital Phnom Penh that offer powerful marijuana as an optional condiment, might feel cheated.
Panusak Suensatboon, general manager of The Pizza Company, the chain that makes the cannabis pizzas, said: ‘It´s just a marketing campaign – it can’t get you high. The cannabis can be tasted and, depending on how much you consume, may make you feel sleepy.
This is one of The Pizza Company’s Crazy Happy Pizzas with its crispy cannabis leaf topping.
The Crazy Happy Pizza is a mashup of toppings evoking the flavours of Thailand´s famous Tom Yum Gai soup along with a deep-fried cannabis leaf on top.
The cheese crust also contains cannabis, and the sauce is made with chopped cannabis.
A nine-inch pie costs 499 baht (about £11). Customers preferring a do-it-yourself variety can choose their own toppings, with a 100 baht (£2) surcharge for two or three cannabis leaves.
Crazy Happy Pizza Recipe (pictured): A deep-fried cannabis leaf topping and a cannabis-infused mozzarella crust are combined with a chopped cannabis dipping sauce.
The cannabis plant is used in two main ways for many years: it can be used to make rope, clothing and an intoxicating drug known as marijuana, ganja, or weed.
But, in recent years, CBD has become a middle product. It is cannabidiol or CBD. This chemical can be extracted from cannabis and processed to make what’s being called a “cure-all” medicine.
You can separate CBD from Tetrahydrocannabinol, also known as THC (the chemical found in cannabis that gives you the high).
CBD is now legal for cannabis products. It allows you to enjoy the magic of marijuana while not breaking the law and raising serious health concerns. It´s become a boom industry, especially in the United States.
Pizza Company is known for making unusual pizzas, such as the Crazy Happy Pizza. The company used to make pizzas that were topped with foul-smelling durian.
Even though Thailand has liberalized drug laws in recent years, recreational marijuana remains illegal.
For medicinal purposes, cannabis can only be grown in small quantities.
Thailand was the first Southeast Asian country to take specific extracts and parts of cannabis off its controlled narcotics lists in December 2013. They also allowed their use in food and drinks in February.
CBD products must contain no more than 0.2% of their total weight. This effectively eliminates the chance of you getting high.
Before being made illegal, cannabis products had been a popular cottage business in Thailand. However, The Pizza Company has adopted them and they are now thriving commercially.
The Pizza Company’s general manager said: ‘I don´t think the market is ready for cannabis products yet. Since the very beginning, we knew this. It was our goal to become the pioneers of something innovative and new in the marketplace.
Crazy Happy Pizza has been available at all of The Pizza Company´s branches in Thailand, but sales have been lacklustre, according to Panusak.
This product has been hampered by several legal issues, such as the inability to legally sell or advertise it to any person under 12 years of age.
Panusak predicts that, when Panusak ends his sales promotion it will have to discard about half of the cannabis leaves it has acquired.
“I do not believe the market for cannabis products is ready yet. Panusak said that this was something we knew from the start. “We wanted to become the first to introduce something innovative and new to the market.
He cited durian pizza, incorporating the exotic and pricey tropical Asian fruit known for its pungent smell, as another example of his company´s innovations.
He stated, “We look for trends and new ingredients. We use these and encourage people to discuss it.”
Associate professor Wilert Puriwat, dean of Bangkok´s Chulalongkorn Business School, believes that using cannabis for marketing can be effective in an initial stage, but business owners need strategies to make it work in the long run.
He stated that people who attempt it won’t expect to be high. They just want to look trendy, and post photos on social media showing that they’ve tried it.
He said cannabis has an emotional value that builds on a product´s core value, adding: ‘When people walk into your restaurant, they should come for your food and service, not for cannabis.’