Today we're gonna look at the Frosted Oranges flowers from Maryland's licensed medical marijuana growers, Grow West from Cumberland. If you've not been out that way, you totally should make the drive. They carved out a chunk of mountain to squeeze a road in. It's called Rocky Gap. It's pretty cool. They got a little casino there that I have a weird deja vu dream about sometimes. I banged a centaur once, too, but that's not relevant either. We're here to discuss weed and not my erotic travels across the astral plane. That's a different website.
Who Is Grow West?
Hell if I know. Their website talks more about their mascot George the bear than their company. I don't think George is real. He's a make-believe bear to sell weed which makes him an Alternative-Care Bear, bah dum ching.
I met one of their growers at the Cannabis Science Conference a couple months back, seemed cool. I suppose I could do some journalism to find out more it but I got a deadline to keep today and I dunno if they're gonna want to talk to me after this review. Ruh-roh, George!
The Good- Frosted Oranges
Right, so we're actually gonna look at three different flowers from Grow West but that doesn't fit as nicely on the marquee. The first one, Frosted Oranges, is a delectable cannabis treat.
I found this one at Positive Energy out in Ocean City. They had it as part of a weed flight, which is just like a wine flight, a sample of several different strains for a small discount. I liked the diesel aroma so much that I grabbed a full eighth of Frosted Oranges instead.
The buds are loose but far from larfy. No big nugs in the prepack and very few popcorn nugs, so that's alright. Decent trichome coverage and beautiful light orange hairs. Still a little sugar leaf on it. Grow West's Frosted Oranges have decent aesthetics overall. I'd be happy with a little better trim.
The smoke is fairly smooth and has some diesel flavor to it. I could smoke a full half-gram joint in one sitting without trouble, but the potency (19.5% listed THCa) was more than sufficient halfway through.
Grow West's Frosted Oranges deliver a phenomenal high that hits on every point the Gentleman desires. Half a joint and I've got a powerful mood boost that pushes out my anxiety and lets me think clearly without making me drowsy. Smoke the whole thing and you'll be flying on a fluffy, pink dragon dog, accosting neighborhood bullies and forcing them to seek refuge in refuse.
It does such a good job against fatigue that you'll want to skip it in the evening unless you plan on playing video games til the sun comes up. Sigh. Again. Sorry, mom.
The Bad- Mandarin Cookies & Willie's Stomper
Now, see, if I stopped there, then everyone would like me. "What a great guy GT is," they'd say about me, and "why, GT's just the cat's meow!" someone else would respond, possibly while sockhopping.
But I picked up two more eighths, one of Mandarin Cookies, the other SW Stomper x Willie's Wonder, from Charm City Medicus in Baltimore. They looked good but smelled heavily of must. Mandarin Cookies had a little bit of citrus to it, Stomper a little diesel, but both were mostly mildew.
Since being a guinea pig was what I signed up for, I went ahead and smoked them. The results were very similar- very harsh smoke, lots of coughing, bad flavor. I've had worse, even recently, but I don't think these two flowers from Grow West are safe to smoke. I'm disposing of the rest.
Gentleman...eh, it depends
The Frosted Oranges were very good. Mandarin Cookies and Willie Stomper were both very bad, like, scary bad. And yet, they must have passed internal quality control, it passed some lab's testing, and ended up for sale. That's...distressing.
Grow West is clearly capable of high quality flower. Maybe they'll fix whatever's wrong in their curing room so the next batch of Mandarin Oranges and Willie Stomper are as good as these Frosted Oranges. But for now, I have to recommend that you buy nothing from Grow West without smell-checking it first.