DOSE:

4 pods

oral

Poppies - Opium

(tea)

BODY WEIGHT:

260 lb

Poppy Tisane for Pain Relief

I've been suffering with chronic knee and back pain for several years and have been taking vicodin for pain relief. I've been reading about herbal remedies for various ailments and I decided to see how well poppy tea worked for my knee/back pain. I read several experiences folks had with this and spent time reviewing the different methods of preparation. I think with a small bit of care, a proper and strong tea can be made quite easily.

I used:
* 4 medium-sized Turkish poppy pods
* 5 cups of water, around 20oz. for poppy tisane
* 2 tsp dried loose leaf spearmint or 4 spearmint teabags
* 5 cups of water, around 20oz. for spearmint tisane
* 2 tbsp honey
* 6 6'x6' sheets of cheesecloth
* coffee grinder

I also used a glass teapot with an infuser to hold the cheesecloth in the water and make it easier to remove. I also used a coffee/tea thermometer to gauge the temperature of the water.

Step 1: Brew some spearmint tisane (herbal tea). Boil 20 oz water. Put 2 tsp of spearmint into an infusor if I'm using a teapot and poor the boiling water over the leaves/bags. This should steep for no more than 7 minutes. Remove infusor or bags and let sit while the poppy tea is brewed.
Step 2: Grind poppy pods in the coffee grinder as fine as I can. Be careful to pause the grinder every so often as heat from the grinder may burn the dust.
Step 3: Put the 6 sheets of 6'X6' cheesecloth on top of each other and dump the dust into the middle. Push the middle of this into the infusor so that it doesn't move. If I didn't have an infusor, I may want to draw the ends and tie a string around the top to keep the grounds from escaping into the mix.

Step 4: Heat water to 200 degrees or just under boiling. The first bubbles I see are an indication if I don't have a thermometer or the first ticking sounds I hear from the kettle.
Step 5: Pour near-boiling water over the cheesecloth and let sit for 15 minutes or until cool enough to touch without scalding.
Step 6: Remove cheesecloth and strain as much of the thick liquid from the cloth as possible taking care not to spill or burn hands.

I have a batch of spearmint tea, and a batch of poppy tisane. The taste should only have a slight bitter aftertaste, but should honestly not be bitter to drink. I mixed the spearmint and poppy tisanes together, added enough honey to make it enjoyable, and sipped it over the next 30 minutes to an hour.

There's *no need* to drink this quickly. The effect will come on soon enough and should last a decent amount of time to get through any pain I may be having. I can drink this on an empty stomach or with food, but the effect is weakened with food. I enjoyed the flavor and the effect worked well enough.

If the tea is bitter, my water is too hot or I've steeped the grounds too long. There's no need to make this super concentrated and unpalatable to work. If I don't notice the effects within a half hour to an hour, I try making another batch out of the same grounds and same spearmint leaves, just lengthening the amount of time I steep them.

Exp Year: 2004	ExpID: 39317
Gender: Male
Age at time of experience: Not Given
Published: Jul 15, 2017	Views: 2,193
[ View PDF (to print) ] [ View LaTeX (for geeks) ] [ Swap Dark/Light ]
Poppies - Opium (43) : Therapeutic Intent or Outcome (49), Preparation / Recipes (30), Unknown Context (20)