Hogshead is serving Kansas City’s first CBD cocktail. We are pretty sure it’s legal.

Since opening this past December, Hogshead Kansas City has busied itself carving out a place for local ingredients and chef-driven creations on the Country Club Plaza. Its latest creation? The CBDiki, a play on the classic piña colada, but with one very significant twist.

It has CBD in it. 

“I’ve seen chefs on the West Coast cooking with cannabis,” says Clark Grant, executive chef and proprietor at Hogshead, “and I realized CBD is legal in Missouri, so why no do something with it here?”

Grant takes the medicinal oil every day — it helps with the lower back pain, stress and anxiety that accompany long restaurant hours. And it is indeed legal in Missouri, though Kansas is another story. But is CBD legal in a cocktail?

Short answer: Yes? 

Long answer: “We can’t find anything to tell us it’s not legal, so why not?” Grant says.

Grant and new Hogshead bartender Jerrod Gardiner (previously of Julep) checked with Regulated Industries, who said it fell under the Health Department’s purview. The Health Department didn’t have anything on the books, since CBD is legal. So with that, Hogshead became the first Kansas City restaurant (that we’re aware of) to serve a CBD-infused cocktail. 

With the legal obstacles cleared, they had to figure out how to make it taste good. CBD has a sharp, pine-like, vegetal taste to it. It’s, um, pretty dank. It tastes like weed. 

“We had to sweeten it up a little bit,” Gardiner says. “A friend of mine told me CBD goes with coconut.”

After a few tries, Gardiner came up with a base of Del Maguey Vida Mezcal mixed with Togarashi, which is a Japanese chili blend made up of seven spices; it’s smoky and adds more depth to the piña colada than a rum would. He then adds house-made coconut cream; watermelon juice; and a ½ milliliter of water-soluble CBD oil from American Shaman. He tops it with a bitters float and a fat sprig of mint.

The result isn’t a boat-drink sugar bomb. It’s a complex flavor combination: spicy, sweet, and sharp, but also packing the punch of CBD oil’s relaxing qualities. (We’re told that mixing with alcohol won’t take away CBD’s supposed health benefits.)

The CBDiki hits the Hogshead menu this Thursday, August 9. It’s $16. You can also add CBD oil to any other drink for an upcharge. Try it with the Watermelon Kombucha.