What Are the Munchies?

Are you craving something to eat right now? Did you just finish a J or an L or possibly take a big bong rip? Maybe you even ate an edible earlier and you’re hungrier now than before. This hunger phenomenon known to most cannabis users is affectionately called the munchies. Unlike that song playing in your head right now, that hunger is a real physiological thing—and here is the chemistry that explains it. 

To understand the munchies, we have to accept that cannabis has natural effects on our bodies because of how it interacts with several of the body’s systems, mainly the endocannabinoid system. When the bud is inhaled the most famous cannabinoid, tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) is absorbed by the lungs and pushed to the heart which pumps it into the bloodstream like a piston pumps gas into an engine. Like any other stream, blood surges through our veins introducing THC and oxygen to the rest of the body. One area that the THC travels to is the brain where it begins to interact with the endocannabinoid system.

Located in your brain behind your eyes is the hypothalamus, a small region dedicated to helping the body maintain basic functions like sleep, body temperature, sex drive, and appetite. The hypothalamus is a mini control center with nerve cells that regulate the release of hormones to command these different human functions. It is here that THC binds to the Cannabinoid Receptor 1 (C1), a part of the endocannabinoid system after you finish toking in a cipher.

At that point, a hormone called ghrelin produced in the stomach is released in the bloodstream like that dude who waits for somebody to hold him back before he decides to fight (after the smoke). It is the rise in this hormone that causes the intense hunger that we all know as the munchies. As ghrelin flows through the blood it gets pumped into the hypothalamus and triggers the hunger response.

So next time you blow down and find yourself red-eyed and salivating you can thank your body’s endocannabinoid system and the hormone ghrelin for your need to hit the burger joint, chicken shack and taco spot to eat some greasy cuisine with the heavy butter.