A temple ball is a ball of hash, traditionally charas or sieved resin, that has been worked by hand until homogeneous and then stored to age. The traditional association is with Nepal and the wider Himalayan region; the legend of temple use is popular but poorly documented. The outer surface oxidises to a dark, shiny skin, while the inside stays softer and more aromatic.
In practice
Modern makers produce temple balls from ice water hash or dry sift to recreate the style, curing them for weeks to months. The working and curing change texture and aroma; as in any long storage, some THC oxidises toward CBN, especially at the surface. Temple balls are often prized for aged, complex aromas. GenetixBay defines the style only and doesn't give production methods.
Don't confuse with
- Charas: hand-rubbed resin; a temple ball is a shape and cure that may use charas.
- Pressed hash: compressed into slabs or blocks, usually by press rather than by hand.
- Rosin: an oil, not a worked resin ball.
Hash is any concentrate made by separating trichome heads from cannabis and collecting or pressing them, from dry sift and ice water hash to hand-rubbed charas.Charas is hashish made by rubbing the resin off living cannabis flowers by hand and rolling it into balls or sticks, a traditional method of the Himalayan regions.Bubble hash, or ice water hash, is a solventless concentrate made by separating trichome heads from cannabis in cold water and collecting them on graded mesh bags.Kief is the loose, powdery collection of trichome heads that falls or is sifted off dried cannabis through fine screens; it is the simplest solventless concentrate.THC (Δ9-tetrahydrocannabinol) is the neutral, decarboxylated cannabinoid mainly responsible for cannabis's reported intoxicating effects; the living plant makes it almost entirely as THCA.CBN (cannabinol) is a cannabinoid formed mainly when THC or THCA oxidises after harvest, so high CBN readings usually signal age, heat, light or air exposure, not plant ripeness.Pressed hash is loose trichome resin, such as kief or ice water hash, compressed into a solid cake or slab so it holds together and keeps better.Rosin is a solventless concentrate: resin squeezed out of flower, kief or hash using heat and pressure, then collected as an oil free of plant material.Hashish is the traditional pressed resin concentrate of cannabis, made for centuries by sieving or rubbing trichome heads from plants and compressing them into blocks or balls.
