Herb & Zen | Black Jack

“Bred by Sweet Seeds, Black Jack is a cross of Black Domina and Jack Herer. This strain produces thick buds with huge calyxes that are completely encrusted with trichomes. It has a heavy and flavorful taste and it produces exceptionally long-lasting effects. Because of its high THC levels, Black Jack is popular among medical marijuana patients.” – Leafly.com

Review

[based on the transcript of video, edited for clarity]

Welcome again to the red bench. It’s time for another Red Bench Review. We’re coming at you from the hi-desert here in Southern California where it’s a very windy afternoon…

Today we’re going to talk to you about a strain called Black Jack. It’s from a company called Herb & Zen.

I walked into the collective this last week and it was on sale for $25 an eighth… wow, that takes me back. I paid $25 an eighth for pot when I bought it back in 1983, when I first started smoking weed. But that was just one thing that brought my attention to this hybrid. The other thing was it is called Black Jack, and I had a grandpa whose nickname was Black Jack. Black Jack Shelton. He was a railroad man in Chicago, a gamblin’ man, and when I saw the name Black Jack I said, “let’s do this one for grandpa.” So for Black Jack Shelton, we’re doing this review.

This strain is a hybrid which means it’s a combination of some things. While most marijuana is a combination of different strains, this particular hybrid is a combination of Black Domina, which is an Indica. It’s known for being more relaxing, helps put you to sleep. And then Jack Herer, which is a Sativa, and it is known for being more uplifting and energetic. So when you combine the two, what do you get? Well, we’re about to find out. So let’s take a look at what’s inside the jar. Let’s have some close-ups here and check it out…

Alright, let’s take a look at this jar full of Black Jack. It’s a nice little bottle, a solid glass bottle, it’s not cheap glass here. It’s got a black lid on it [with the name of the herb]. It’s sealed as you can see. Let’s break the seal and see what’s inside.

As we pour it out on the tray we see we’ve got four nice little nugs. A couple big ones and a couple little guys. You want to be very careful when you handle the nugs, you want to respect the herb. You don’t want to squeeze them too much, you don’t want to squeeze those trichomes. So I’m looking at these and they are dense, not like Sativa can be, it’s not leafy and fluffy. It’s got very dense nugs. Let’s cut one of these up and see what it looks like…

Alright we’re cutting up one of these nugs, taking a look at the feel, the texture, the consistency. This is not dry, it feels very nicely cured… actually some of it’s turning a little bit to dust, but generally the nugs cut up really nicely.

Now we’ve got a nice little pile here. Mmm, there’s a faint scent of pine, pepper, not overwhelming, just a nice subtle kind of smell. Let’s put this in the bong and let her rip and really get to the heart of this issue.

[one bong rip later]

Mmm. I don’t think I’ve ever tasted an herb that has such a strong flavor of black pepper to it. That’s really surprising. I feel like we just got some food and you use the pepper grinder, and you grind that pepper… and that fresh smell of ground pepper comes up to your nose. That’s exactly what that tasted like. It was really delightful actually. I wouldn’t necessarily go for a strain like this, but in this case it hit me really nicely. Still waiting for the effects. We’re gonna have to take another rip see what happens.

[one more bong rip later]

Oh, I already know where this is gonna go. Straight to my body. I can already feel it in my arms with a sort of soothing effect starting to go on, everything’s starting to get a little fuzzy in the body. It’s not so much of a strong head effect at this point, might take another rip or two and find out if it creeps up on us or what.

[10 minutes later]

Oh my, I am stoned. I am stoned in a classic stoned fashion. My eyes, I’m sure if you can see it they are turning red right now. Wow, I’m you know, my body is like [makes waving motions], my head is like [makes different waving motions]. It’s amazingly, as I mentioned before, it was amazingly peppery, it has some pine in it, it even has some hints of mint in it. The effects are just really nice for twenty-five dollars. Thirty years ago, thirty-plus years ago, if I spent twenty five dollars on pot like this I would have been really thrilled. And if it came in a glass jar I would have been doubly thrilled because nothing came in a glass jar back then. Everything was in a baggie that you sealed with your tongue. Okay I won’t go down that road…

It’s a really fine herb for twenty-five dollars. Even if you paid up to forty dollars with this you might be fine. It’s a little on the dry side, but that’s okay. I’ll let that slide because other than that, it has a very nice cure on it. I’m gonna give this one a good rating and say this is worthy of going and checking out if you’re interested in a heavy Indica stone, a classic marijuana stone.

Alright, let’s take one last rip of this and I think I’m gonna go kick it on the sofa. This is that kind of herb it just makes you feel like hanging on the sofa for the afternoon. So here we go with one last little rip (yeah, little… ha).

Herb & Zen have done a fine job on this Black Jack. This is the first Black Jack I’ve tried so I’m going to compare it against some others down the road.

Until later, best of health.

The Low Down

SCALE – 1 (Poor) 2 (Average) 3 (Very Good) 4 (Exceptional) 5 (Holy Grail)