Is it really possible to get high on nutmeg?

[JVS]

I've heard some rumors, but it all sounds very suspect to me.

[Whoa_Nelly]

1. Apparently, there are lots of sites claiming nutmeg can get a person high

Do the ol' Google search using keywords: nutmeg high

Personally, I think it sounds like a dumb idea... :eyes:

[JVS]

2. Come on people, answer this, it's really important!

[NewWaveChick1981]

3. I don't know about getting high off nutmeg, but it's very tasty.

:hi: :P I love spices.

[JVS]

4. Taste alone is not enough!

[NewWaveChick1981]

5. I suppose anything ground and snorted can get you high

if you use enough of it. :P :hi: If you're looking for a cheap, tasty high, I hear whippets (NOT the dog :P ) are pretty good. :)

[meegbear]

6. From The Straight Dope ...

Is nutmeg hallucinogenic?

Dear Cecil:

Reliable sources have informed me of the LSD-like properties of nutmeg. Eat sufficient quantities, they say, and you trip. One dude told me he washed down about 15 grams with OJ and a Skor bar and when he woke up, he was high. I followed the formula dutifully and nothing happened. What's the dope? --James Como, Bronxville, New York

Dear James:

Elvis, Aerosmith, and now nutmeg. If you post-baby boomers are tired of this ancient history, don't blame me--you're the ones who keep bringing it up. According to Hal Morgan and Kerry Tucker, authors of a book called Rumor! (a splendid volume, if not quite as grand in scope as my own collected works), nutmeg does have hallucinogenic properties, if you eat enough. The high lasts about 24 hours. Unfortunately, the side effects include nausea, dehydration, and generalized body pain. Might as well stick to margaritas.

--CECIL ADAMS

http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a3_114b.html

[JVS]

7. SWEET!

[Monk06]

39. Fair warning. It contains a neuro-toxin that attacks the spinal cord.

[JVS]

8. Does anyone else have comments, or even better, experience?

[HarukaTheTrophyWife]

9. Erowid is your informative friend for drugs and entheogenic substances.

http://www.erowid.org/plants/nutmeg/nutmeg.shtml

Basically, yes you can get high, but most people find the sickness not worth the trip. I wouldn't try it. You'll want the whole nutmegs, so check your local healthfood store. You can read plenty of experiences at Erowid.

[Monkey see Monkey Do]

10. from William S Burroughs "Letter From A Master Addict To Dangerous Drugs"

(which can be found as an appendix to Naked Lunch)

Nutmeg. - Convicts and sailors sometimes have recourse to nutmeg. About a tablespoon is swallowed with water. Results are vaguely similar to marijuana with side effects of headache and nausea. Death would probably supervene before addiction if such addiction is possible. I have only taken nutmeg once.

There are a number of narcotics of the nutmeg family in use among the Indians of South America. They are usually administered by sniffing a dried powder of the plant. The Medicine Men take these noxious substances, and go into convulsive states. Their twitchings and mutterings are thought to have prophetic significance. A friend of mine was violently sick for three days after experimenting with a drug of the nutmeg family in South America.

edit - here it is in its entirety
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/afs/cs.cmu.edu/user/ehn/Web/release/BurroughsLetter.html

[tinfoil tiaras]

11. I heard you can smoke lettuce

and get high off of that...people can/will do wierd things to get high i guess...?!

[JVS]

12. That's just bullshit from the American Association of Lettuce Growers

[HarukaTheTrophyWife]

13. "Wild Lettuce" is a different plant than what you get in the supermarket.

If smoked, it does produce a light body buzz. It's used in some natural tobacco alternatives, but you don't really get high off of it.

[tinfoil tiaras]

14. Oh, i see

I also heard you can smoke fromaldahide-soaked cigerettes. I remember someone from like 6th grade asking the "say no to drugs" guy that...rofl.

[Elidor]

54. It tastes surprisingly good, too

Better than tobacco ever dreamed of tasting. But it's worthless as far as getting buzzed, yeah.

[Ariana Celeste]

15. Yeah, my SO has done it

He ate a big spoonful and ended up feeling really drunk and not being able to move very well. He read about it here: http://www.erowid.org/plants/nutmeg/nutmeg.shtml

On edit: He also said he could taste nutmeg with every burp for several days. Yum.

[Mutley]

16. Uh, I dunno, but if you can, why would you want to?

Why don't you just go out and buy some weed? Or a six-pack? :P

[JVS]

17. One they don't have at the corner store, the other won't get anyone...

all fucked up. I want terrifying visions and a freak-out, dammit!

[Ariana Celeste]

18. It's shroom season

:)

[JVS]

19. Where do those grow?

Maybe you could PM me on the finer points of this division of botany

[Ariana Celeste]

20. check your PM

[liontamer]

21. yes

but you have to eat so much nutmeg that you get really sick. It's only used in populations who really have trouble getting drugs, such as prisoners

[pitohui]

22. probably

i've heard it causes a nasty headache tho, it's better after a little chemistry is done on it

dr. fester had a method for manufacturing X using nutmeg extract as one of the pre-cursors if i recall correctly

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

23. Yes, it has compounds related to ecstasy.

It's also been used as an abortificent.

However, the range been the desired effects and the toxic effects is very narrow.

Sometimes you'll hear about teenagers trying it.

[Jamastiene]

49. I tried it several different way and got zilch.

One word of warning to anyone who wants to try to snort it, I would NOT recommend it. yes, stupid ass me tried that. I thought I was going to die. I screamed the scream of a man who just got kicked really really hard in the nads. It hoit, in other words.

[patcox2]

24. You are better off looking for some jimsonweed.

Grows all around here, behind the flowers there are little green seed pods, eat one, high as a kite. Look them up in a guide to flora.

I understand high doses of nutmeg damage the liver. Strictly a prison drug.

[distantearlywarning]

33. Jimsonweed can be problematic too.

I wouldn't recommend that either to anyone who didn't know exactly what they were doing with it. It can be quite poisonous for one thing, and I've heard the trip is totally out of control (from friends who did it, not from personal experience).

I also once saw a special on TV showing a police video of two young teenage boys who had been picked up off the street for erratic behavior. It turned out that they had been smoking Jimsonweed, and they were both utterly out of their gourds. One of them was smoking and having a serious and lively conversation with another person in the police interrogation room. Unfortunately he was all by himself in the room and the police had taken away his cigarettes and lighter about 20 minutes previous. From my perspective as a former social worker and holder of a psych degree, he seemed just slightly more insane than your average schizophrenic in the grip of a major episode. It was interesting and scary to watch.

[JVS]

34. Wow! Cool!

[Bridget Burke]

55. A friend warned me off jimsonweed (not that I was interested).

She was quite "experienced" & had used most of the "bad" drugs but was strong enough not to get trapped. (& is much more settled down nowadays.)

Her opinion: Jimsonweed was the worst experience EVER!

"The Golden Guide to Hallucinogenic Drugs" has some interesting data on Daturas used by South American natives. The book is long out of print, but I believe the whole thing has been scanned & is available on the 'net. Interesting stuff--the role of these substances throughout history is detailed, but indiscriminate use is not encouraged.

[gardenista]

35. For God's sake, don't try Jimsonweed, whether you "know what you're doing"

or not.

The alkaloids can be more concentrated from one plant to another.

A kid in our town tripped out on Jimsonweed a couple of times, and landed in the local state mental hospital. He stayed there for about 10 years, until he killed himself by pouring a pot of boiling hot coffee down his throat. Scary. He was a great kid before he went completely nuts.

[JVS]

36. hmm, sounds bad

[pitohui]

41. some kids died in new orleans of jimsonweed a few yrs back

frankly i don't advise that anyone eat the friendly flowers and berries to get high unless they know exactly what they're doing -- of what grows around here, marijuana fine, psilocybe mushroom fine, but the amanita mushroom and the jimsonweed/datura and brugmansia just don't seem worth the risk to me

[sundog]

43. datura is a beautiful flower

and it smells amazing

but i like the poetry of it: used correctly, it'll give you vision... used incorrectly, it will poison you

it was used by some native tribes in ceremony, and those spiritual purposes are sacred knowledge among the traditional people (not meant for the western world)

i think it's best to just let it be & just admire the flora

i have not used it & definitely wouldn't recommend doing so

[pitohui]

53. she is beautiful but evil

i don't like the vibe i get from this flower, okay, that is unfair, let's just say there is something sinister about her

i don't know if i'm being catty or chicken

but i would never ingest her, i haven't even evolved to the point where i understand the message of just being around her


btw, not to pick nits, altho i pick nits so well...south america is part of the western world beyond a DOUBT and to my knowledge they are the best at working with datura/brugmansia

[sundog]

58. evil from a judeo-christian perspective maybe

depends on where one's perspective falls

if you are filtering your perceptions through those values, then sure... anything can be evil

that's why traditional people had to be 'saved' by the invaders of this country (who saw the natural land as an enemy that needed to be conquered & tamed)... they considered the traditional practices of the indigenous people to be evil

and 'western world' was indeed a poor choice of words... it was an attempt to politely say 'white man's world'

but remember, many of our non-human relatives on this planet existed long before we did... humans are the most recent arrival & the most ignorant of all

[begin_within]

25. Nutmeg can be highly toxic in large doses!

Even in doses as low as 7.5 grams, it can have side effects "potentially inducing convulsions, palpitations, nausea, eventual dehydration, and generalized body pain"

See article:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nutmeg#Risks_and_toxicity

[JVS]

26. yeah yeah. I know

[sundog]

27. i tried once

it didn't do anything

[KyndCulture]

28. From this old hippie DON'T TRY IT.

If you eat enough to get any of the psychedlic affects you will be vomiting thru your eyesockets trust me.

[distantearlywarning]

29. Yes, absolutely.

I did it once as a teenager. It resulted in a highly unpleasant nutmeg-flavored hallucinogenic trip that took 8 hours to take effect and then lasted almost an entire day. I wouldn't recommend it myself under any circumstances. You have to eat a lot of nutmeg to get high, and it tastes bad. To this day (16 years later), I still don't like the taste of nutmeg in foods. Honestly, just writing this post and thinking about the events of that particular day of my life gives me the heebie-jeebies. I really would think twice or maybe even three or four times about doing it if that's what your post is about...

[JVS]

30. It sounds like it worked ok then

[distantearlywarning]

31. Um...yeah

I guess it depends on what your definition of "OK" is. :scared:

[JVS]

32. You had a day long hallucinogenic trip, that certainly sounds like...

it did its job

[KyndCulture]

38. Dude, you're kinda scaring me.

I've tripped on every substance there is, including all the "legal" ones.

Go here and read a lot before you do anything!!!

http://www.erowid.org/

[KyndCulture]

37. That's what it did to me too.

I also got really sick to my stomach and was tweaking for 3 days.

never again.

[jus_the_facts]

40. Tried that once....never EVER again....

....sick as HELL..didn't do shit...and makes me HATE nutmeg to this day! :puke:

[Mojambo]

50. My buddy tried to smoke a banana peel one time

He said it gave him the worst headache he's ever had.

[jus_the_facts]

52. Made me so sick....I gag just thinkin' about it now....

x(

[cobalt1999]

42. yes.

If you combine it with lots of eggnog and bourbon. :)

[JVS]

56. How about just bourbon

[Blue_Tires]

44. i put it in my coffee daily

and i'll get a little mood-enhancing buzz

[Guy Fawkes]

45. Yeah... but don't do it.

Not pleasant. Anyway, you'd need pure nutmeg oil- which can be pricey.

[Generic Brad]

46. I'm tripping on pumpkin pie right now

Of course I had to eat 47 nutmeg laced pies and I'm feeling a little on the nauseous side. :hippie:

[JVS]

57. Mmmm, pumpkin pie

Maybe if I put all the stuff in a couple slices of pie it will be good.

[conflictgirl]

47. Yes, but it's not worth it

It's not a good trip, trust me.

Also: don't ever smoke catnip. :puke:

[u4ic]

48. If you put enough in

those marijuana brownies...YOU BET!!:thumbsup:

[Merrick]

51. I've done it - and it works + recommended alternative

swallowed 2 tbsps straight away - not too pleasant, but not as horrible as some say IMO. The onset was long, but the effect was very long as well. Physically, I felt moderately stoned/drunk without the euphoria, and a bit flushed for about 24 hours. Also - some slight halucinogenic visuals at night when I closed my eyes to sleep, and my dreams might have been a bit more weird than usual (if that's possible). Overall, not that great.

if you're looking for legal herbs and spices to get kicks from, I'd recommend the myriad of goodies at http://www.everyonedoesit.com (i'd recommend the happy cap series - the psychedelic flavor was like a pleasant, midling mushroom experience after the moderate nausea wore off)