Why Colorado Tokers Love Banana MAC

For all the blubbering I do about older strains, the hybridization of cannabis makes everything in my pipe bigger, faster and stronger. Growers take the yield and potency from a strain over here, match it with something flavorful over there, and maybe you have a winner. Kids don't always outshine their parents, though, and don't have to be A.J. Soprano to come up short. Sometimes Mom or Dad are just too tough of an act to follow.

Banana MAC had a big hill to climb from the start. The name sounds like a cartoon pimp who hangs out by a fruit stand, and then there are the legacies of parents Banana Kush and MAC (Miracle Alien Cookies) to live up to. Banana Kush still clings to the title of most popular banana-flavored strain, and MAC has been a dispensary superstar for years now, thanks to serious potency and a sterling extraction record. If plants knew the pressures of societal expectations and resentment, Banana MAC would either experiment with ecstasy a little too much in high school or constantly overachieve. But Banana MAC was bred for a reason, and we'd be wise to take it seriously.

Banana Kush is a fragrant, delicious strain, but its power largely reflects those of past decades. MAC's potency and trichome production are unquestioned, and they've helped usher in a new era of strains bred for extraction. No one has ever accused MAC's basic, earthy flavor of blowing their minds, though, so the obvious plan here was creating a banana-flavored strain with bigger biceps. And for the most part, the plan works.

Representing qualities of both parents, Banana MAC has bigger buds and a fuller head of trichomes than Banana Kush, and a much louder flavor profile than MAC. The high is one of the more dangerous I've come across in a while, but it's also a fair representation of the strain's lineage, taking me on a bungee-jump-like experience of disoriented energy before gluing me to the couch if I overdo it.