Eight Little Quesos

Steps

1. Set out 8 identical lidded ramekins and a digital scale. Pile the cilantro, red onion and pickled jalapeño on a board and chop them together into a rough relish; set aside.
2. Brown the infused butter first, while the kitchen is calm: melt the 60 g in a small pale-bottomed pan over low heat, swirling, until the foam drops and the milk solids turn amber and smell nutty. Pour it — every brown fleck included, that's where the dose lives — into a small bowl and let it cool while you build the queso.
3. In a large saucepan over medium heat, melt the plain butter, scatter in the flour and stir until it looks like wet sand.
4. Pour in the lager and milk and whisk without stopping until it simmers and thickens enough to coat a spoon, about 5 minutes.
5. Pull the pan off the burner. Add the Monterey Jack in handfuls, stirring with the pan's residual heat until smooth.
6. Scrape in all of the browned infused butter and whisk for a full 30 seconds, chasing the edges and bottom of the pan — even distribution is the whole dose plan. Start low, go slow: this is where 40 mg becomes eight equal 5 mg portions.
7. Weigh the empty ramekin, then weigh the full pot. Divide the queso's net weight by 8 and fill each ramekin to that exact number on the scale, topping up any shy ones before you move on. Spoon the cilantro relish over and dust with chipotle if using.
8. To reheat, microwave a ramekin in 30-second bursts, stirring between, or warm in a low oven — never above 175 °C / 350 °F.
9. Label each lid: Beer Queso · 40 mg THC total · 5 mg per ramekin · 8 ramekins · made [date] · 21+ only.