Prickly Pear Fruit--the food that bites back :)

All summer we have been so excited about the fruit growing on our prickly pear. On our variety of prickly pear there are first these pretty pink flowers that turn into a green fruit which ripens into a deep pink--almost purple. In August it is time to harvest! But you have to be fast because the coyotes, desert foxes (kit foxes), birds, and ants all love the fruit too. 3/4 of our harvest was eaten by Aug 1st.

Here is a picture what ours looked like--this isn't my picture because I can't locate my camera at the moment...which is why my blogs have been lacking in pictures...but that's alright--it will do :P

The only problem with these things (well actually there are two problems--I'll get to the second one in a minute) is that they are COVERED with prickers!!! And were talkin' teeny tiny microscopic daggers! The daggers even have a name--"glochids." Each of those warty looking things on the fruit and the green paddles is actually about 100 little glochids all waiting to stick you. Below is a picture of one under a microscope--this is why they are impossible to get out of your skin!

I've been pretty busy with our full house of kids and never ending supply of dirty dishes, laundry to wash, fold, hang, put away not to mention three meals to make a day and a baby to nurse and change diapers...I could go on. So by August 1 I was pretty much over the prickly pear fruit and was ready to let the birds finish them off. But my hubby was still excited and went out there and picked 'em all off and unknowingly got about a million little glochids stuck in his hands and then...came inside and picked up the kids and gave them hugs!!! So...we were picking these tiny prickers out with tweezers all lunch! It's one for the memory book :)

So we had about 10 fruits in all--not that many--but I let them sit in that bucket for about a week until finally today I said I'd better just juice them and get it over with. Once juiced I can add sweetener and make into a syrup or jelly or whatever. So each one you stab with a fork and then hold over a flame to burn the glochids off. I used our gas stove burner. You don't get them all but you burn off all the ends which is where they are the pointy-est. It did really help to do this step. And then you cut the ends off and make a slice lengthwise, peel off the skin and underneath there is a fleshy seedy fruit that is similar in texture to watermelon. The seeds are like papaya seeds (the seeds are edible if you like them) and the flesh is like watermelon.

But that is where the similarity ends---it does not taste like watermelon!!! That was the second problem with these--all that work--inevitably getting stuck with glochids--for a fruit that is just yucky! I see why every recipe for these things has like 2 cups of sugar! But--maybe they are like papaya in a sense because I think that papaya is pretty gross--but with a little lime, some sweetener and the right recipe they are pretty good--I made a delicious mango salsa that had papaya in it. I bet I could have thrown some prickly pear fruit in there too.

So like I was saying, even though you burn the glochids you can't get them all--so when you hold the fruit to cut it you get stuck with the few that are left. And then when you handle the fleshy insides it transfers to the fruit! I tried used rubber gloves but that was worse because they arn't nearly as nimble as my fingers and I found I was getting more glochids on the fleshy inside that way. My goodness what a hassle!

Most people boil the fruit to extract the juice, but since we have a juicer I just used that. A juicer separates the fiber (pulp) from the juice of the fruit. I was hoping this would also help in getting out any glochids that might have snuck in. The end result was a pepto-bismol like drink--a little darker of a pink than pepto-bismol, but similar in that it was kind of a thick juice (although pepto-bismol might taste better!). And I should say I juiced the seeds and fruit--that might have given it the thicker texture. But the seeds and fruit are both apparently really good for you.

And I have a very very fine mesh strainer that I strained the juice 4 times with--I was not about to risk getting a glochid stuck in my throat---can you imagine!?!

So that's it--there's my experience with prickly pear fruit (it may be my last :) But--at least if I am starving I will know what to do and now you will too :) God bless!