A few weeks ago, Warren asked our neighbor if we could have the fruit off of her prickly pear cactus. They weren't ripe then, but she said we could have them when they were. Fast forward to this weekend, when she let us know they were ready, almost overly ripe. Andy and Warren went over with tongs and
Tupperware and picked the fruit and then yesterday, Warren and I decided to make jelly with it.
After rinsing the fruit, we cut it open. Warren was
surprised by all the the seeds inside, and got really good at safely cutting the fruit. Next, while holding it with an oven mitt to avoid the fuzzy barbs, I scooped out the flesh, seeds and all. We added a bit of water then boiled it down to juice on the stove. Last, we strained it through a mesh colander to remove the pulp an seeds. At this point I realized I had no pectin and not very much juice, so I improvised syrup instead. It turned out a very pretty and vibrant magenta--just the same color as the
bougainvillea flowers that bloom so much here.
We ate it this morning on pancakes, and truthfully, it looks better than it tastes--prickly pear is just not a flavor I am accustomed to. It might be much better suited to eating over vanilla ice cream. Hmm. Still, I'm glad we did it, and next year, we'll probably try something else just because it is such a funky novelty to eat prickly pear.
5 comments:
oh! Prickly Pear jelly reminds me of my Nana...she used to make it in the fall, and along with shucking the pomegranates in her back yard her house had ruby red goodness all over. I will miss that.
There is a way to boil off the fuzz but I completely forget it...
It is so much easier to throw everything in a pot of boiling water (don't even bother cutting the fruit) and then putting it through 2 strainers separated with cheese cloth. After the strainers we let it boil down by about half. My Mom and I made prickly pear jelly like that and then flavored it with limes. I am not a huge prickly pear jelly fan myself, but I like this.
Are you the Kelsi that lived across the street from me at one time? :) So the cheesecloth and strainers took out the barbs too? That is great! I will do that next year. The limes sound good; I had some here and almost put some in, now I wish I would've.
Yep, that's me. Your kids are adorable by the way.
Warrem looks so proud of himself!! He's probably better with the knife than I am.
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