A lesson on harvesting and cooking prickly pear fruit from the Prickly Pear and Mesquite Festival at Superstition Mountain Museum
This post has been replaced by Cooking With Prickly Pear And Mesquite In Arizona.
Prickly Pear Cooking
December 10, 2014
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13 Comments
Susan Cooper
December 10, 2014 at 5:06 pmHi Donna, What an interesting post. I have not cooked with prickly pear yet. Harvesting it does seem to sound like a lot of work, as does cooking and canning the jam. Think I’ll stick with you on this and buy it already prepared. 🙂
Donna Janke
December 11, 2014 at 10:10 amYes, it does seem a lot of work. I might try it if I could buy the fruit already cleaned of its glochids, but I am not usually in this part of the country during harvest season.
Irene S. Levine
December 10, 2014 at 8:52 pmHaven’t cooked with prickly pears but coincidentally, it was one of the ingredients the chefs were using in the Food TV Network’s “Chopped” last evening. Looks yummy!
Donna Janke
December 11, 2014 at 10:11 amFunny how those coincidences show up.
Karen Warren
December 11, 2014 at 4:41 amI didn’t know you could cook with prickly pears – I’d like to try it some time.
Donna Janke
December 11, 2014 at 10:15 amPrickly pear jams and syrups are readily found in the southwest states where prickly pear grows. I know prickly pear grows in other parts of the world, but I don’t know if is used for cooking in these places.
jacquie
December 11, 2014 at 5:51 amWho knew that you could cook with prickly pear??? How interesting! Like you, I’m not sure I’d go for harvesting them, but it does look good!
Donna Janke
December 11, 2014 at 10:18 amIt fun to find out about ingredients in cooking you never knew about. I sometimes wonder how people figured out what they could safely eat and how best to cook it in the first place.
Anita Oliver
December 11, 2014 at 5:10 pmI remember tasting prickly pear candy as a kid when I grew up in California and I loved your post about how the fruit can be prepared and used to make many tasty dishes including jelly. We had prickley pear growing all over south Texas where we last lived and I always enjoyed the brightly colored yellow and red blooms.
Donna Janke
December 12, 2014 at 11:36 amI enjoyed hearing about how to prepare the fruit, even if it sounds a bit more involved than I am prepared to tackle. I love the blooms on the prickly pear cactus – so delicate and vibrant looking at the same time.
SuzanneS
December 12, 2014 at 6:37 pmI did not know you could eat them! I am glad that you tried it for me! Super interesting post!
Ken Dowell
November 16, 2016 at 4:05 pmI can’t say it’s the most appetizing looking thing. Never tried it but you’ve piqued my curiosity.
Donna Janke
November 18, 2016 at 5:26 pmKen, the candy and preserves are actually sweet and tasty.