prickly pear cacti

[Pheonix]

I recently found some prickly pear cacti and looked up if they were edible. they are so I tried it, I used a knife to cut the thorns off (even thou they look like little hairs, their sharp as hell and go straight into the skin) boiled them till they turned yellow (don't know if that was to long or not) I knew it was going to be bitter so I picked some mulberries and boiled them with it to offset the taste. It said to rinse the sticky goo off after boiling but I didn't cause I know thats where the mescaline is. also I mashed the mulberries in the boiling water. then I put the cacti pads on a plate and put the mulberries over top (tasted pretty good) I also mixed the water with grape kool-aid and put in the freezer to chill. I read that prickly pear cacti are 0.1% mescaline as opposed to peyote 1%, and san pedro 0.8%. was wondering if anyone else has any good recipes for cacti or cacti tea?

very, very lit head buzz after eating it but only lasted 10-15 min, not worth eating for the high but still an edible cacti that's easily foraged in the lower states

 

[Cade]

I have never heard of prickly pear containing mescaline; maybe it is the pad that contains it.I have also never heard of boiling the fruit either. I live near a huge patch of prickly pear cactus and have eaten the fruit many times. I always make sure to remove all of the skin because hidden inside are thousands of tiny prickles. Hopefully before I leave this summer I can make some prickly pear wine

 

[Pheonix]

not the fruit, but the pad that I ate. the cacti out here haven't yet fruited. not sure what season they fruit in. practically all cacti have mescaline its there natural defense mechanism it causes them to taste so bitter that most insects and animals don't want to eat them. prickly pear has a very low percentage of mescaline that I don't think it would really be worth trying to extract.

 

[Cade]

The pears here in southern California are green right now, and will be ripe by about August.

 

[wildboy860]

i've know about this for a while and from what i remeber seeing on those survivor shows is that you can eat it raw. but i guess thats only during the fruiting season?

 

[Doobie_D]

Down here in Florida we got Opuntia growing everywhere! I made a 5 gallon batch of wine outta the fruits and it turned out suprisingly awesome (had a rasberry type flavor). Came out bright fluorescent pink! The best way to get rid of the prickles is to take a blow torch or anything similar and scorch the outside of the pads or the fruit. You dont gotta burn the shit out of it just pass it over the whole piece semi slowly.
As for extracting any type of mescaline out of them, I dont think its a cut and dry process. Seems like no matter what type of extraction process you use you'd get a lot of other alkaloids with your mescaline.
You can eat the young pads and the fruit raw minus the prickers that is.

 

[dirtyfacedan]

The prickly pears also grow in the desert in Canada! Yes! We do have desert up here! The south Okanagan valley has pocket desert in the hills above the orchards..and there is an amazing abundance of desert plants, and creatures. Plenty to survive on if your crafty about it.

 

[Monterey]

Mexicans roast them like meat and eat them.

- Monterey

 

[Doc Road]

Mexicans roast them like meat and eat them.

- Monterey

You got that straight,makes a dam fine meal,''nopalitos''. I do believe that they have to be in season for them to taste good.