Greetings Steemit Friends!

Yayyy! It's almost harvest time of one of my favorite fruits, the Prickly Pear. If you’re a fan of pears, watermelon and honeydew melon, you’ll love their tempting taste too!

They're sooo pink, juicy and succulent... Mmmmmmmm....

In this post, you'll learn step-by-step how to prepare and extract the refreshing juice of prickly pear cactus fruits!

Prickly Pear Health Benefits

Not only does fresh prickly pear cactus juice taste delicious, it's also a beverage with benefits. It’s an excellent source of vitamins and minerals like vitamin C, magnesium, calcium and hydration regulating potassium.

According to scientific researchers at Tulane Health Sciences Center in New Orleans, prickly pear extract may help alleviate and prevent certain hangover symptoms when taken hours before drinking alcoholic beverages. Good to know!

Where You'll Find Prickly Pears

Prickly Pear Cacti (Opuntia Ficus-Indica), are native to the Western Hemisphere and are abundantly found in the Southwest United States as well as central and western Mexico and the Caribbean West Indies.

Opuntia has been introduced around the globe and can be found in abundance in the Mediterranean region as well as Australia.

Prickly pear fruits are often called cactus figs, Indian figs, Barbary figs as well as tunas. They come in three color varieties; white (or greenish), yellow and red.

Let's Make Prickly Pear Juice!

Firstly, prickly pears are just that - they're very prickly!

Before we get started, you'll want to slap on a pair of rubber kitchen or garden gloves to safely handle the cactus fruits. If you don't have gloves, you can use kitchen tongs instead.

If you don't have a juicer, no problem! We'll use a blender to help extract the juice.

1. Clean & Soak

To start, soak your clean prickly pears in a bowl of cold water. This will help remove most of the remaining hair-like spines, or glochids, from the skin of the fruit.

I let mine soak for about twenty minutes.

2. Cut & Remove Skins

Now, carefully remove your prickly pears from the bowl. At this point, you can remove your gloves.

With a paring knife, cut a slit lengthwise like so and peel the skin from the flesh of the fruit.

Once you've removed all the skins, cut the flesh into small chunks.

3. Chop

Add your fruit chunks to your blender. I'm adding about a quarter cup of filtered water to one and one half cup of prickly pear fruit.

4. Blend

Now this step is the fun part! Purée the heck out of your peck of prickly pears!

If you prefer your juice a tad sweeter, now is the time to add a generous dash of agave nectar and blend.

5. Strain

You're almost done! Use a fine mesh sieve to strain and separate any seeds and extra pulp from the juice.

Watch my Prickly Pear Cactus Juice Video Tutorial:

Now you're ready to enjoy your prickly pear cactus juice!

You can serve and sip your juice as is, or, use it as a mixer for a refreshingly delicious Margarita cocktail. Get the recipe HERE!

Have you tried prickly pear cactus fruit?

Thanks for commenting, upvoting and resteeming this post! I hope my post will inspire you to make and create or treat yourself to something new. Until next time...

Cheers!

Michelle

xx

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P.S. If you enjoyed this post (and I hope you did!) FOLLOW @michellectv for more Fun, Food, Drinks, Beauty, Travel & Style! ❤

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