Call it Cactus or Nopales - I Call It Delicious

It’s August and the summer is winding down but the mosquitoes don’t seem to know that. I have a bad reaction to the little vampires and tend to swell massively wherever they decide to attack. This morning I awoke with an elbow the size of a basketball and bites on my upper cheeks and neck that make me look like Jack Palance with a goiter. You remember him right? OK so I guess I’m old or at least I feel that way with a birthday coming up next week. It’ll be my last one, I swear. So if this post is rife with typos it’s because I’m squinting from one eye to write this.

Cactus – it’s a lovely treat done right. I had a hard time finding any information on correct cooking techniques. I even resorted to asking Rick Bayless @rick_Bayless on twitter for a resource but the king of Mexican cuisine told me that he didn’t know of any such resource that was written in English. I hope he writes something because there is so much misinformation on the web that many people will undoubtedly have a bad first encounter.



I picked up some Cactus – Nopales – at Harry’s this week along with some corn to make a black bean salad. The pads were about the size of my hand and about ¼ inch thick. I scraped off all of the remaining prickles on the pads and cut off the ones on the edges with a sharp paring knife. Then I simply brushed them with olive oil and grilled them in my grill pan for about 4 minutes per side.



Then I cut it into slices and tossed it with my other salad ingredients which included black beans soaked over night and simmered with bacon and chipotle, fresh grilled corn, bell peppers and jalepenos and some diced red onion. Throw in some cilantro, fresh squeezed lime juice and some fruity extra virgin olive oil and you have a delightful summer salad. That can serve as a main or a side.

I found the cactus to be sweet tasting and slightly citrus flavored. I understand that improperly cooked it can be either bitter or slimy but I detected none of that in my version. I also found loads of recipes in the interwebz that are very, very wrong. Once recipe instructs you to chop the cactus pads and boil them for 45 minutes adding baking soda at the end to reduce the slime! Please don’t ever abuse any vegetable in this fashion!



So I give two thumbs up to Nopales and will be adding them to my regular ingredient list. I understand that they are available from late spring through the fall months here in North America. I know that it's grown and harvested across the south but a fellow foodie from Cleveland @BlogWellDone tells me that he has ready access to it there as well. Give them a try when you get the chance and let me know if you find a book that has good information on this delightful ingredient.