Yesterday I discovered prickly pears (aka Tuna Fruit) at the grocery store! I’m so glad we picked a couple up. The toddler and I had fun exploring this new healthy food together this morning. According to NutrionData.com prickly pears are a good source of Calcium and Potassium, and a very good source of Dietary Fiber, Vitamin C and Magnesium.
So in honor of the produce pick, I present our Prickly Pear adventure. Stick around to the end, we salvage it and make an AWESOME smoothie!
If you have any prickly pear advice please, feel free to share! If you are looking for more prickly pear info these sites do a much better job of explaining how to use the fruit. :~)
- How to Cut and Prepare Prickly Pears
- How to Eat a Prickly Pear Fruit
- Tuna Wrangling (aka Processing Prickly Pear Fruit)
We’ll be picking more up soon! I REALLY want to make another smoothie without the seeds! It was YUMMY!
Hi Roni,
This was a fun video. I love that you are willing to try out a new type of produce on camera, even when you aren't quite sure what to expect. You produce adventures have encouraged me to try some new things in the produce department and now I am going to keep my eyes out for a prickly pear - the red color inside was beautiful!
Usman - According to NutritonData.com prickly pears are a good source of Calcium and Potassium, and a very good source of Dietary Fiber, Vitamin C and Magnesium.
Hmmm...sounds interesting!! Any specific benefits that the fruit has??
hahah ryan is hilarious in this video!! (even though he did give you a LITTLE bit of a hard time 😉 ). "tree in my belly..." hahah i don't understand but its so funny/cute.
anyway, i love being able to "walk through" these produce picks with you! and i love that you tell exactly how it is. i've never seen these in my supermarket but makes me want to make a smoothie - its so pretty!
Congratulations on your smoothie! The word you were looking for on the spines is "glochids". They are tiny hairy spines that get in your fingers and are darn near impossible to remove.
The pomegranate jelly I made recently tastes like my prickly pear jelly plus a touch of grape jelly flavor. So...prickly pear jelly tastes like pomegranate with no grape overtones. LOL!
Great experiment! I've never tried them, but that smoothie sounds delish 🙂
Oh! Sorry for the extra comment, but I forgot something: this video CRACKED me up. You and Ryan were hilarious. I think it's great that you are so honest and REAL on your blogs. 🙂
How cool! I can't believe you Northerners get prickly pears in your grocer! We can just pick them off the cactus over here (West Texas) - lol! I've never tried one, but I know in this region there's a LOT of prickly pear drinks (margaritas, sangria) and sorbets. I guess you could strain out the seeds.. I only do that if the flavor is worth it though, and I have the time 😛
Guess I'll pick one up and experiment! Thanks for such a cool produce pick.
Roni,
My husband and I tried this fruit a few months ago. Our house had the same experience. Not very good. Too many seeds for us. Maybe next produce pick will be that much better!
Thanks for the video.
Hey Roni,
If you slice off the two ends, first, and then slice through the skin horizontally, the skin peels right off, and you have the fruit whole.
Hope that makes sense.
I got one straight off a cactus last week in AZ, and, uh...It was nasty.
I'm super open minded and I LOVE food. That said, I still spit it out. And I got pricklies in my fingers. And red shtuff on me. LOL.
Your way is much cleaner! Tee hee!
Bonnie - It's just the speed of the internet, the length of the movie and so on. It's out of our hands.
Sorry.
I think it's great that Ryan's getting to try all these exotic fruits! It's not the typical 3-year-old who gets to eat a prickly pear before school. 🙂
When I lived in Vegas with my parents years ago, we picked on of these somewhere in Nevada once during a hike. My dad and little sister were the only two brave enough to try it. I don't recall how they ate it, but it was smaller and green.
Roni,
How come sometimes your videos load really quickly, and I can watch it and it loads ahead of me, but other times (this video), it loads so slowly that I can only watch a few seconds at a time, then have to wait several minutes for it to load so I can watch another few seconds? Am I doing something wrong?
Thanks,
Bonnie
Thanks for occupying my mind while I'm off on sick leave. I re-joined WW last week...weigh-in on Thurs. wish me luck.
Ryan is adorable-such a great age!