By Pamela Walker, writer and local farm and food activist (www.GrowingGoodThingsToEat.com)
My favorite way to eat chopped prickly pear cactus pads, aka nopales or nopalitos, is to sauté them with white onions. I like to eat them along with black beans that I simmer for many hours and season with coarsely chopped white onion and sprigs of fresh epazote in the beginning and again about half way through the simmering.
This nopalito and onion recipe comes from Adán Medrano’s Truly Texas Mexican: A Native Culinary Heritage in Recipes. I usually add a little minced garlic to the sauté, and sometimes I also like adding chopped fresh tomatoes. When I have leftovers, I scramble them with eggs and some sort of chopped fresh chile.
I was lucky to find freshly harvested, chopped nopalitos this past Saturday at the Taos Farmers’ Market from a southern Colorado grower. I plan to ask some Santa Fe Farmers’ Market growers to consider bringing some to market, whether cleaned of spines and chopped or in the form of whole paddles. The texture and flavor of fresh nopales are so much better than canned.
Cactus Sautéed With Onion
Ingredients:
- 6 fresh nopales (cactus paddles), cleaned of all spines, rinsed, and cut into 1/2-inch squares
- 1 white onion, thinly sliced
- 2 tablespoons canola or other vegetable oil
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
Preparation:
- To remove spines from the cactus, cover your working surface with newspaper. Use tongs to hold the cactus paddle with one hand and peel the spines off with the other hand using a potato peeler. Keep the debris and spines away from any gusts of air, as some spines are so fine that they become airborne. When finished, roll up the newspaper carefully and discard.
- Heat the canola oil on medium heat and sauté the nopales for 13 minutes. They will acquire some golden color and most of the liquid will evaporate.
- Add the sliced onions and salt, and cook until the white onion is soft and translucent but not brown.
- Adjust the salt and serve immediately.