Job Discussion Forums

[cangringo]

This may sound stupid but can anyone tell me how to cook the cacti that I see in the supermercados?? It's hard to get a variety of veggies that are any good and we'd like to know what to do with the cacti. I hear it's tasty...

[hlamb]

Do you mean the nopales (sp)?

[Ben Round de Bloc]

If you do a Google search for nopal recipe, you'll come up with dozens of ways to prepare nopal: soups, salads, drinks, roasted, toasted, fried, whatever.

[thelmadatter]

If you like okra, you'll like nopal. I personally like the taste of both but not the sliminess that both have. You can cook it much like okra too. I like it best in stews where you can cook that slime texture out of it.

[cangringo]

Thanks, I know it's a stupid question. I should have said how do you cook your cacti and do you like it.

Not big on slimy but next time we're at the store we'll buy some and try it.

[MamaOaxaca]

I LOVE nopales!
I have three cookbooks dedicated to Nopales. Did you know there are over a hundred varieties? They are all edible, but some have a lot more spines, so the most common eating varieties are the nearly spineless ones. If you are ever out in the bush, there is a very common variety (well common in the Mixteca bush) called Nopal de Vaca. They are huge and have realitively few spins and as the name suggests, cows sometimes much on them when all the grass is gone. These are the most flavorful for raw eating, so if you are ever out in the bush you don't have to worry about what's for lunch!

The trick to tackling the slime is something called sal banca. It tastes a lot like baking soda but it's coarser. Cut your nopales in cubes, strips, or if you want to roast them like steaks, score the top and bottom with the tip of a knife. Rub in sal blanca, leave stand ten minutes, the slime will come out of the nopales. Rinse in drinking water, repeat if desired. You can actually cook the nopales in their baba by cubing them, rubbing them in sal blanca for a long time, leave to stand, put pot on the fire with just nopales and baba. This method makes them come out a brillante green color, full flavored and very little slime (it boils away I guess) add diced onions, copped tomatoes, cilantro and chile verde to taste and you have a faboulous side!

Can you tell I'm getting really excited about all this? So I'm going to share my all time favorite nopal recipe--Fajitas de Nopal.
Cut the nopales in strips the long way, rub with sal blanca and leave to stand while you prepare the rest. Cut onions in strips, I like to use red onins, but that's just me. Slice up some chipotles, the long way, and Sun dried tomates--I used to buy these at Costco in Morelia, they go fabulously with chipotles, I miss them so much!!! Heat skillet, toss in the Nopales, (I do this with no oil, just their baba in a cast iron skillet, but you could use some olive oil if you like) when they are about half way cooked toss in the onions, chipotles and sundried tomatoes, add enough soy sauces to give yourself some liquid to work with. Move contanstly until the nopales are fully cooked--they should become limp. Serve on corn tortillas. Good with or without queso fresco crumbled on.

Oh and nopales in the blender with grapefruit juice is good and good for you!

[cangringo]

Very cool, thanks mama

I will try the slime removal first, not big on slime. I am very excited to try them now.

[lozwich]

Nopal slime can be very useful for some. There was a thread on here a few months ago by some people who had chronic stomach problems. I don't know if I posted it then, but when I lived in Mexico had a bit too much acid going on in my stomach lots of people prescribed a nice slimy glass of nopal juice.

Here in Boggy, I had a little hyperacidity episode the other week and discovered that guanabana is a lot tastier than and just as effective for tummy aches as cactus goop, especially when there's no aloe juice around.

I myself *love* the nopal and green tostada thingies you can get in the zocalo in DF and a bit of nopal in lentil soup is definitely the magic ingredient!

[delacosta]

Here's my super healthy breakfast smoothy recipe: a large banana, ample chunks of papaya or mango depending on season, a few table spoons of oats and amaranto (amaranth in english?), one tb. flaxseed and a large nopal (ear?). Add water or milk to preference, a few ice cubes to chill and blend till smooth. This is sooo healthy and by blending it one doesn't notice the nopal baba (nopal 'drool').

I have tons of nopal growing in my garden so I just pick one off before blending. There aren't any spines on the local variety here, which also taste lemony. I think their taste depends on the type of earth that they grow in.

[cangringo]

Thanks for all the tips, this is very helpful...haven't gone back to the store to get any yet but very soon.

[lozwich]

I just found nopal in the supermarket here in Bogota! Although each 'ear' was about a foot long, so I don't know if I'll be sticking them in my smoothies any time soon.

[MamaOaxaca]

I'm an avid nopal fan, if you haven't noticed and in the spirit of promoting their consumption here is some information from my nopal book.

Nopales are 90.1% water, making them a good diet food! Each 100 grams of raw nopal contains:

27 kilo calories
93 miligrams of calcium
1.60 mg of iron
2.00 mg of sodium
1.66 mg of potassuim
260 micrograms of vitamin A
8 mg of vitamin B1
0.06 mg of vitamin B2
0.30 mg of niacine
3.50 g of fiber
5.60 g of carbo hydrates
1.70 g of protien
0.30 g of fat

Buen Provecho!