Prickly Pear Pie

Prickly pear cactus grow just about everywhere.  I'm fortunate to have neighbors with huge stands of them.  They've been there as long as I can remember and must be 15 feet high. Beautiful, ancient stands of them.

The fruit of the prickly pear is called a tuna.  And they are delicious.  They remind me a bit of a melon, but so very sweet.  

But like a lot of things, you have to work to enjoy the goodness.  The fruit and the pads are covered with spines called glochids.  There are lot's of sites that you can google to see how best to navigate the spines, but my advice is 'move slowly'.  When you get in a hurry, that's how you end up with a finger full of needles.  I use tongs, heavy gloves and fire.   You use what you're used to.

But once you have that wonderful fruit, here's a delicious pie you can make with them.  It's not a traditional pie.  It's more like a filled 'dutch baby'.  

Filling:

3.5 cups prickly pear pulp.  (The species near me has small seeds, so I don't worry about seiving them out.  If the species that you are using has large seeds, you might want to remove them.)

1 cup sugar

1 cup water

Mix together in a medium saucepan and bring to a boil.  Simmer until sugar is dissolved.  Set aside.

Pie:

Preheat oven to 425 degrees.

Place 1/4 pound butter in a 13" x 9" baking dish.  Put it in the oven while it is heating.  You want the butter to be sizzling, but do not let it brown.

While the butter is melting, mix together:

In a blender, mix 6 eggs, 1 cup of milk, 1/4 cup orange juice, 1/2 cup sugar, 1 cup all-purpose flour, 1/4 tsp salt.  Blend till frothy.

Remove butter from oven and immediately pour batter into the butter.  Do not stir.  Quickly pour prickly pear filling onto batter.  Do not stir.

Place back into the hot oven for 20 minutes or until puffed and brown.

Serve immediately.