Last year my husband really wanted to make prickly pear cactus jelly. I wasn't very excited about it, but after putting it off for several weeks, I said ok. He collected the pears from the cactus all around here. They aren't the big, juicy red pears like you see on YouTube videos or other web sites - those must be from localities with much milder winters. Our pears are tiny, and mostly seed, averaging the size of the first joint of a man's thumb. I searched online to find out how to remove those tiny, extremely sharp spines (called spicules) from the pears. The concensus was to burn them off. So, for the first batch of pears, my husband used our gas stove and carefully turned each pear using tongs. Then I washed them, finding several residual spines (ouch!), and started to make my first batch of jelly. We used a steam juicer, and it worked great. The juice was thick and slimy, like mucus, which I didn't expect (I have found out that is what it's supposed to be). After boiling it, adding lemon juice, sugar, and liquid pectin (which was at least 3 years old and looked like jelly itself), it was a bust. Beautiful, flavorful, but no thicker than the thick juice - probably the old pectin. I then tried jelly rescue instuctions from the SureJell site, and it thickened to the consistency of hard plastic. Delicious, but it had to be warmed in the microwave to spread. Meanwhile, we were finding cactus spines everywhere - on the counter, in the stove, on the floor - very painful. For the second batch last year, my husband went onto our back porch and used a camping stove to burn off the spines - kept them from getting inside, but he got spines all over his lap, legs, and feet. He had to strip naked before he came into the house (good thing our neighbors are 1/2 mile away) and segregate his contaminated clothes to wash separately. I even found a spine, the hard way (imbedded in my finger), 10 months later while cleaning the stove! The second batch was like softer hard plastic - it still had to be heated in the microwave to be spread. However, it was delicious (my husband says it tastes "pink"). Over the last year, we used a few jars and gave a few away for presents, with instructions for microwave softening.
Despite those difficulties, we decided to try again this year (again stimulated by my husband). I decided to try a different method to deal with the spines. My husband picked the pears, and thoroughly rinsed them several times. He then cut each pear in half, but didn't remove the spines. I lined the fruit section of the steamer with two layers of cheese cloth, and we placed the fruits into it, spines and all. It worked! We didn't get any spines into the juice. The second change for this year was to use Pomona's Universal Pectin, something I had seen online. I had made a trial batch of apply jelly last Fall after I bought the pomona pectin and it was awful - it had lumps, with the consistency of large ball tapioca. But I read the FAQs online, and re-read the instructions. I used a hand blender (Emeril calls it the boat motor) to blend the juice after I added the pectin-sugar mix. I blended it for a LONG time. I also used the boil-and-test method, e.g., boil a minute or so after everything has been added, then put a small dab on a cool dish and see how it jells. I ended up boiling it for ~10 minutes, at which point it seemed to be jelling well, so I put it in jars and processed them. The good news it that it is the perfect jell consistency - spreads well and not syrupy. Unfortunately it has a very slight granular texture, like tiny (tiny!) tapioca. Maybe I needed to use that boat motor a few more minutes. But it is so delicious and just the right jell, so you don't notice.
I'm glad that we didn't have to deal with the spines at all, and that we have jelly that spreads without being nuked! But will I remember what we did next year? Sure, I'll read this post....
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