With prickly pears in season, upgrade the tequila classic on World Margarita Day with the Prickly Pear Margarita.
Prickly Pear Margarita – Photo © Cocktails & Bars
Prickly pears are the fruit of a prickly pear cactus and come into season at the end of summer. Their fruit varies in colour and can be hot pink, yellow-orange, and pale green with subtle flavour differences.
Also known as cactus fruit, prickly pears have thorny spines which can easily pierce the skin and they can be painful and difficult to remove. To remove as much of the spines as possible, handle carefully by holding the fruit with tongs under running water and scrubbing it with a brush. One way to peel the prickly pears is to handle the fruit using tongs in one hand and a knife in another. One peeled, cut them into chunks and run them through a blender to make a purée.
For the Prickly Pear Margarita recipe, we used reposado tequila, freshly squeezed lime juice and Solerno blood orange liqueur. The drink is on the sour-tart end of the spectrum and works particularly well with the pink prickly pears which tend to be not as sweet as the yellow variety. The cocktail is shaken, strained and served in black lava salt rimmed glass on ice. There will be some pulp in the drink but it adds to the overall flavour. Double straining makes it too watery and diminishes the fruity flavour of the prickly pears.
Prickly Pear Margarita Recipe
Original recipe by Cocktails & Bars
Ingredients
- 60 ml reposado tequila
- 30 ml fresh lime juice
- 30 ml orange liqueur
- 60 ml prickly pear purée
Glassware: rocks glass
Garnish: lime wedge, black lava salt rim
Method
Carefully peel the prickly pear, cut into chunks and purée in a blender. Wet the rim of a rocks glass with lime and dip the rim into black lava salt.
In a cocktail shaker, add tequila, lime juice, orange liqueur, prickly pear purée, ice and shake hard until cold. Strain into the rimmed rocks glass with an ice sphere. The cocktail can also be served up in a coupette.
