Is it safe to eat the cactus plant?
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Well, you have to cook some before you eat them and some definitely taste better than others. The fruit and leaves of the prickly pear cactus is one of the most well known of the edible cacti. Their leaves and fruit are very favorable and are a staple of many dishes in Central America. Another cactus which has delicious fruit is the dragon fruit cactus which is a vine-like cactus with long, fleshy leaves and bright red or yellow fruit with a white or red center and tiny black, crunchy seeds with high nutritional value. The plant is also called the night-blooming cereus because it has large, fragrant white flowers that only bloom at night.
And then there are several species of agave succulent plants that can be made edible, such as the Agave tequilana which is used in the production of tequila, as well as edible palms such as the saw palmetto. The heart of the stems are tender enough that you can eat it raw or it can be cooked as a vegetable. It’s seeds are big business too because they are made into herbal supplements said to treat benign prostrate conditions.
There is prickly pear cactus which can be picked and eaten directly from the cactus, but you have to remove the small,needle sharp stickers first. Eat the fruit when it’s dark red to purple. The green cactus is also edible, you just have to cook it for few minutes just to soften it or you soak it in order to remove the thorns. After that, it can then be chopped up and boiled, fried, pickled,or any way that anyone knows how to prepare them. The pickled cactus can be found in the pickle section of the grocery store.