It’s prickly-pear season and Ken Harvey, the executive chef at Loews Ventana Canyon Resort at 7000 N. Resort Drive is making the best of it. He’s using the vibrantly colored fruit in a variety of interesting ways, according to a few e-mails I’ve gotten from the resort’s public relations people in recent weeks:

Thanks for your interest in Chef Harvey. The dishes I’m aware of are a salad, a popsicle, a margarita and an ice tea all using the prickly pears.

A few days went by and I got another missive explaining all the ways Chef Harvey is using the delicious little desert fruits:

One of the juices served at brunch uses prickly pear juice and watermelon juice

Prickly pear is used with sauerkraut in the Canyon Cafe “Reuben”

It’s used in a prickly pear salad dressing: prickly pear juice, sweet vinegar (apple cider or red wine), oil, raspberries or strawberries

The juice is also cooked down with sugar to create a glaze for chicken and fish

That’s what I’m talking about. There’s more on the resort and its restaurants over here.

This article appears in Sep 27 – Oct 3, 2012.

4 replies on “A Gratuitous Use of Prickly Pears”

  1. Adam, I think the resort needs a new PR person. Personally, I would have taken the time to make the descriptions they sent you more appealing.

  2. Just last week I took a walk around the block here in Midtown and picked a bucket full of fruit, took it home, washed it, simmered it in a pot (w/the skin on) to a concentrate of beautiful juice…along w/spices, honey and ginger. It has wonderful anti-inflammatory effects for arthritic joints and fluid bloating. Not only that, it’s very tasty and free!

  3. Right on Pammy! I spent a recent weekend helping harvest hundreds of pounds of prickly pears and turning them into juice for several different projects. I ended up stained bright pink from the shoulders down and very happy about it! Prickly pears are truly an underutilized local treasure.

  4. Thanks Adam. Ironicly I had a conversation w/my doc the week before and he told me about the fruit. I’ve been here since ’85 and had no idea about the holistic properties. I went online and created my own recipe out of the many posted. Good stuff! Do hou know TriVita charges upwards of $30 a bottle? Don’t even get me started on their true ingredients. Let’s just say there are about 10 other juices along w/itzzz

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