I just put three gallons of prickly pear mead into four separate jugs for fermentation. Process is below.

First, these cactus are from my dad's garden. He got them from me when I lived in Tucson and had a bit of a cactus invasion, so it's cool to be re-using some cactus fruits from many years ago...

Picking: Used tongs and a sharp knife to separate the fruit from the cactus.

Processing: Next day (I was very late in getting things done this time) I heated the fruits in water, then scraped the glochids and put the friut into a blender. That was for 1/2 the fruits. The other 1/2, I heated in water, then tossed on the barbecue for a few minutes to burn off the glochids and then tossed into a separate blender. This was different from what I have done in the past, but I had a LOT more fruits and not nearly as much time.

I had two 3/4 gallon jugs of juice from this. These were refrigerated for a few days until I had time to come back to them. One is still there and will be turned into syrup and jam later this weekend.

The jug of roasted fruits was then heated and diluted to make about four gallons, and Mountain Top Honey Company (Mesquite) honey was added to taste (about four pounds). I never boiled the solution. I rehydrated a wine yeast while the solution was heating. After cooling the mixture down, I pitched the yeast then racked to four 3/4 gallon jugs and put the rest in soda bottles for my son (six 16-ounce bottles).

This will sit in my fermenting closet for a while, probably a few months at least, and then be bottled for conditioning.

Of course, I strained the juice after running through the blender, but after having just moved the soda bottles into the fridge, I noticed that I could have done a MUCH better job of straining. I'm considering opening the soda bottles and straining them a second time, and perhaps diluting them a bit if necessary. I'm not sure if I will move the mead to secondary to remove some of the fruit. Probably not.

Whats the deal with the soda bottle batches? Is it supposed to be prickly pear soda or something?

Yeah, prickly pear soda. It's a bit on the sweet side, but the kid likes it (especially after I surreptitiously diluted it with water).

Nice. Too bad those don't grow ANYWHERE near me!

Well now I just purchased twenty odd pounds of pears. Bought the same size lug last year squeezed the lot and put the bulk of it in one five gallon batch of mead. Less a couple that went swimming in tequila. These things are I think off beavertails maybe? they do not have prickles at all. Anyway, I was curious if this is an experiment, or have you made this batch before? The batch I made last year was a bit of a disappointment, considering all the work and expense I put into it. Course I have not tasted it in a few months either. The pears are ripening on a workbench in my garage, and I am gonna rob my bees here real soon, should get quite a few pounds of honey I gotta do something with. Are the separate fermenters cause ya do not have one large enough free? or did you treat each batch a little different

This time it's a bit of an experiment. My dad used to ferment in a couple of five-gallon carboys, one open, one closed. Mine are all closed with airlocks. They are in separate containers because I've got three batches of beer in the regular fermenters. I may consider doing something different with each in a while, but I'll probably just be lazy.

I suspect your fruits have either already been tossed in hot coals or run through a flame to remove the glochids, or they're from the mission cactus strain of prickly pears, which were bred to have no glochids. You say they're ripening. Are they green? I have never picked green pears before. I suspect they will be a lot more like nopalitos than citrusy fruits. If they're just a little green, that's probably fine. Mine are always deep purple or red and I leave the ones with green for the birds.

I have never used a blender to juice the fruits before. It worked well, though I did not peel them first, and I think I would do so next time; even with the strainer I have used in the past, I ended up with a lot of sediment in the juice. This isn't really bad, but it...um...makes you a little more than regular.

The soda was a complete experiment and I think I'm going to open up the bottles and 1) dilute by about 50% to 100% and 2) strain the sediment out.

I suspect this will work out just fine, and I'll keep an update going on how everthing is progressing.

I moved the mead into bottles this evening. Boy, oh, boy, is this going to be good!

It's already very smooth, with very little alcohol taste (but it definitely has alcohol), and is very nearly ready to drink. It could use at least another month or so to condition and clarify, and I plan to keep some for at least six to twelve months.

It has a very nice hot pink-purple color. I'm very excited to open a bottle for the New Year (maybe I should have carbonated one of them... oh, well). I intended to take a picture but cleaning got in the way and then I finished the last sip before remembering. When I open one I'll take a picture.

I didn't do anything more with the separate jugs; just didn't have time or inclination to mess with them--they were sitting very peacefully and without any kind of infection. I didn't want to chance anything going wrong.

Each of the jugs had several inches of sediment that I tossed into my compost. Next time I do this (I have more pears that have been sitting for way too long already), I'll have to use a cheesecloth to strain the juice.

I bottled in three 22 ounce bottles and seventeen 12 ounce bottles. I plan to use the 22 ounce bottles when I have people over.

threhamr, perhaps you would like to exchange a bottle of yours for a bottle of mine? If so, PM me and we'll figure out how to make that happen.