It’s a cactus apple. You can eat the purple ones, but the green ones aren’t ripe yet. I have several on mine right now.
Don’t just pick and eat them unless you want to deal with thousands of hairlike needles stabbing you. Use thick gloves to pick them, then soak them in hot water to soften the spines. Still wearing gloves, carefully use a fork and paring knife to remove the skin. Wash them again, and then they’re ready to eat.
Use tongs to pick them and wear heavy leather gloves. Prepare a fire (torch, BBQ, or other flame). Hold the cactus apple over the flame to burn off the hairs without burning the fruit. Then, enjoy the delicious fruit!
FYI, instead of using hot water, you can also spear the cactus apple and hold it over a flame until all the spines are burnt off.
Apple cactus fruits are smooth and leathery, without any spines. Whether a fruit has spines or not can vary widely by species.
You’re confusing prickly pear with cactus apple. I have both in my yard. Cactus apple is smooth and is the fruit produced by the night-blooming flower. Once the flower stalks fall off, the fruit grows if the flowers were pollinated. The fruit starts out wrinkly and purple, and when mature, it becomes a smooth shade of red wine.
You know, there are plenty of foods out there that don’t come with hairlike needles to worry about, so I’ll stick with those. But I appreciate learning about this—I had no idea it even existed until just now!
Yes! Neighborhood kids brought me one, asking what it was. After handing it over, she started crying. I tossed it out and then wanted to start crying myself. Those tiny needles are so hard to remove!