The flavor of a Cactus Pear sounds like...

It sounds painful upon first impressions. Just thinking of the word "cactus" I think of words that  relate to; prickly, spikes, pain, hurt, and ouch. However, I do like pears, most pears I've had tasted good, sweet, and nutritious. Something I don't think of much when I eat something is what senses do I experience other than tastes and smells? That's the point of this assignment for this week, to eat something we have never had before and describe all the senses we receive for it other than the primary ones for eating, which would be smell or taste; then create something using it. While grocery shopping with my dad over spring break, I noticed a cactus pear in the produce section, and I knew that's what I would try for the assignment. I had always wondered what desert fruit would taste like, whether it'd be sweet or some other flavor I haven't tried before. I imagine that it would not have much flavor, since most cactus plants do not want to be eaten and will try different strategies to discourage animals from doing so.

This is a picture of it with a size comparison of my hand next to it. It might not be clear, but the small bumps on the surface of the pear appear to be fuzzy. However, with the name cactus pear, I decided not to test to see how fuzzy they actually are. While we were shopping, my dad also mentioned to me how he did indeed feel as though he was pricked by something after handling it, so I decided to cut off as many of these bumps as I could to help the experience.

It honestly looks a bit gruesome, but for the sake of not having tiny little cactus quills poking my cheeks, gums, and in between my teeth, it was worth the time and effort. So now it's time to finally test out how many and what types of feelings I receive while eating a cactus pear. I made sure to turn all noises off possible, close my eyes, and open my mind in anticipation. Just on a side note, before actually taking a bite, I thought of the scene in Ratatouille where one of the rats experiences the flavor of cheese and a berry together in a way of seeing colors and hearing sounds. 3...2...1...

First crunch (yeah, a crunch), it just felt like a train wreck had happened right in my face. Every bit of the pear reminded me of cucumbers and I really do not like cucumbers, mainly the flavor. The initial feeling was that the outer area of the fruit was hard and crunchy, while the inside was really soft but almost crumbly, the texture wasn't that great overall. It smelled a lot like a cucumber as well, which didn't help in any way. It just felt as though while I was chewing the pear, I was just really regretting my choice for the food that I chose. After I had finished up the first bite, I thought that I needed a second opinion, this was also not a good decision. This bite had some of the seeds in the center of the fruit in it, they were hard, small, blood red looking pellets that made me think of blackberry seeds, but much larger. I finally made a good decision in all of this, I spit out the second bite, but after giving it a bit of time for me to think while the flavor was reminding me of cucumbers and slowly making me sick. The experience was not bad enough to make me feel like I wanted to up chuck or anything, but it was just plain unpleasant. After this, I saw in the mirror that it turned the inside of my mouth to a dark red color maybe similar to blood, but not completely. Overall, this really gave me images of a train wreck or being hit by a truck. These images did give me an idea on what I could use the actual pear for in my book, I decided to put it in a plastic bag to save it.

If it wasn't gruesome before, now it looks like part of a heart in a bag. I think I will turn the juice of this heart into a kind of paste that I'll use to seal the pages of the book together so that they cannot be opened. In this way, I can turn two things I do not like into one thing that I do enjoy. All I hope for is that the result of the paste does not attract many bugs, because then I will have something I like that possibly attracts things that I do not like (flies and gnats). I did crush up the fruit to make one of the components for the paste, but I think I will not show a picture of that, because it looks like a smashed up bloody heart in a bag. I'll do some research on how to make a glue or paste with this fruit then incorporate it into my Altered book. Somehow, even though I wore gloves while handling it, I managed to get some tiny little cactus quills in my fingers, one on my face, and one on my foot.

As for the 4 S's, that was the last thing I thought about while I was eating the cactus pear. The flavor of a cactus pear sounds like... a real hassle.