Annual New Mexico Prickly Pear Festival

The New Mexico Prickly Pear Festival returns for our 6th Annual Event!

Coming back for our 6th year, the New Mexico Prickly Pear Festival is excited to return to the beautiful grounds of the Gutierrez Hubbell House for another year of food, music, arts and crafts and a lot more celebrating everything prickly
pear.

In addition to our full day of cooking demos, arts and crafts workshops, music, and vendor market selling all kinds of prickly pear and local goods on Saturday September 28th, we're also adding an evening event to our festival line up. On Friday September 27th, our Prickly Nights programming will host music and performances alongside a selection of food and
drinks with a prickly pear focus. Tickets can be found here.

On Friday, festivalgoers can watch a series of musical performances from jazz trio Basilaris, named for a species of prickly pear cactus, Lara Manzanares, and performance bythe National Institute of Flamenco Company, all while taking in the evening air and food and drinks from a selection of vendors.

We're very excited to be back for our 6th New Mexico Prickly Pear Festival.  The festival will be on Friday September 27th from 4-8pm and Saturday Sept 28th from 10am-4pm

Schedule of Events:

Outside

10:00am - 10:30am: Opening

Our festival and vendor market opens, with vendors selling all kinds of prickly pear food, beverages, arts, and crafts.

10:30am - 11:30am: Prickly Pear Pot Painting Party

Join Susan Gomez Arts on the main festival lawn in a guided pot painting workshop, show folks how to paint beautiful designs on a pot for your own prickly pear. Register for you spot here (with prickly pear cuttings and soil available separately)

10:30am - 11:30am: Prickly Pear Agua Fresca

To start off the day's demos, Lilia Avila of the Three Sisters Kitchen and owner of Fiesta Food on Wheels will be showing festival goers how to make a refreshing prickly pear tuna agua fresca

10:30am: Acequia Walks

Join the Center for Social Sustainable Systems for an engaging educational walk along the Pajarito Acequia, where we'll share stories and discuss key issues related to this vital irrigation system and our community. The Pajarito Acequia is an essential part of the larger acequia network in South Valley. Learn more about this history and the lifeblood of our region

11:30am - 12:30pm: Prickly Pear Cochineal Dye Workshop

Led by Gutierrez Hubbell House contributor Kayln Finnell, in this workshop attendees will dye fabric together with cochineal insects, which live on the pads of the nopal and have been harvested for dyeing for centuries. While getting their our hands dirty, festival goers will learn about the history of dyeing with cochineal, as well as the processes involved in natural dyeing.  (pre-registration available here, walk-up spots will be available)

11:30am - 12:30pm: Preserving Prickly Pear: Red Chile Prickly Pear Jam and Pickled Nopales

An intro to the world of water bath canning process, with NMSU's Amber Benson. This class will provide an overview of several different methods of home food preservation specifically focused on Prickly Pear cactus!  Participants will have the opportunity to taste Prickly Pear Jam and Pickled Nopales and receive USDA approved publications on preservation methods and recipes to take home

12:00pm - 12:30pm: Prickly Pear Pot Painting Party

Join Susan Gomez Arts on the main festival lawn in a guided pot painting workshop, show folks how to paint beautiful designs on a pot for your own prickly pear.

12:00pm - 12:30pm: Prickly Pear Cocktails and Mocktails

Join Safe House Distilling Co. and Sugar Moon Syrups to learn how to make some delicious and refreshing prickly pear cocktails and mocktails

1:30pm - 2:30pm: Bluecorn Prickly Pear Pinon Tamales Demo

Chef Tina Archuleta of Itality will show festival goers how to use the meat of hand harvested prickly pear tuna to make a sweet filling for tamales to make a delicious vegan recipe using prickly pear.

1:30pm - 2:30pm: Prickly Pear Cochineal Dye Workshop

The last arts and crafts event of the day, Kayln Finnell, will lead a second natural dye workshop using cochineal insects, which live on the pads of the nopal and have been harvested for dyeing for centuries

1:30pm - 2:30pm: Prickly Pear Pot Painting Party

Join Susan Gomez Arts on the main festival lawn in a guided pot painting workshop, show folks how to paint beautiful designs on a pot for your own prickly pear.

2:30pm - 3:00pm: Prickly Pear + Lion's Mane Green Tea

Join owners Justin Smurawa and Mereya Blanco of Midnight Disco Fungi for a demo of their prickly pear lion's mane green tea, what goes into the drink, and some of the health benefits of prickly pear in tea

1:30pm - 3:00pm: Welcoming to the Prickly Pear Stage

We have an awesome line up of local artists to grace our prickly pear festival stage including

Dust City Opera
Micah Thunder
Maruo Woody
Inside the
Gutierrez Hubbell House

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