How To Prepare San Pedro Cactus


Nan's Nook : Archives : Botanicals : Cactus : San PedroNan's San Pedro Syrup
Posted by: mjshroomer Jun 26 03, 10:15 AM GMT
Later I will rewrite and word this with photos after I come back from southeast Asia.

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San Pedro Preparation.

Well I had two methods, one on paper and the other on film.

Editors for Psychedelic Illuminations conducted the filmed version. Those were lost when the publisher and his wife went through a violent divorce and the photos got trashed, along with many new articles.

And I wrote it all down somewhere and it too cannot be found.

Now. Here is my story on the preparation of this cactus.

Years ago in the early 1970s I became friends with the employees of Murphy Stevens Indoor Sun Shoppe in the Seattle�s University District.

Murphy Stevens was the owner of these shops (2) and was also the author, as well as the editor of several fine books on �How to grow the Finest Marijuana Indoors under Halides.� And How to Grow Pot Hydroponically.� They also published the How to Identify and Grow Psilocybe Mushrooms book by Jule Stevens and Rich Gee.

And one of the employees and I went to the arboretum in 1975 and were playing Frisbee when I dropped the Frisbee to the ground at the Woodlawn Park section of the Seattle Arboretum.

AS I bent down to pick up the Frisbee I noticed some interesting mushrooms in the field in which we were playing.

I then lifted one shroom out of the ground and realized it was Psilocybe semilanceata.

Well let me tell you guys. That really blew my mind.

I showed my friend this shroom and he mentioned to me that I since I showed an interest in these special mushrooms, maybe I would be interested in trying a San Pedro Cactus, which he told me, contained mescaline.

T that time in the 1970s, I learned that this cactus from Peru and Ecuador was used ritualistically in ceremonies similar to Peyotl rituals. That the natives of these countries prepared these cacti in a drink called Chimora.

The cactus should be sliced, chopped and then boiled for hour after hour to get the alkaloids to mix in with the water. Then I would be able to partake of the sacred juice for a most rewarding experience.

I also learned that the cost at that time for a plant shop was $3.00 a cactus for a one to two pound cutting and that such size would be equal to an equivalent of 4 to 6 buttons of fresh peyotl or equal to 300 to 500 milligrams of mescaline sulfate. A dose equivalent to a Native American Church ceremonial dose.

My friends at Indoor Sun Shoppe told me I would have to slice and cook the cactus for about four hours or so and then drink the remaining liquid.

So I purchased about ten of the cacti and planted all but one of them in my home. Several of them I kept at the Beauty and the Books Used Bookstore in the University district. Se photo with article of such cacti at the book store.,

Well I chopped up the cactus and placed it into a small 2 quart pan and began to cook it.

I let this goop boil for a few hours and then strained off the pulp from the cactus and waited for it to cool off to drink it.

And I did.

After two hours I felt only a little tingle and i could not sleep the whole night but I never got high from it.

AT that time, High Time Magazine was just one year old with four issues and now th3ey were going monthly. In the first year of 12 issues, there were many ads for 6� cuttings of San Pedro Cactus for ten dollars each per cutting.

I imagined that hundreds of interested people had bought this cactus, cooked it , drank the liquid and then nothing happened and went on thinking that they had been royally ripped off for their ten dollars. What a shame.

Okay. So I learned a few days later from my friends that I had not prepared the cactus in the right manner and was apparently in too much of a hurry in my method of preparation.

I recalled that the Indians of Peru and #Ecuador who use these cacti (13 species) have to boil the preparation in a black kettle cauldron for at least 12 to 24 four hours. However, I of the Western World know the secret of the blender. Something the Indian does not have access to in his jungle. The magical Electrical Blender.

So here is the proper method to cook this cactus. After I return from SE Asia I will present a photo step by step process for the extraction.

The Preparation of San Pedro cactus.

(1): Take one � one foot section of a cutting of Trichecerius Pachanoi (San Pedro) cactus and slice it like a cucumber into star sections and then chop those star sections into quarter pieces.

(2): Fill one cup of cactus to one cup of water and place into a blender.

(3) Blend this mixture and pour into blender. Blend. Repeat process several times until the whole cactus is in the blender. You will most likely have to do this step in several steps. After blending each cup of cactus and blending you will pour it one cup at a time into the blender., blend and then pour the mixture into a large cooking pot of at least 3-5 quarts of water.

(4): Cook on a slow low heat until the mixture is even. Once you have blended this mixture into a pot to boil, the cactus pulp is separated from the water and sits on top of the mixture. Once the water starts to boil, the pulp will rise to the top of the pot and boil over. So it is very important that you use, hopefully a gas stove because you can better regulate the heat of the cooking temperature. You can also leave the spurs (spines, needles) on the cactus since the boiling eventually softens them into a sting like piece of material. Therefore the spines will not be harmful. Cooking renders them soft. Now, as I mentioned above, it is important to stir the mixture while it is rejoining itself into one liquid. Always stir and turn the heat as low as possible for the first half hour of cooking. Slowly but surely the green goop will eventually remix with the water until you have one substance in the pot. A pulpy green Kermit looking glop of goop.

(5). AFTER THE WATER AND PULP HAVE REJOINED THEN YOU CAN INCRASE THE AMOUNT OF HEAT TO THE BOIL SO IT WILL BOIL CONTINOUSLY BUT NOT RISE OVER THE PAN ONTO THE STOVE.

(6): Continue boiling for two to four hours until you have just about 12 to 16 ounces of goo left in the bottom of the pan. Do not burn. During this 2-4 hour period, you can always add another 12 to 16 ounces of water or more and boil a little longer if you like.

(7): Now Take your blender and place an old t-shirt pocket onto the top of the blender as if making a filter out of some of your old t-shirt. Make a pocket into the top of the blender with the t-shirt. Then pour the liquid mixture from the pot back into the cloth section you have made a cup of in the top of the blender. The liquid will slowly seep into this cloth pocket and drip into the blender. Keep repeating this process until all of the remaining pulp is in the pocket of cloth in the blender.

(8): Now take a piece of string and tie it around the cloth so that it is closed up keeping the cloth ball over the top of the blender. Attached this string above you to a kitchen cabinet door and let the ball of good trapped in the cloth dangle over the top of the blender so the juice drips into the blender with the remainder of the liquid. After fifteen minutes the Cactus pulp should have cooled down considerably and then you can squeeze the remaining liquid into the blender.

(9): Next, let the liquid cool off for a while until it is warm enough to drink and will not burn your throat.

(10): Now take one half hour to drink this glass of goop. Remember that it is very easy to open your mouth and swallow a big shot of cactus juice. It is not the same as chewing horrible bitter tasting fresh buttons of Peyote, which make you gag. Each time you take a swallow of the mixture you can take an equal drink of whatever you want to counter the taste. It is not as bad as one would think and does not create nauseated feelings when swallowed instead of chewed where the taste in the latter stays in your mouth. Remember the reason to drink this liquid slow is to make the come-on to your system be gentle and not shock your central nervous system. The Indians of Peru do so with the San Pedro as do the North American Indians do when consuming four to 6 or more buttons of peyote.

(11): I think you will find this a cool way to prepare the cactus.

Sorry I no longer have my original photos of this process but will prepare it later for all.

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mj