You can. I ate some as a friend (a trained San Pedro practitioner) and I were preparing cactus for brewing. I didn’t eat enough for any effect, just to see what it was like. It wasn’t unpleasant, but it also didn’t taste good. It was fairly neutral.

I believe you’d have to eat a LOT of fresh cactus to have any effect – the water content takes up a lot of the mass. So boiling it down or drying it and making a powder are the two most efficient ways to process it.

In the future I’m going to dry the skin and then pulverize it into a powder. Making tea and then freezing most of it isn’t all that practical, since I don’t plan to use full doses of San Pedro very often – maybe once every week or two at most. (I only sat in ceremony once, with my friend, and I’m now going to be drinking on my own. I’m starting with a small dose to see how I handle it without a guide.)

Hi John — I would recommend you join our free, private community and post the question there. There are so many experts who will be glad to answer these questions: https://community.thethirdwave.co/

Thanks,
Dorth Raphaely
Third Wave GM.

The cactus will scab over and eventually grow new shoots. 😉