How do I eat cactus?

[avram]

Hmm. Those look more like red potatoes, don’t they?

I stopped off at the Korean grocery on Flatbush on my way home from the movie; I picked up a couple of pieces of cactus (two for a buck), figuring I could look it up in The Visual Food Encyclopedia for storage and preparation instructions, but the book has no listing for cactus.

They weren’t being sold in the refrigerated section, so I figure I don’t need to fridge or freeze ’em. And the spines have already been removed (or were never there in the first place), so that’s not an issue. But the sign just said “cactus”, nothing more specific, and I don’t know if these things need to be cooked or peeled or whatever. Any tips?

BTW, when looked at under my florescent kitchen light there’s a lot more yellowish-green in these things than there was under the incandescent lights in my living room, where I painted them. And there are small specks (that didn’t come out so well in the scan, or in the painting for that matter) that I’m guessing were where the spines used to be.