High Desert Cactus Vodka
Prickly Pears surprise and delight in this new, beautifully executed iteration of the classic spirit.
The idea behind High Desert Cactus Vodka started, appropriately, in the desert, at the White Buffalo Bar in Marathon, Texas. If you’ve been there, you know the Big Bend sky outside is immense and quiet, while inside, the seating is cozy, the friendly strangers somehow seem familiar, and the margaritas are simply second to none.
High Desert co-founder Logan Sligar sat drinking a prickly pear margarita and pondered the limitations of the prickly pear fruit itself. Why couldn’t these spiny fuchsia darlings of the desert be made into, say . . . vodka?
Back in Austin, Logan brought the idea to co-founder Ryan Springer, and they got to work answering the question. Six years later, we have it: a very good vodka, it turns out, can indeed result not from mere corn or a potatoes, but instead from prickly pear tunas.
The prickly pears distilled into High Desert Cactus Vodka are straight out of central casting, hand harvested from an actual high desert, in the beautiful San Luis Potosi region of Mexico. Thus begins their journey to arguably become of the most distinctive vodkas in the world, and without question the most “Texas” of vodkas.
As of March 2023, High Cactus Desert Vodka is available now in the Austin area and coming soon to a high desert near you. Well done, Logan, Ryan, and the prickly pears.