Hot Sauce Mini-Crate
A hand-made mini version of our signature Alientown crate with one each of our green, yellow and red hot sauce variations.
Handmade Gift Crates
ALIENTOWN BEGINS
Alientown Cactus and Chile Company is an “accidental enterprise” that grew out of a love for everything New Mexican and the realization that everything about prickly pears is awesome. And New Mexico green chile. It’s awesome too. In 2018 we got our hands on a very small harvest of prickly pears - just a few pounds. We managed to make a few jars of jelly out of the pears and loved it so much, we vowed to get more the next year. In 2019, we went on a hunt for local opuntias and were amazed at just how readily they are available - if you’re looking for them. This time we picked several GALLONS of the fruit and started giving away samples of jelly and syrup. When people started asking where they could buy it, we knew we might be on to something and Alientown Cactus and Chile Company was born.
Our hometown is famous for the 1947 “Roswell Incident” in which an Unidentified Flying Object - allegedly - crashed not too far from town. Do you believe? We’re not sure, but either way, we couldn’t ignore the fact that it would be great fun to tie the mystery of this event into creating tasty treats made from uniquely New Mexico ingredients.
Our signature gift crate
Our PRODUCTS (SO FAR…)
We are a very small home-based company, so we’re limited to just how much we can produce. We create everything out of our state-approved kitchen and process and cook everything in small batches. Our crates are hand-made in our garage wood shop.
We’ve come a long way since that first jar of jelly we concocted so many years ago. Since then we’ve added prickly pear syrup, three flavors of hot sauce (both traditional and fermented), chile salts (green chile and a super hot blend made from peppers we grow ourselves), green chile candied pecans, cold-pressed pecan oil, small-batch roasted coffee, Alien Diablo barbecue sauce, prickly pear vinegar-infused balsamic vinegar, prickly pear rimming salt and sugar, various extracts (vanilla, lemon, prickly pear, red and green chile) and other seasonal treats as we are inspired.
We are also proud to partner with Red River Brewing Company and Distillery in Red River, NM to produce a prickly pear beer. Look for Alientown Prickly Bear on tap in Red River and throughout New Mexico.
We can also be found at various fairs and events around New Mexico with our fresh-pressed lemonade mixed with our own lemonade powder and a dash of prickly pear syrup, along with a cold-brew version of our own coffee.
core products
We are excited to grow our lineup, and can’t wait to share with you some new ideas we’ve been cooking up. In the meantime, we hope you’ll enjoy our core line of products. They are all made using New Mexico-grown key ingredients - prickly pear, green chile, pecans and peanuts. If you’re lucky, your candied pecans might even be made from pecans picked and hand-shelled by the Ballard boys’ Nana.
Handmade Large Crate
Made from cedar for the bottom and sides and pine for the slates, these crates are handmade to last and look great. They serve as a beautiful unique gift, and hold our entire core line of products, and are, of course, reusable in any number of ways. Dimensions: 13”x5.5”x5.5”
PRICKLY PEAR MARGARITA
Add an ounce or two of our Prickly Pear Syrup to your favorite margarita recipe to add amazing color and some of that earthy prickly pear flavor.
