Food I'm Eating: The Olive Project Continued (January-February 2011)

It's been just over three weeks now since I determined to try to make olives--eating olives, that is--from the bitter black fruit on our backyard olive tree. I went into the project with a fair amount of skepticism, having tasted unpleasant homemade olives in the past. Tasting my efforts now after three weeks in brine, I'm pleasantly surprised. The bitterness is all gone. The olives have a nice fruity quality. Best of all, it was a rather easy thing to do. My only reservation is that they taste a little saltier than I would like. I wonder how you regulate the saltiness? That seems rather hit or miss. Perhaps by adjusting the brine? I used 1/4 cup of salt for each quart of water. Nevertheless, I'm inspired to do another batch already.

These will sit in the brine another week or so, then I'll package them (in jars, still in the brine, with a layer of olive oil on top. They're supposed to keep that way for a month or two).

My original post on the subject of making olives

The olives before starting their soak in brine (left: each berry has been scored with a knife blade, to allow the brine to penetrate; below, the more-or-less finished product).