phragmentation

I’m going to try each of these recipes with my freshly harvested olives:

Brine cured

Brine cured red-ripe or black-ripe olives are Greek-style; brine cured green olives are Sicilian style. The red-ripe olives generally turn a grey green to pink, while the black-ripe ones keep their color, becoming a Kalamata-deep purple. Again, you pick the olives, or you shake the tree over a tarp, and collect the olives. Deeply slit each one using a sharp paring knife, then plunk them into a brine (brine is 1/4 cup canning salt in 1 qt water). Weight down the olives, make sure they are fully immersed. Cover your vat of olives, stir once in awhile, wait one week. Rinse, and change the olive brine once/week for at least 3 weeks. Taste, if still too bitter, keep changing brine 1/week. Mine usually take about 6 weeks. Scum will form on the top of the vat; its harmless *if* olives are immersed, but get rid of it when you see it.

Fresh water, then brine cured

For the first seven days, cover the olives in fresh water, rinsing and changing the water daily. Some will float, most will not.

For the next 10 to 15 days, soak the olives in a brine of 1/2 c. salt [or more] to 12 c. water. Change the water every five days or so — but use your instincts. If the water gets especially scummy, change it sooner. Don’t worry too much about it just being murky.

During this stage, one of the most amusing parts was that many olives were clearly at exactly the density of the saline solution, so they would slowly rise and fall, occasionally hovering in the middle, like a mouth-watering lava lamp.

However. What Andy doesn’t tell you, and what I am telling you now, is that mold is the biggest scourge here. Ultimately, I took to dropping a length of cheesecloth in the mix to keep the olives submerged under water so as to avoid exposure to air.

After 10 days in the brine, start tasting. They should be mild, almost bland. Keep soaking until all bitterness is gone.

At this point you can drain the olives, and transfer them to a sealable container. Cover with good olive oil and add any flavoring agents you like — spices, garlic, what have you. I used a couple bay leaves, some red pepper flake, a few good pinches of coarse salt and some julienned orange rind. Stir at least once a day to keep the olives well covered in oil.

Salt & Oil Cured

Cover the bottom of a wooden box with burlap. Weigh out 1 pound of salt for each 2 pounds of olives. Mix the salt and olives well in the box to prevent mold from developing. Pour a layer of salt over the olives to a depth of 1 inch. CAUTION Place the box outdoors so that the brine formed will not ruin the floor.

After 1 week, pour olives and salt into another box, then back into the first box to mix them. Repeat this mixing process once every 3 days until the olives are cured and edible. This usually takes about 30 to 35 days.

Sift out most of the salt through a screen. Dip the olives momentarily in boiling water. Drain. Let them dry overnight.

Add 1 pound of salt to each 10 pounds of olives. Mix and put the olives in a cool place. Use within 1 month, or store in a refrigerator or home freezer until used. Just before using, coat the olives with olive oil. Do not use oil if you plan to use the olives for cooking.

Stan’s Black Olives

Day 1 Wash in running water. Place in flat trays (large surface area) or plastic ice cream containers. Add boiling hot water and allow to soak for 24 hours.

Day 2 Remove cold water and add dry salt

Day 3 Onwards - mix well and keep adding dry salt

After about a week water comes out of the olives - pour off

Total salt = about 15% OF THE OLIVE WEIGHT IE 150 To 200 grams

Test - wash salt off olive and taste. When the salt has penetrate into the olive, wash off salt and add olive oil. .