The picking process is an important factor in determining the final taste and quality of the olive as it appears on our table. To pick black olives, many cost conscious producers use sticks or machines to shake the ripe fruit from the trees. Some producers leave the olives on the trees until they are so ripe that they fall off by themselves.
In either case, the result is an inferior black olive. Since not all olives on a tree reach ripeness at the same time, machine or stick harvesting means that many of the olives collected may be under or overripe.
Olives harvested by either method are likely to be damaged by this rough handling. They have an inconsistent texture with many of the mushy, soft spots found on any bruised fruit. Mechanical picking also yields an olive with an inferior flavor, as the bruising alters the chemical make-up the olive. To avoid these pitfalls, the best producers use an older, more time-consuming method: hand picking. Careful hand-picking insures that each olive is plucked at just the right stage and all bruising is avoided.
The careful handling is evident in the cured olive's firm, even texture, and in its wonderful rich flavor. The color of an olive indicates the stage of ripeness at which it was picked. Green olives are olives picked before they are ripe, usually in September or October. They should have a firm texture and nutty flavor. What we refer to as "black" olives actually run the gamut from light brown , to beautiful shades of red and purple , all to way to deepest black.
As a general rule, the darker the olive, the riper it was when it was picked. Black olives are usually picked in November and December, sometimes as late as January. The lone exception to this rule is the "olive" which more Americans eat than any other-the canned "black-ripe" olive. These olives are picked green, then for reasons unknown-greater marketing appeal? Since they taste like no other black or green olive in fact, they have almost no taste at all , it is impossible to put them in the same class as you would any other olive.
The olive itself is quite simply the fruit of the olive tree. But unlike most fruits, the olive is never eaten in its raw state. The high percentage of glucosides naturally found in the raw olive makes it incredibly bitter.
Anyone who has unknowingly popped an uncured olive into his mouth will testify to this terrible bitterness. For the olive to become edible, the bitterness must be drawn from the olive, through one of several curing methods:.
Lye Curing -This is the curing method used by nearly every large commercial olive producer. Invented in Spain, lye curing is the most time and cost efficient method of curing.
Unfortunately, it also produces the least flavorful olive. Raw olives are submerged in vats filled with a lye solution. The alkaline lye quickly leaches out the glucosides from the olive. Unfortunately, the fast acting lye also takes with it much of the olive's natural flavor, leaving behind a slight chemical aftertaste.
Water or Brine Curing - This curing method is much more traditional, and produces a far superior olive. To cure in this older slower fashion, the olives are simply submerged in vats of fresh water or seasoned salted brine.
The liquid naturally soaks the bitterness from the olives over a period of weeks or months. During that time, the water is regularly changed according to the preference of each producer. When the olives are aged in brine, it serves not only to remove the natural bitterness of the olives, but seasons them as well. Kalamata olives, for example, are cured in a red wine vinegar brine which helps give them their delicious, almost wine-like flavor.
Some producers begin curing in a water bath, and then later shift their olives into a seasoned brine. Water or brine yield a naturally cured olive, bringing out and enhancing the natural flavors of the olives. Dry Curing - In this method, raw olives are rubbed with salt and left to cure for a matter of weeks or months. An important note: kalamata olives often have a misleading label.
SO make sure you read the label and import label carefully when buying these. Black olives are a fully ripe olive, and they can be of different cultivars. Most olive cultivars ripen fully black, though some are a deep, dark brown. There are jumbo or mammoth black olives, very meaty and bred specifically to be easy to pit without losing too much product. There are also small or regular sized black olives that usually have more flavor than the large ones.
And there are sizes that range between these two, with different degrees of pungency. In terms of flavor, black olives are perhaps the easiest to get used to. These always have quite a bit of meat on them, no matter the size. Kalamata olives always have the pits inside, ad they are much more difficult to remove without losing a lot of meat. And they have a pungent, salty flavor that we think surpasses even green olives. A key difference is the lack of bitterness. Where a green olive is a bit bitter, kalamatas are not bitter.
They have a much stronger olive taste, and they may remind you a little of red wine. If you mix these with crackers, Cheddar, and cream cheese you get a snack that just begs for a beer. Black olives are treated with a lye solution, to leech out oleuropein. These small, purplish-brown, wrinkled olives from Puglia have soft, tender flesh and a tart, citrusy taste. Gaetas can be either dry-cured shrivelly, chewy or brine-cured plump, juicy.
I like them served over spaghetti with capers and pine nuts, or simple served out of bowl for snacking. These torpedo-shaped French green olives are wonderfully crisp and crunchy, with a tart, nutty, anise-y flavor.
They're pretty and elegant enough to serve as hors d'oeuvres, and give a welcome punch to risotto or a hearty stew. Gordal means "fat one" in Spanish. The name is justified; these are some big, proudly fat olives, with plenty of firm, meaty richness to match their imposing size.
Serve them beside some jamon and a glass of Sherry. While Alfonso olives are traditionally considered Chilean, the province of Tacna, in the foothills of the La Yarada mountains, where they originated, has been under Peruvian rule since These are huge, deep purple olives that are brine-cured, then macerated in red wine.
They are supple, juicy and fleshy, with a hint of sour bitterness. It's a variety typically enjoyed with charcuterie and a full-bodied red wine. The USA's very own olive baby. Although its origin was believed to be Spanish, scientists at the University of Spain at Cordoba were unable to link it to Spain's olive varieties. Mission olive trees have flourished in California since the 's; most of the yield goes to make olive oil, but black oil-cured and green brine-cured table olives are both mild, grassy, and bright in flavor.
This familiar, friendly, oval-shaped olive from Spain is brine-cured, with a crisp texture and a slightly smoky, almond-y flavor. They're often stuffed with pimientos, or cracked and dressed with olive oil and fresh garlic. A spot-on hors d'oeuvre, especially when served with cold Fino Sherry and crusty bread. Morocco produces hundreds of varieties of olives, but exports only a few. If you can get your hands on these, you're truly lucky.
They are dry-cured and wildly, intensely flavorful. Serve them like the Moroccans do: in salads, tagines, or sprinkled with good olive oil and hot peppers. From the hills by Delphi, the legendary home of the ancient Greek oracles, these hand-picked olives are prized for good reason.
Plucked from their branches when very ripe, they slowly brine cured to coax out a mild, fruity flavor and a melt-in-your-mouth softness. In Greece, Amfissa olives are often served in soups or stews; they're also great beside cheeses and cured meats. Actively scan device characteristics for identification. Use precise geolocation data.
Select personalised content. Create a personalised content profile. Most people suggest that Kalamata olives are a perfect snack alone, or added to cheese and vegetable plates. You can rinse brined olives too, to reduce some of the salt. Tricia has a Literature degree from Sonoma State University and has been a frequent DelightedCooking contributor for many years.
She is especially passionate about reading and writing, although her other interests include medicine, art, film, history, politics, ethics, and religion. Tricia lives in Northern California and is currently working on her first novel.
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