Fresh Green Olives

[reuvens]

I got a bag full of fresh green olives.

Any suggestions for a perfect brine?

Vue

[Redsugar]

VUE: Olives are picked either unripe (green), almost ripe (red to black), or ripe (black). They are virtually inedible until they are cured. Commercial methods of curing olives include soaking them in olive oil, water, brine or salt for several months; dry-curing them in salt; or lye-curing them in a strong alkaline solution – and then rinsing them thoroughly, which is the most common method.

You may be interested in preparing these zesty, marinated spiced olives:

2 cups black olives

2 cups green olives

¼ cup black peppercorns

¼ cup white peppercorns

1 tsp each dried thyme & oregano

½ tsp hot pepper flakes

6-8 cloves garlic

rind of 2 lemons, cut in strips

approx. 2½ cups olive oil

Combine all ingredients, except olive oil, in a bowl. Spoon into glass jars; pour in sufficient olive oil to cover. Seal jars; marinate at room temperature for 2 weeks, turning jars every day or two to ensure even spicing. Store marinated olives in the refrigerator.

[reuvens]

thank you,

but do i have to prepare the olives before that procedure like

little cuts into the skin or smash them softly with a hammer?

just curious

[SobaAddict70]

just smash them gently with the side of a chef's knife or cleaver.

Soba

[chezcherie]

VUE:  Olives are picked either unripe (green), almost ripe (red to black), or ripe (black).  They are virtually inedible until they are cured.  Commercial methods of curing olives include soaking them in olive oil, water, brine or salt for several months; dry-curing them in salt; or lye-curing them in a strong alkaline solution – and then rinsing them thoroughly, which is the most common method.

You may be interested in preparing these zesty, marinated spiced olives:

2 cups black olives

2 cups green olives

¼ cup black peppercorns

¼ cup white peppercorns

1 tsp each dried thyme & oregano

½ tsp hot pepper flakes

6-8 cloves garlic

rind of 2 lemons, cut in strips

approx. 2½ cups olive oil

Combine all ingredients, except olive oil, in  a bowl.  Spoon into glass jars; pour in sufficient olive oil to cover.  Seal jars; marinate at room temperature for 2 weeks, turning jars every day or two to ensure even spicing.  Store marinated olives in the refrigerator.

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redsugar, this looks great, but i have a question. is this recipe to be made using fresh, uncured olives (i.e, without the preliminary rinsing, water or brine soaking, etc.)? i have a few lbs of fresh green olives soaking in water that i have changed daily for a week or so. the method i saw said to do this for about 10 days, and then test for bitterness. i'm wondering if, after i reach the 10 day point, i could then continue with this flavorful-sounding method. thoughts greatly appreciated---my olives look so gorgeous in their glass-and-water "arrangement, i may need to get more, once these go into brine or olive oil!

[halland]

I think the water soak is a good thing. There is a lot of bitterness that gets washed out of the olives by changing the water, it also reduces the chances for spoilage. After 10 days or so, taste an olive and see if its still too bitter; it will get milder in the brine/vinegar solution so take that into consideration.

Hal

[chezcherie]

(bump)

my green olives are now tasting wonderful, after weeks/months in a brine cure. i want to keep them at this level of flavor now (not milder, by further brining)> can i cover them with olive oil, and if so, are they okay, covered at room temp, or must they be refrigerated?

i'm excited about my "house cured" stash.

thanks!

[Sackville]

Just FYI, it took us about 2 months of soaking the olives in fresh water and then a brine solution before they lost enough bitterness that we could then add flavours back in. Having said that, we did not cut a slit in them immediately, which we probably should have done to speed up the process. They were absolutely magnificent in the end and definitely worth the time! I think it was about 1/2 cup salt to 5 litres water that we used as a brine solution, changing every week.

[chezcherie]

once they were yummy, did you just gobble them up, or keep them in brine, or ? that's where mine are now, but i have too many to eat this week! thanks

[slbunge]

I'm curious about your source for uncured olives.

[chezcherie]

i got them at a local middle eastern market, where they have lots of cool things i would never get a chance to try---cardoons, all manner of herbs, etc.

[Eden]

thanks to inspiration from this & a few other eG threads I ordered fresh olives to try curing them myself for the first time. The boxes arrived this afternoon (10 lbs lucques, 10 lbs manzanillas) and I'm really looking forward to playing with them!

The lucques will get a mix of herbs de provence type flavorings, and the manzanillas a simple lemon and oregano mix.

Keeping my fingers crossed that they turn out well!

[calimero]

I found this

http://baconpress.blogspot.com/2005/09/ext...ive-branch.html

[Eden]

So I have two questions I'm hoping those of you who've done this before can answer:

1) should the olives have completely changed color by the end of the initial 10 day rinsing period? I'm on day 9 and they're nowhere near done transitioning from bright green to olive drab...

2) there are some reddish orange spots on a few of them. is this anything to worry about?

I'm feeling all paranoid today for some reason, that I've messed up somehow...

for more olive pictures see My Olive Album

[peppyre]

After brining our olives for 2 almost 3 months, they are still a little bitter. What should we do now? Change the brine solution and just keep going, or should they just be chucked? Help!! They have such great potential.

[Margaret Pilgrim]

I'm feeling all paranoid today for some reason, that I've messed up somehow...

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10 days is a very short soak period for green olives. In fact, we have a couple of trees (mission variety), usually leave the olives on the trees until they reach the "rosy" shade. Even then, we let them leach for a month before brining them. I'd keep the faith and let them soak longer before going on to the brine.

This year because of inclement weather, we had almost no crop. My husband put up a small batch the dry method: slitting each olive with a razor blade, being careful not to pierce to the pit, layering the olives in rock salt in a plastic pail, stirring them up daily for about 3 weeks, tasting one from time to time. He just finished them by rincing, drying and putting them in a container with EVOO. They're very good.

[ChefCrash]

After brining our olives for 2 almost 3 months, they are still a little bitter.

This is how we prefer them.

You don't want to chuck them! Eventually the bitterness will subside. I think if you change the brine now with another 10% solution they'd become too salty. If you change to a brine with less salinity the olives will get soft and rot.

[Eden]

we finally used the first of the olives last night, and they were really tasty. I don't know if they were good enough to justify the labor involved, but they are mighty fine. They acheived a perfect texture, are not as vinegary or salty as a lot of commercial olives, and I agree with ChefCrash, the very slight remaining bitterness blends in to be part of the flavor. I used an herbs de provence blend to flavor these, but you really can't tell from the final product. Oh they're also much less oily than your average store olive.

I hope the other batch comes out as well. Those won't be used till late in the year so they have plenty of time to mellow...