Olives Home-made

[v12spirit]

Joe, Mick,

Thanks for your care mates. Kind of you to be concerned. I truly appreciate it. I am lucky for having a good wife and good friends too.

[wotavidone]

My wife has just finished smashing the green ones,.

You are a lucky man. I'm trying to imagine where the brick would end up if I gave my wife a bucket of olives and a half brick and told her to get on with it..
Good to see you are still with us.

[Gulf]

V12Spirit,

It's great! to see you back on the forum. I've been concerned about you lately. I hope that you and your's are all safe and well.

[v12spirit]

The course is clear for me from now on:
Green and red olives in "floating egg" brine a la v12spirit, Left to ferment to that lovely slightly bitter salty fruitiness that is as good as my neighbour Socsy's olives.
Black ones dry salted then rinsed and tossed in oil.

Good to know the black ones have ended up fine. Now is the season of olive harvest. My wife has just finished smashing the green ones,. A person gave us a recipe for increased crispiness that we will try this year: to soak the smashed olives in water and change the water daily for 4 days or until an acceptable bitterness is achieved, then to put the olives in a "floating egg" brine added to it a teaspoon of citric acid -for crispiness- and a teaspoon of sugar -to adjust the salt and acid-- per mid size jar. This technique is claimed to give fruits that will remain crispy with a lovely green colour for a year+. Another tip for crispiness is to use noniodized salt. We are trying it this year.

[wotavidone]

My olives are going great, I've got more than I can eat, but what the heck, I can always give some away.
A month or so ago, I went to prune the tree, and noticed it still had quite a few fully ripe solid black olives on it. The missus really only enjoys olives on pizza, and the shriveled black ones are the go, apparently.
So, nothing ventured, nothing gained, I picked a couple vegemite jars of black ones before I pruned the tree. I gave the olives a rinse, put a couple large spoonfuls of cooking salt in each jar and put em on the cupboard. I turned the jars over and shook them occasionally to make sure the olives all stayed in contact with the salt. They shrivelled up and acquired an interesting odour. They tasted great on last night's pizza. I rinsed the adhering salt off them before I put 'em on. Just little salty flavour bombs as you work through the pizza. Magnificent.
I've rinsed them all now. They've shrunk so much they all fit in one jar so I've put em in a fresh jar with a cup of olive oil.

The course is clear for me from now on:
Green and red olives in "floating egg" brine a la v12spirit, Left to ferment to that lovely slightly bitter salty fruitiness that is as good as my neighbour Socsy's olives.
Black ones dry salted then rinsed and tossed in oil.

[Alden03]

Anyone with good simple recipes.
Calamata and mission olives making your own the simple way.......
Your own personal way........i can google and get books, but lets see what transpires.
Also , how is the best way to store them

[TropicalCoasting]

Re: Olives Home-made

If they are over salted in their brine they last longer,but taste too salty.
We always removed a few weeks worth from the main batch and had them in plain water in the fridge,this perks them up and removes the saltiness to a a more palatable level.

[v12spirit]

Re: Olives Home-made

I once hapened to do the black ones the same way. It worked fine. You would better leave the black ones intact, I mean without sliting them or something. I once slit the blacks and their color started to pale after a couple of months.
Hint: When you serve olives, black or green, drain them well then toss them in olive oil before going to the serving dish. That gives a noticeably better look and taste. You can even rinse them well in water first if they were rather salty.

[wotavidone]

Re: Olives Home-made

It's all working out well. I picked some more on the weekend. I'm doing them all the V12spirit way. Just slit 'em, still haven't mastered the stone/brick technique, and put them in a jar with brine. I now have 5 x 3 litre jars with olives at various stages. These jars were $5 each at the cheap shop, they have the clip down lids and rubber seals. If the pressure builds the seal leaks out the excess.
Two jars have olives that have been presoaked. The others are done straight in brine. I'm getting the light vinegar smell, other than that they smell like.....olives.
The first lot that I put down a la V12spirit recipe are now a month old. Just edible, very nice flavour but quite strong bitter after taste.
They have pretty much stopped making gas - another month and they'll be very good I think.
This weekend I put down some green/half ripe ones, and some black ones the same way. The green ones are fizzing a bit, the black ones - opening the jar is like opening a hot bottle of soda water.
Not how people say to do black ones, but it's an experiment. If it doesn't work, I've lost maybe an hours work and a couple tablespoons salt. The olives are free so what the heck.

[Greenman]

Re: Olives Home-made

What I know about olives (other than eating them) you could fit on a postage stamp but would a plastic mesh on the top of the olives help keep them submerged and would an airlock (like those used for beer and wine making) in the lid help relieve pressure buildup?

[v12spirit]

Re: Olives Home-made

Haven't been on the forum for a couple of days. I'm just an amateur, but I can tell my experience that may assure your answer. As women devised the use of soda plastic bottles that could resist a slight gas pressure, it surely is because the olives will exhaust some gas. Moreover, the bottles solve the annoying problem of many olives keeping floating thanks to the bottle neck. However, opening the bottle could be challenging as the compressed gas wants to exit at once and should be done carefully and slowly. You don't want to open the bottle for the first two months, just open it when you are to consume it. I do use bottles but I would never recommend it as they are likely to explode even if nobody has reported that yet. You would better use jars with lids that allow gas to exit but not enter, or at least slightly seal the jar of the olives to minimize contact with air. The olives should smell fine. Eventually, you are pickling olives and it is natural to smell a lovely slightly vinegary smell, not a strong unpleasant one. My guess is that exposure to air causes the unpleasant smell if any, so try to fill the jar completely so that no room is left for air. To overcome the problem of the olives at the top oxidizing and darkening in color when using jars, cut a 3 cm thick sponge to the shape of the jar neck and put it on top before applying the lid. This forces the olives down while keeping them soaked in brine.
Try to capture the art of smashing olives. It really gives a different flavor than silted ones. Just gentle strokes with the help of half a brick maybe. The more fresh and totally green the olives the neater they smash up.
Don't throw the olives as they look good. Following Andrew Zimmern’s philosophy of bizarre foods: "If it looks good, eat it".

[wotavidone]

Re: Olives Home-made

A question for Dino_Pizza and V12Spirit, being the resident olive experts.
One of my jars is making gas. It happens to be the jar I'm doing the V12Spirit way. I rinsed and slit my olives and put them in the jar with "floating egg" brine and poured some oil on top. No pre-soaking. The blasted olives keep floating to the top but I give the jar a shake up every couple of days to keep the olives wet with oil and brine.
Anyway it definitely looks like the whole thing is fermenting! Slight whiff of vinegar when the jar is opened, too.
Being brave, or maybe stupid, I tasted one tonight anyway. Expecting the thing to be "off" I was amazed to find it quite tasty, and 4 hours later I'm not dead yet.

The question is, is it unusual for olives to ferment? Does it happen when you soak them but you don't see because you change the water every day?
Should I throw them out?

EDIT: answered my own questions. Read the UCDavis info sheet again. I should be expecting bubbles for up to two months and might even take up to 6 months for the bitterness to reduce (depending on how bitter one likes his olives I guess).

[wotavidone]

Re: Olives Home-made

This home made olives thing is rather addictive

I was thinking I had put up enough olives for a year, but now I need to do some black ones, Italian style, for mum.
I decided I'd to go and see what is happening at my neighbour's place, which is between tenants at the moment.
He grafted some Kalamatas onto his tree a few years back, and they are loaded. One of the last things his wife said when they left was"Help yourself". Came back with about a gallon of black Kalamatas.
These kalamatas are grafted onto the normal Olive tree, so I've got a few of those that sort of fell into the bucket - so those are soaking separately, and I'll do those in brine and red wine vinegar a la Dino Pizza's recipe.
I also picked a few more green ones from my tree and put them straight in a jar with "floating egg brine" a la V12Spirit's recipe. We shall see if I've done that right. I didn't do the hit 'em with a rock thing - couldn't get it right, they either didn't split or were smashed beyond recognition.
So now I have 4 litres or so of Kalamatas soaking, a litre of Socsy's big fat Verdale olives soaking, a 4 litre jar done in a mixture of brine and white vinegar, and about a litre done V12 Spirits way.
I've barely scratched the surface of the mountain of high quality olives available to me, but that'll do for this year.
Sure wish I had an oil press.

[wotavidone]

Re: Olives Home-made

When I find decision making at work difficult, I like to leave my desk and pace the corridor.
So I'm walking past a colleague's office today, and it occurs to me to leave work behind for a few minutes and ask, "Hey Pat, you're of Mediterranean descent,so I've got to ask, have you ever preserved your own olives?"
The answer was "No, but my dad did it for years."
I was treated to a few wonderful moments of reminiscing about his childhood in a remote mining town, and how his father used to load the kids in the car and journey a few miles out of town to collect bucket loads of olives from a roadside tree.
It is amazing how a fruit that is basically inedible as it comes off the tree can make so many eyes light up.
Conversation ended with a promise to bring in some of mine for his appraisal when they are done.

[wotavidone]

Re: Olives Home-made

Changed the water last night - these things have been three weeks now, and the olive I tasted was still bitter but I could eat the whole thing, and while I was refilling with clean water I felt like I wanted another. That's close enough for me. Into the floating egg brine on Saturday, or maybe even during the week if I get time. I've been adding a couple tablespoons of salt each time I've changed the water, so they've been lightly salted all the way through.
I reckon I'll do them the way my neighbour used to do them.
A mixture of brine, white vinegar, a clove of garlic, a whole fresh chilli, and a layer of olive oil on top.
His last for years in the cupboard, can't see why mine wouldn't.
I've got some red ones soaking too - I'll do those similar but, just because I have some, I'll try red wine vinegar.
Looked at thre tree this morning - I could pick another load if I wanted. The deep watering I gave it on Sunday has paid off - all the olives are plump and wrinkle free.