Being a keen fisherman all my life and liking to have a go at growing some fruits, mainly tomato's I think I fall into the hunter gatherer category.
Picked some stunning olives yesterday and started the process to be eating them within the week. I was wondering if any other members cure their own olives and as there are so many recipes would members like to share them ?
There are some very good ways of doing them that are simple and you can be eating them in a week ! I think a lot of people think it will be a long process ( some recipes are and are worth waiting for ) and it put's them off having a go.
If you have a tree or two in your area that have reasonably good size olives with smaller pips then your in business. ( verge trees or ones on private property that the owners / tenants don't pick if you get permission to pick are great )
Nan planted hers 5-8 years ago to fill the space of a cut down conifer, the two trees are finally bearing olives this year for the first time - I'll be laying the tarp out this weekend.
I think she has a curing recipe from her mother in the old cookbook, will have a look at the next visit.
Have had a good crop of tomatos, oranges are ripening, apples getting there, lemons are a bit thin on the ground though
Also have some sort of ice cream bean tree - apparently the seed pod flesh tastes like ice cream - I wouldn't know as the cockatoos and rosellas beat me to them haha
Sounds like you have all happening there, nice work ! What type of olive trees are they ? hopefully a Kalamata. This will be my last lot of greens as most of the trees I pick are now ripening and turning to black and I do like black olives, another week or two and they will be ready to pick. Are you picking some green or have they already matured ? I always hand pick to minimize bruising especially the blacks as they are softer. Would like to see the recipe when you get it. The recipe I do most of the green olives is as follows 1. split the olives by hitting using the base of something like a coffee jar which has a bit of weight and a slightly concaved bottom, you get the knack of how hard is enough without belting the daylights out of them. As you remove the pips put the flesh straight into a tub of water while you do the rest ( stops browning of the flesh ) 2. Mix your curing solution, 10% salt brine ( non iodised cooking salt ) in a quantity which will be enough to cover the amount of olives you have. When mixing the brine a lot of people still use the old fashioned method which is to put an egg in the brine as you slowly add and disolve the salt in it, as soon as the egg floats to the top it's enough salt. 3. Add white malt vinegar to the solution until you can taste the vinegar as well as salt. 4. Drain the olives in a colander and put into a suitable sized tub, add the curing mixture and place something on top that will keep all the olives submerged, discard the mixture daily and add a fresh batch. 5. After 4 - 5 days rinse off one off the olives and taste to check the bitterness has gone, change curing solution for another day or two if required but they should be ready. 6. Drain the olives into a colander, give them a rinse under cold running water and let them drain for a few hours and they are ready to go. 7. Make a dressing if you like, extra virgin olive oil, rosemary and garlic work well but you can experiment with your favourite herbs etc. Dress enough olives to have with your salad etc in a small bowl and let them come to room temperature. I keep mine in a sealed plastic container in the fridge and take out small lots as required, they keep well in the fridge.
And they are starting to go black so I my have to get up on the ladder and try to manually pick some
I'm still smarting from the last tree I did up the ladder - cut a palm frond off, it spun around on its own axis, and came straight at me - took a fair wack of skin off my forearm and lodged a deep splinter threw the glove and into my thumb
Great that you have Kalamata's, wise lady your Nan. If they have started maturing it's best to let them go black before picking unless the recipe you have is specifically for half/half. You will find that they don't all start to change colour at the same time and there will most likely still be a number of green ones in the tree. If that's the case you could pick some greens and do the above recipe while waiting for the rest to mature. I used to cut the seed pod clusters off the palms at my old address so I didn't have to pick them out the garden beds for weeks on end, these things weighed around 20kg and when they came off would sometimes change their fall angles and I had a couple of near misses as they brushed me on their way down while I was on the ladder. I started wearing a pair of brown corduroy pants when doing this work so at least some dignity could be retained.
Many of my unfortunate tree moments are stemmed from palms
I still remember Dad up the tree cutting one of those cocus palm seed pods - he said that with his luck it would fall on him.
Walked out the front with mum (I was only 4 or 5 at the time) and we hear this "Jesus christ, c*** f***". Turned out he got off the ladder to reposition, and the little bit of bark holding it on let go - it speared the ground about 1ft from his left foot.
Then there was the time I had to fell a strelitzia palm thing (like a giant bird of paradise). I had several directives from Nan - miss the fence, miss the orange tree, miss the shade house, miss the frangipani, miss the arch - which left one way. Got everyone out of the way, and felled it straight as anything down the middle. Look across as it was falling and my dog had wandered down (was quite blind and deaf by that time) thankfully it just missed him.
Or the time she wanted me to get a palm frond off the giant cocus palm - I tied a small brick to the rope and (after getting everyone out of the way) threw it up over the frond - only problem was the rope slingshotted back and hit me with the brick. Other problems with palms include how I have to pull fronds off the shorter one and run like hell with it across the lawn so as not to hit the frangipani below or Nans prized tree dahlia. I forgot to move the sprinker one time - exit one Pope rotary sprinkler
I have been waiting for her to want onions to make a batch of picked onions - on bottle from the last batch she forgot about for a year, tipped them down the back in the thick weeds in the middle of winter - I hit them at approx 8000 rpm with the whipper snipper when I slashed down the weeds - ever tasted year old pickled onions that have been out in the sun a week
Some Gold medal moments there Tyler ! Yes this gardening caper is fraught with danger and then we get the petrol powered machinery out and rarely do ourselves a mischief. I think Ill pass on the pickled onions.
Green olive batch ready, this lot is dressed with extra virgin olive oil with a few drops of white malt vinegar, pinch of salt, fresh rosemary and some wild fennel flower heads.
The birds beat me to the trees - still some there but picked over. The youngest olive left were half green
I don't really mind though - there is bugger all food around for them with the dry summer we had
Looked through the cookbook (CWA circa 1952), no olive curing recipe though. Also had a look through the hand written notes book (which is actually a wa govt issued school exercise book from her last year of school (circa 1944)) and nothing in that either
She has all sorts of birds in the garden wce - she is the only one around that puts water out for them
Doves, willy wagtails, magpies, pewee (mudlark), sulphur crested cockies, pink and grey gallah, honeyeaters, parrots, occasional rosella and 28's (there were 2 28's on the powerline so I think it was them)
Some are very tame - they will walk around 4 feet behind her for 5-10 minutes all through the garden
