Nearly ripe

Our second olive tree is a Lucque, a variety which originated in Italy but is now grown mostly in our département, the Hérault. It ripens later than other varieties. We have only a few olives on this young tree, but they are slowly turning from green to dark purple and should be ready for picking in a week or so.

Here they are usually picked green if they are for curing, the ripe ones being pressed for oil. But curing green olives involves using caustic soda to remove the bitterness, something I'm not keen on doing, so we leave ours until they are black and then cure them.