New Season Olives and Valley View

The first jar of new season olives arrived this morning. I have proved so hopeless at putting our own olives in brine that a friend now has his wife do it on my behalf.

Olives straight from the tree are eye-smarting bitter. They must be soaked in water for one month and the water must be changed daily. There is the snag right there. I would forget to change the water. Olives are harvested in the winter, the crock for the olives is kept outdoors in the cold -- what's not to forget? I always ended up with a bubbling, fermenting, mouldy mass of soft olives.

After a month the olives are put into brine together with spices of individual choice: bay leaves, cloves, cinnamon bark, chili peppers, whatever. I like cloves.

About four months later the olives are ready to eat. There are those who think there are two varieties of olive -- green and black. While there are many varieties of trees the olives are only ever green until they are ripe whereupon they turn black.

In this picture, the sun is shining on the hills and church across the valley. I was going to crop the picture to show only the olives but decided to leave the whole thing. The large terracotta object to the right is a concha which was dug up by the builders when they were excavating. These were all-purpose objects used for planting, mini septic tanks or rain barrels.