Two weeks ago we began harvesting olives from the villa's small grove, with students helping out as they could. Harvesting involves spreading out a tarp or a net over the ground beneath the tree, then raking the olives from the branches. I've seen some people actually use a little hand rake to do it. We just used our hands.
Our olives are relatively small, a mix of green and black. The ones here are a bit wizened; they were overlooked in the harvest.
An uncured olive, right off the tree, is one of the foulest tastes you can ever have in your mouth. It's inescapable and bitter--the word that comes to mind is alkaline, although I have no idea whether that's accurate--and the oil coats your tongue in a way that makes the flavor hang around for hours.
But of course the oil--pressed, with the water removed--is a different story. Today at lunch we had oil made from the olives we helped pick. And it was fantastic. We're in the olive oil capital of the world, of course, but apparently this variety of oil would retail for about $35 a liter in the U.S.
It's not as olive-y or briny as some oils I've tasted. There's a slight bite to the flavor, which is clearly the pleasant counterpart of the raw olives' bitterness. And it's beautiful--almost as green as absinthe.
1 comment:
My parents grow olive trees in their yard in Arizona-and occasionally my father and a friend of his collect the olives and cure them for all of us to enjoy. They are truly delicious and I love your pictures. It is cold in Chicago-even some snow flurries yesterday. Hard to believe Thanksgiving is next week-I will enjoy my lunchtime travels to Italy in your blog.
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