by Sarah Espigares

Created on: October 24, 2009

Things have changed a lot since we moved to Spain in 2005. Some things never change though and are worth preserving. The first winter we lived in the farm one of the coolest things I got to do was make my own olives. My neighbours took me out to their olive fields so I could pick a pail full of olives, taught me how to crack them, wash them and then marinate them with their own family recipe.

Four years later, now living and working on the coast, I was able to grab some time out of my busy work and family schedule to make them again this year. I thought I would document it this time. Olive making is an annual tradition amongst Spanish famers leading up to the Christmas season. By the time the olives are ready it is very near to Christmas day.

Two weekends ago, I went to the farm and met up with our neighbour Juan. Farmers generally have hundreds of olive trees that they need to pick closer to December when the olives have turned black and are ideal for olive oil production. Olives are only picked green in early October for consumption; usually just enough for the family for an entire year. With harvesting of hundreds of trees in mind, most farmers use netted tree skirts to pick trees quicker than it would take by hand. You put the skirt around the bottom of the tree and either shake the tree (they have a machine for this actually) or in our case the trees were still quite young and short that we were able to strip three trees and use the net to pour the olives into a container in about 30 minutes.

Once the olives were picked I was able to use a little contraption that my neighbours use to crack the olives. The olives need to be cracked so that when you wash them the oil is released and they become more tender and eventually absorb the marinade. When I did it 3 years ago my neighbours did not own this handy contraption so I had to hit each olive with a little wooden mallet one by one. It took me about 3 days and about 2 months of finding delinquent olives around the house. Some times they get away from you when you go to hit them. I have twice as many olives this time around so I am quite thankful for this simple and yet effective tool. Thanks guys! (They never read this, they don't speak English or have internet, but I thought I would say it anyway).

So after 2 hours of cracking the olives, with a nice paella lunch in the middle, I was back on the highway driving to the coast. After arriving home my next step was to begin the washing process. Olives take some time

• 1
• 2
• Next Page >>