Harvesting the bitter fruit - what to do with olives

Living on a vineyard the biggest and most important harvest of the year is, of course, the grapes. Once that is out of the way and we heave a massive sigh of relief (until the whole cycle starts again) and look at harvesting and curing our olives - and they must be cured. If you have ever eaten a raw olive you know they are bitterer than lover scorned. 

We have only half a dozen or so olive trees in three different varieties, however just which varieties remains a mystery as I lost the labels before recording the names.  Most years we have more fruit than we need for curing and preserving but nowhere near enough for olive oil - more on that later.  I didn't weight the yield from our few trees this year, but I suspect  seven to eight kilos would be a generous guess.   

In the past I have cured them using the water or brine method.  This is very straightforward and means soaking them in water or brine, which needs changing daily, for about 30 days to extract said bitterness.  After draining the final time, the now more tasty olives can be bottled in a 10% brine solution.  At this stage it is possible to add chillies, various spices, lemon peel or whatever else tickles your taste buds. 

This year I experiment with a couple of different methods, drying  the olives instead of soaking them.

olives colour change on ripening

I stand to be corrected on this, but my understanding is green and black olives are the same; it is all a matter of ripening. The olives shown above all came from the same tree and show how the colour develops.  I find the best stage for brining is as they change from green to the slightly purplish colour - if they get too ripe they become soft in the brining process. I don't know about you but when I bite into an olive a want a firm texture, not mush.

from the dehydrator, then coated in oil

Having said that I pick ripe but firm black olives for drying  - I put some in a food dehydrator and the others aside for salting.

I run the dehydrator for 24 hours then, having to go out of town, trust the hunter-gatherer to judge when they are ready.  "Job done" he said. I think  these are still a little bitter and need more drying, but he says he likes them - I guess he has to!

salt cured before cleaning, coating in oil and bottling

The salting method is my new favourite, not just because it takes the least effort.  It gives a great result. Completely cover the olives in sea salt (though I used ordinary table salt this year as I didn't have enough sea salt) and let the salt draw out the bitter juices. If the salt becomes too wet, replace it with fresh salt.  I leave these for about three weeks, rinse off the salt and dry the olives again before tossing them in olive oil.  They will keep in the fridge for 6 months, though I doubt they'll last that long as they are delicious.


Olive oil is a whole different kettle of fish - or olives in this case. You need tonnes to get any meaningful yield. Unlike grapes, which cropped at a very high rate this year, the olive trees around the district were variable in yield.  One of our neighbours doesn't bother harvesting her trees so we raid those and join forces with other contacts who have olives but in short supply. 

The method of choice for collecting vast quantities of olives is by a frenzied whacking of the branches with long sticks in what must look like a Fawlty Towers sketch.   It is very effective and  the fruit falls onto tarpaulins spread underneath,  then is transferred to large bins for transportation to the press. On a couple of tree-thrashing days we harvest about 800 kilos over three properties (plus a couple of meagre kilos from our "grove".  This gave us a surprisingly good yield of 15% so all in all we had over 100 litres to share out. 

The colour, taste and smell of fresh olive oil bear little resemblance to the imported oils you find in supermarkets.  

fresh home grown olive oil

If this blog were scratch'n'sniff you would be able to scrape your fingernails on the photo and inhale the heady aroma of freshly mown grass  - just what you want on your salad!

So, you see, with the right treatment even the most bitter fruit becomes palatable. 

Rough and ready on the Pacific edge

Great Barrier Island or simply the Barrier is a perfectly named landmass, sitting as it does between the vast Pacific Ocean and Auckland’s Hauraki Gulf. The craggy landscape initially formed by volcanic activity millions of years ago is further shaped by the ocean and weather - and the people are similarly rough and ready.

On an overcast and slightly breezy day we leave our boat on anchor and go ashore at Port Fitzroy.  We see a rental car and call the number printed on its door.  No problem.  But he's not sure “what state the car’s in” and it’ll take a half hour for him to come over to us, driving from a neighbouring bay.  He duly rolls up, cites a price of $85 a day but if we don’t want him to wash the car  "call it $80".   We call it $80.  I point out the vehicle has no registration (“yeah, I renewed it on-line and I’m waiting for it to come in the post”) and no warrant of fitness (“yeah, it has to go over to the only garage on the other side of the island and it’s booked in tomorrow”).  This has a Tui billboard feel about it, but we're in the equivalent of Mexico here, so hand over the cash.  As we head off he heads to the general store and emerges minutes later with a slab of beer. 

At 90 kilometres north-east of Auckland, the island is not that remote yet only 800 people live here year round.  By necessity everyone generates their own electricity through solar or using generators, and access to what most of us consider daily necessities is limited or non existent.

The sheltered waters of Kaiaraara Bay

The severity of the landscape is a surprise after the benign islands of the inner Hauraki Gulf where we have been cruising for the previous three weeks.

The west coast is a mass of native-bush covered ranges plunging into the sea, nicked by bays and dotted with bony islands.  Port Fitzroy is the result of a drowned valley system and forms a protected bay.  The settlement there is tiny, comprising a wharf, an info centre that rivals a phone box in size, and a general store selling various necessities including bait and the aforementioned booze. Half gallon flagons of sherry seem to be popular items.

Port Fitzroy - a wharf and the general store up the hill

In contrast the east coast is exposed to the expanse of the South Pacific – next stop Chile. This coast is varied, with wetlands in the north and graceful curves of white sand beaches showcasing good surf along the waist of the island, then more rocky coves to the south.

Awana Bay on the east coast

Between the two coasts the land is steep and brutal and covered in dense bush, yet over the centuries whalers, miners and loggers have had at it.

The island has a number of  Department of Conservation (DOC) walks/hikes, some more rugged than others. The 25 km Aotea Track is a manageable 2-3 day circuit for a reasonably fit person, and includes the ascent of Mt Hobson, at 621 metres the highest point on the island. You can count on plenty of up and down terrain, stunning views, interesting historic sites and beautiful native bush, including the surviving kauri trees.  The island is free from predators such as possums, goats and deer, so the bush has regenerated well. However the presence of rats means the native bird life has not fared as well. 

steps, steps and more steps

We spend our first few days around the various bays of Port Fitzroy; not just for the cheap sherry -  there are many very sheltered anchorages with access on to some beautiful tracks through the native bush. Although it is the very end of April and we are well into Autumn, the weather is still warm. 

We hike up the Kaiaraara track towards Mt Hobson; our destination is the old kauri dam about two hours up.  The  DOC tracks are well constructed and maintained, so the hike up is only moderately taxing; parts of the track are very steep and there are lots of series of steps to take you to the next section.  While you appreciate these early on, the sight of another flight becomes less joyous as time goes on.

The old kauri dam

The kauri forests were logged heavily between the 1880s and 1930s and the dam was one in a linked series used to transport the logs down to the bay.  The dam is a feat of clever engineering built by men with no formal training who just figured out what would work.  An estimated seven million feet of timber were logged out and sent down the dams.  Not without cost – John Mowbray in the New Zealand Observer in 1931 wrote “I saw what had happened to the Kaiaraara stream. The banks of the stream had been torn and mutilated. Its bed was four of five times its former width…The defacement of that valley was complete”.

The valley has regenerated to a large extent but of course the magnificent kauri don't grow back overnight. 

Great Barrier is, in a practical sense, quite accessible with daily flights (30 minutes) from Auckland, and a ferry service (4.5 hours) operating every day in Summer and three times a week in Winter.  However it feels very remote and is a little like a step back to a simpler life - rough and ready is exactly the right way to be. 

time to put our feet and pour a glass from that flagon of sherry