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Friday, November 11, 2011

For the Love of Olives

As you may know, I handcraft silver and gold artisan jewelry. I was about to show off with a new Opal ring I've handcrafted a few days ago, but I will do this tomorrow maybe.I  could not resist posting  about my love for olive trees.
Along each side of  the road, when approaching my  handmade jewelry design workshop, there is a row of beautiful olive trees standing there,  watching me go by, every day of the year.


As I get closer to my  workshop I take an appraising look at these trees. This time of the year they are laden with beautiful olives. They seem to call out to me: " Please pick my olives"!  So that's exactly what I do. I collect quite a number of beautiful black olives into a small bylon bag and then drive off happily on to my workshop.
I do this every year and fill about 5 jars with olives. We eat them all years round.


Here's how I pickle them:
First I put them all in a bowl of water and cut through each one of them with a knife.
Then I fill about 5  glass jars ( I use empty coffee jars for this) with the olives and pour fresh water over them.
I change the water every day for abut 4-5 days. This gets out the bitternes out of them.
On the fifth day I add a few slices of lemon, to each jar,
 a slice or two of a green sharp pepper,
 about 10 garlic cloves, a soup spoonful of rough salt.
 I fill up the jar with water,
and add some olive oil on top!
Then I place the jars in a cupboard, away from daylight.
Within about 10 days, the olives are ready.
I do this once a year and we have delicious olives at out  table throughout the year (if we do not finish them earlier!)
As I am a new member to the Etsybloggers team, I have chosen a few favorites' items from the  team. I hope you will like them as much as I do:
http://etsy.com/shop/ayalaart

http://etsy.com/shop/FaerieGardenFancies


















Handcrafted artisan jewelry:
http://etsy.com/shop/riorita


5 comments:

BunnyKissd said...

How cool that you can can your own olives! We have olive trees around here and they have the most heavenly scent in the spring, but I think they are primarily ornamental.

Thanks for including my Chubby Mermaid in your post! She was one of my favorites to paint!

Ayala Art said...

Hey, thanks!♥

debbi@yankeeburrowcreations said...

sounds wonderful. sometime you'll have to post pictures of your design studio/workshop. complete with swans. :~)
Debbi
- ourhometoyours

riorita said...

Thank you dears!
Ourhometoyours -Great idea. Ill do that. Not swans dear. Peacocks!

Almost Precious said...

When I lived in Ojai, California there were olive trees everywhere. Of course they seem to do well in Southern California as it has that Mediterranean climate. It is a pretty tree and I do love olives, black or green it doesn't matter. Guess that's the Sicilian in me. :) Unfortunately in Florida the olive tree will grow but never bear fruit. I have a small tree in my front yard here and love to look at it but know I will never be able to make my own fresh olives like you do.