Vegetarian Recipe: Water-Cured Green Olives

Every week on the Good Food Blog we celebrate Meatless Monday by sharing a vegetarian recipe from our archives.

On her weekly Market Report, Laura Avery talks olives with Flora Bella Farms and Peacock Family Farms. Good Food first shared this recipe for Water-Cured Green Olives from Maggie Blyth Klein’s The Feast of the Olive on September 21, 2002.

Photo: ChefMattRock on Flickr

Water-Cured Green Olives

5 pounds green mature olives

1-1/2 quarts water

3 tablespoons salt

2 lemons, cut into 1/2-inch cubes

2 tablespoons dried oregano

2 cups white wine vinegar

6 cloves garlic, peeled and halved

2 tablespoons cumin seeds, crushed in a mortar

Olive Oil

Crack the flesh of the olives with a rolling pin, or by hitting each one individually with a hammer. Rinse with cold water. Place them in a stoneware, earthenware, glass, or porcelain jar and cover with cold water. Weight them with a piece of wood or a plastic bag filled with water (to keep the olives submerged) and keep them in a dark, cool place for ten days, changing the water every day.

Boil the water and dissolve the salt in it. Empty the liquid from the jar in which the olives have been soaking; rinse the olives in cold water and cover the olives with the salt brine. Mix in the lemons, oregano, vinegar, garlic, and cumin. Float enough olive oil on top to cover the surface. Store in a cool place at least two weeks. To make a more interesting mixture, add a few store-bought Kalamata olives. Store in a cool, dark place. The olives keep quite well for at least two months.