Olive February

"I'll bet you ten dollars that you won't like this."

"You're on and I'm gonna’ love it!"

In an instant, my daring twelve year-old little tongue reaches out to meet the salty, tangy, crunch of my very first green olive. Internally, I’m cringing and can't wait to be rid of the vineagery aroma that lingers in my mouth. On the outside, however, it's all smiles and cheers because I naturally refuse to lose this bet with my dad.

A declaration is made and the bet is won: "Mmmmm.... delicious!"

Between the time of the infamous "olive bet" with my dad and a few years ago, I have been slowly nursing a rather healthy obsession with olives; with their role in our history, their nature, their aroma, and their lore.

Olives. How creative were the first people to eat olives?!? I would have loved to be a fly on a fruit that day: "Hey- here's a really bitter little fruit that tastes awful, yuck! I know, let's stick it in some vinegar and salt for a bit and re-visit eating it in a few months! Oh yeah- and while we're at it, let's take some of these little suckers and press them until we squeeze out all of their oil and use it for EVERYTHING! Great idea!" And it actually did turn out to be a great idea- ingenious, in fact! An idea that would form the pillars on which our civilization was built. Olives... who woulda' thought?

As a sort of amuse bouche, I will leave your senses with this:

The whole Mediterranean, the sculpture, the palm, the gold beads, the bearded heroes, the wine, the ideas, the ships, the moonlight, the winged gorgons, the bronze men, the philosophers - all of it seems to rise in the sour, pungent taste of these black olives between the teeth. A taste older than meat, older than wine. A taste as old as cold water. Only the sea itself seems as ancient a part of the region as the olive and its oil, that like no other products of nature, have shaped civilizations from remotest antiquity to the present”

- Lawrence Durrell (1912-1990), Prospero's Cell (1945)