Preserving the olive harvest
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This online album has 3 photos and will be available on SkyDrive until 23/07/2011. | ||||||
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This online album has 3 photos and will be available on SkyDrive until 23/07/2011. | ||||||
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After 5 years our olive trees have finally set enough fruit to harvest! The past 3 weekends I have been up and down ladders picking the fruit. We've decided not to use lye whilst the kids are still small. The rock salt method I began 3 weeks ago has worked a treat so I've got another bigger jar going. Brining began last weekend and what a painful process it is to change the brine everyday. Mike has read something that says not to worry so much about daily changing of water just make sure you stir well so I'm only changing the brine every 3rd day. It is about twice as salty as the recipe asks for.
We don't have enough large containers for brining olives so Mike has relinquished a brewing vessel with a tap. This helps with the brine changing as I dont' have to upend it all. Was hard finding something the right size to fit through the mouth but cover the olives so they didn't float. Resorted to using cheesecloth bag but it is a bit narrow and I they are a little too tightly packed for my liking. In any case, a couple of china plates weigh the bag down nicely and I'll try to get hold of some wider cheesecloth to sew a looser sack to put the olives in.
As I type a feisty little willy wagtail bird is harassing the cat who is harassing a sparrow and they are generally all enjoying this beautiful Autumn dusk.
After 29 degrees yesterday the weather has turned into a wintery chill. A lot of the fruit trees have lost their leaves without the glamour of a colour change. Everything is so green! The pomegranites and figs are splitting with all the rain. For the first time ever the olives are ready to harvest. I'll pick the first ones today and try the simplest preserving method - rock salt. I'm putting off the water changing methods for as long as possible. The strawberry guava has ripened nearly all of last year's fruit and they are beginning to fall due to rain and wind. I might need to freeze some for jam or wine as we are not going to be able to eat them all.