The brining of the olives.

recipe and essay by Severine von Tscharner Fleming


This is a visual instruction to brining olives—an easy thing to do, and a very affordable way of bringing this tasty snack into your life. Many of the olive trees in California, especially urban olives, end up as an oil-slick on the pavement. Rescue these olives by laying down a tarp or old bedsheet and using both hands to ‘comb’ them down.


Once you have harvested the olives follow the instructions below.

The olives were harvested at UC Berkeley, in front of Giananini Hall.

after a ten day custodianship by Bonnie Powell-during which the water was changed every day.. them came to live at my office under an orange tree. The cooler was found on the street, as were the olive amphora—well, on the street outside the cheeseboard.

here the olives are soaking. Amazingly, everyday the water that poured off was brown.. clearly there is some major leeching of tannins or other bitter brown substances as yet unknown to this author, and amateur olive briner.

so, after about seventeen days of soaking in pure water. Here I am draining the olives. And putting them into the amphora filled with brine,

Brine: Brine is salty water. You don’t have to worry that much about the proportions because water will only dissolve a certain amount of salt. The rest stays on the bottom, like a precipiate. Basically that is a waste, so my recommendation is to add the water first and then gradually add the salt until no more can be dissolved. That way you don’t waste the salt.

Be aware. Salt kills plants. Do not splash salt all over the lawn.


This is the clean amphora.

here I am adding salt to the amphora. Do as I say, not as I did. I added too much salt.The salt came from Rainbow grocery. I went there on my bike and carried it home on the bart and it was heavy. The problem is that I wanted to use sea salt, not salt produced by Cargill on the edges of the bay. (weblink) The total cost for the sea salt was $3.25- and I have a whole bag of salt left over. Also I bought a few olives (maybe
twenty) at Rainbow and they costed more than $5—so a better deal by far is to brine own’s own.
Water into the salt makes brine. Here come the olives.

olives, meet brine.

And now for the additions>

For extra flavor.

1. bay leaves.

2. harvest from tree. California Bay Laurel. Ubiquitous in Berkeley. Native.

rinse urban grunge off leaves.

wear play clothes. peel garlic. This garlic was a hardneck variety grown by Ned Conwell and Ryan Casey at Blue House Farm.

chop it up. By whatever means feasible. I am quite satisfied with this method, I must say. I cleaned the blades of my Felco 2 prior to use.. and they were plenty sharp thanks to that wonderful man at the farmers market who sharpens knives.

hot chillis from Full Belly Farm. WholeSage from the hardy little sage plant that lives in my office. It was propagated by Spiral gardens.

Everything looks good. Everything comes from a good local place, everything is beautiful and well loved.
Combine and mix. Be aware. Salty water is quite an experience for your whole arm, and the driplets make salty stains on everything. But is very exhilarating, and the olives float.. like in a fairy tale where the
bandits hide the gold underneath the olives. et. Voila. Our very own olives, curing away. To be served upon
completion to all those who helped with the harvest, and even some who never did lay a finger on a tree at all who none the less love olives. Sharing is caring. Especially when you have more than ten gallons of olives.


After a few weeks of brining we’ll remove the brine and preserve the
olives in olive oil.

The end. Bon appetit!
Please join the SAFE email list to be alerted of the olive-tasting party. I think we’re going to make it a political event. So keep your ears pricked.