Last year we were lucky enough to have a great crop of olives. And, sadly, now we have moved we don’t have any olive trees – though to be 100% honest I think I would be just as happy to buy or trade some fresh olives from someone – even 2 small trees provided far too many olives for just one person to plough through – Mr MWCED doesn’t like eating olives so that leaves them all for me.

The olives we picked were mostly very small.   I decided to brine them and now have a multitude of jars in the pantry. They really need to be used.   It is a labour of love using them in anything as it takes an age to stone them, but at the same time I know exactly where they came from and what has gone into them.  

I have to admit that the taste on their own isn’t amazing. I don’t know if it was the type of olive, or my brine.   They are fine cooked but I wouldn’t put them out for snacking on.   As they are fine when cooked I thought maybe a tapenade might be worth trying. Though not cooked, I thought a mix of other ingredients may work to create a tasty mix.

An hour later (well, it felt like an hour!) after stoning a cup of olives we now have tapenade. Most recipes call for fresh garlic, however I had some roast garlic from the other night and it works fine, probably providing a somewhat more refined garlic taste.

Olive Tapenade 

• 4 cloves roasted garlic
• 1 cup pitted olives
• 2 tablespoons capers
• 3 tablespoons diced fresh parsley
• 2 tablespoons lemon juice
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 2 teaspoons basil pesto (or to taste)
• 2 fillets anchovies – rinsed
• Black pepper (grind into blender – as much as you want)

I just put everything into the blender and mixed it up. The pesto was an addition at the end as I felt the mixture needed a bit of jazz.   It worked perfectly.   The recipe makes enough for two ramekins.

The tapenade will go out on a cheese platter later this afternoon when we have some drinks on the deck.   And some of it might end up on the pizza I think we will make for dinner.