Green olives

Are green olives and black olives the same fruit at different stages of maturation? Or are they separate varieties? Do they press olive oil from both kinds?

The reason I ask, my sister went to an Italian restaurant and loved the oil served with the bread (which was also wonderful). Nobody remembers the name of the oil, just that the label pictured black olives. I'd like to get her some tasty olive oil because she is a good and kind sister who deserves treats, but I'm not sure what to look for.

If you recommend a specific brand, bear in mind that I live in Indiana, where the term "gourmet shop" usually means 1/2 an aisle in the grocery store.

While we are on the subject of green olives, I've always wondered why they stuff the center of a green olive with pimento? Pimento (to me) seems fairly tasteless. Is it for color contrast? And why don't they stuff black olives? Personally, I don't think either kind needs to be stuffed with a pimento.

BTW, what's a pimento anyway?

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Contestant #3

A pimiento is a pepper, very similar to a green bell pepper, only pointed at the end instead of blunt. When ripe, pimientoes are bright red.

Most of the olives you see today aren't stuffed with pimientoes anymore. If you read the label carefully, it's just some kind of paste that they dye red and pump in there (kinda like that "cheese" they put on nachos -- a space age polymer plastic).

Other cool things I've seen olives stuffed with -- jalepenoes, almonds and anchovies.

My understanding is that black olives are ripe olives. Green olives are not yet fully ripe. Peppers (like pimientoes) are similar. All peppers eventually ripen to red, so red bell peppers are fully ripe -- green = not there yet.

Olives and Olive Oil -- food of the gods!

Hey, If eating Olive Oil was good enough for Popeye...it's good enough for me.

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President of the Vernon Dent fan club.

IIRC the black olive is a ripe version of the green olive. In other words, yes, same fruit. Olive oil is from the black olive.

My wife swears by Sperlonga from Italy. Not terribly expensive but sometimes hard to locate.
http://www.4oliveoil.com

"I'd like to get her some tasty olive oil because she is a good and kind sister who deserves treats, but I'm not sure what to look for."
---aseymayo
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You're a good brother, aseymayo.
Get her a bottle of "Extra Virgin" olive oil.
The better kinds are in a smallish bottle (mostly square), Italian, (or california, if available in your area), And should cost $10-$12 or more. These are not for cooking.
Delicious with a nice crusty sourdough french bread. Esp. a baguette. Also good drizzled on pizza.
Peace,
mangeorge


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Work like you don't need the money.....
Love like you've never been hurt.....
Dance like nobody's watching! ....Unknown

Er, sister, mg, I'm her sister, not her brother.

Mmm, love those olives.

While there's quite a few varieties to choose from, I've always wondered why, in my experience, plain old black olives are always sold in cans, while all of the others seem to always come in jars.

Everyone raise their hand if they used to think pimentoes were fish. :D

You're a good sweetie-pie, asey. Why don't you call the restaurant and ask them what brand they use? If you can't find it locally you can probably order some from an on-line gourmet shop.

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Jess
Full of 'satiable curtiosity

"Er, sister, mg, I'm her sister, not her brother."
---aseymayo
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Sorry, shoulda known.
If you were her brother you'd be asking about getting her a power tool, right? :)
You're a good sister, aseymayo.
Peace,
mangeorge

Thanks, mg. BTW, she already has a power tool - his name is Bob.

Hey zyada: no, but I had a girlfriend who thought capers were some kind of shellfish!

Get her a bottle of "Extra Virgin" olive oil.The better kinds are in a smallish bottle (mostly square), Italian, (or california, if available in your area), And should cost $10-$12 or more. These are not for cooking.

I totally disagree. While it might be a bit more expensive, cooking pretty much anything with extra virgin olive oil gives it an extra kick of flavor that I love. The brand I'm using now is called Colavita and is widely available (at least in New England) and is perfectly acceptable.

Aseymayo,
Ouch. I've been called a tool before, but if anyone ever calls me a power tool, I'm hanging it up.

TheDude

"I totally disagree. While it might be a bit more expensive, cooking pretty much anything with extra virgin olive oil gives it an extra kick of flavor that I love."
---TheDude
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That's fine, Dude. But I think if you add the oil at the end of cooking, you'll find that the "kick" is even better. Turn off the fire, add olive oil and butter, stir. Try it. On fried potatoes. Yum :)
High heat ruins the extra flavor that you pay a premium for.
Colavita is a good brand. Not as expensive as some of the others.
Peace,
mangeorge

Something is flawed in the nomenclature "extra virgin." it's the anti-matter equivalent to "a little bit pregnant."

Extra virgin is oil from the first pressing (or, as a girlfriend of years ago put it, the first thrust). I asked a chef about that seemingly odd description once and was told stuff I don't clearly remember, but to the effect that oil produced from subsequent pressings has a slightly different composition - either more or less debris, I think.
Clarifications, anyone?

All you could ever want to know.

http://www.colavita.com/

Peace,
mangeorge

Straight Dope on Olive Oil. Extra virgin oil is the best and purest of all the oils, with less than 1 percent acidity. This oil is produced without chemical means by stone crushing and cold pressing hand-picked olives. Virgin oil has a higher degree of acidity, up to 4 percent; it's made of riper olives that have fallen to the ground. And pure olive oil, in spite of it's label, is an oil that has been deoderized, deacidified, and decolorized by chemical means. (Quote from one of my Italian cookbooks.)

Yet another lesson in how easy it is to remember wrong stuff.

Yes, it's delicious, but watch out-- it's high in nasty artery-clogging compounds too. Enjoy, but in moderation.

-- Sylence

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"A friend of mine once sent me a post card with a picture of the entire planet Earth taken from space. On the back it said, 'Wish you were here'." - Steven Wright

A good extra virgin olive oil should have a sweetish, fruity flavor to it.It also should be a greenish color. Extra virgin olive oils are the only ones worth dipping bread in, and drizzling on food. As you go up from extra virgin, the flavor becomes less and less until you just have a flavorless oil :). Oh, and we regularly use extra virgin to cook with. Extra Virgin should taste good enough that you might want to drink it (not really but it should taste good :)). I remember this local Italian restaurant would serve bread as an appetizer with a bowl of olive oil with chopped garlic in it, and some Balsamic vinegar to mix in. Quite heavenly. My family and i would ask for extra bread and more of this garlic/olive oil mix whenever we went there. BTW: I thought of most oils, olive oil was good for you and not FULL Of artery clogging fats? The brand we get it "Bertoli".

beatle sed: Mmm, love those olives.
While there's quite a few varieties to choose from, I've always wondered why, in my experience, plain old black olives are always sold in cans, while all of the others seem to always come in jars.

Black olives, being ripe, are gonna get riper (mushier) if they're exposed to light; hence the can.

Non-black olives are in a pickle juice, so they're not going anywhere and can be jarred.

Since we're discussing extra virgins:

Q. What's the difference between a virgin and an extra virgin?

A. A virgin has never had sex, an extra virgin has never thought about sex.

If black olives are ripe and green ones aren't, why are the green olives I've seen always bigger that black ones?

That having been said, there is NOTHING like a handful of kalamata olives and fresh salty chunk of feta! Food of the gods from the land where gods were invented ;)

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Cave Diem! Carpe Canem!

http://www.colavita.com/

Just practicing.
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Oh, and we regularly use extra virgin to cook with.
---Doobieous
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Hey, mangeorge say's not to cook with it! :)
Doobieous is right, olive oil and balsamic vinegar were made for each other.
Greek salad. Mmm (You like, Olentzero?)
Peace,
mangeorge

Extra virgin olive oil can be used to cook with however, it has a lower smoking temperature which doesn't make it suited for deep frying.

Check out this link if you're looking for gourmet cheese, olive oil etc. Prices seem to be pretty reasonable (for gourmet foods) plus they have an excellent selection:

www.igourmet.com (http://www.igourmet.com)

I've got a kick butt black olive spread recipe if anyone wants it. It's got Kalamata olives, a few cloves of garlic, fresh parsley, and olive oil in it. Addictive!!! Put hair on your chest too, the stuff is so strong. Can't get enough of it though!!!

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...it has never been my way to bother much about things which you can't cure.
- A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court-Mark Twain

It's in my cookbook at home! I'll bring it in tomorrow and post it up.


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...it has never been my way to bother much about things which you can't cure.
- A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court-Mark Twain

BunnyGirl - your black olive spread sounds good. Give us the recipe!

"It's in my cookbook at home! I'll bring it in tomorrow and post it up."
---Bunny Girl
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Well??? :)

Peace,
mangeorge

mangeorge

an apparent female has requestd your presence on the "Alias" thread in MPSIMS forum

Apparent female? You obviously missed some of my comments on the "Boobs make men happy" thread.

mangeorge - http://www.straightdope.com/ubb/Forum4/HTML/000429.html

Hey Man, I posted it under it's own thread in MPSIMS entitled (drum roll please.....) Olive Recipes.

Enjoy! They're yummy! Tell me how they turn out if you try them!

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...it has never been my way to bother much about things which you can't cure.
- A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court-Mark Twain

[curwin]

Originally posted by aseymayo
Are green olives and black olives the same fruit at different stages of maturation? Or are they separate varieties? Do they press olive oil from both kinds?



I'm responding to this now because I saw it quoted on another thread. I looked at the link, and unfortunately saw that the question was never answered correctly.

First of all, take a look at my post here to see how olives are prepared in general: http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=15476

I mention in passing there that black olives are dyed. There are very few olives that become ripe enough to turn black. So most are dyed. In our plant they were dyed with ferrous sulfate, if I remember correctly. I think in earlier times some type of ash was used. If you want to find out what your brand of black olives uses, look at the ingredients. I think they are obligated to list the chemicals used.

By the way, the blackening process had a terrible smell, and left my hands black (even with gloves) for days.

[sailor]

>> Yes, it's delicious, but watch out-- it's high in nasty
>> artery-clogging compounds too. Enjoy, but in moderation.
>> -- Sylence

Well, not really. Olive oil is one of the healthiest with very low content of saturated fat.

To everybody I have to say the only way to really enjoy olives is to go to Spain. There in the markets you can buy infinite varieties of olives of every color and size and shape and taste. I am looking forward to my next trip pretty soon.

pimiento (of course) just means "pepper" in Spanish.

extra virgin oil is best used for dressings while cheaper grades are generally used for cooking.

[anya marie]

when the recipe that i use for pizza crust call for oil, i always add olive oil. i had heard it make the crust
crunchy outside/ tender inside.
i have been using bertolli extra virgin, rich and fruiy.
but i bake my crust for 7 minutes first, then add toppings and bake 12-15 minutes.
i do this because i cannot abide soggy pizza dough, and unless it gets burned by accident it is good crust.

now my question is: Should i use olive oil that is virgin oil, or should i just stick with the extra virgin?

[panamajack]

Anya - I think it's mostly a matter of taste, but to some extent it depends on how thick the crust is.
I think it's been noted already that 'pure' or 'light' olive oil has a higher smoke point than extra virgin kinds. I don't recall the exact temperatures, but it's in the area of 300+ deg F. The interior of the crust won't get that hot, but the outside is exposed to the 400+ deg F temperature you're baking at. So maybe you're less likely to burn the outside if you use a different variety. You should try another kind and see if the flavor difference is noticeable in the crust.

I don't think anyone's yet mentioned that even among 'extra virgin' there's one more level of distinction : 'First Cold Press'. This term means what it says; the oil comes from the very first pressing of the olives (with no heat added to extract more oil). This is the extra-est of extra virgin. I think it's worth it to check the bottle before you buy, as long as you're spending that extra money anyways. Then you can start comparing oils from different countries, companies ...

I'll agree with Sailor that Spain is one of the best places in the world for olives -- mostly because they are plentiful and cheap. There's certainly good olives out here in California, but they sell for far more (though curing at home is the best way to go).

[Necros]

anya marie, there's no reason to go through the expense of using extra virgin olive oil in a recipe for anything, let alone something being baked. The reason to get a "virgin" oil is because it has more flavor. However, using it in a dough isn't going to add any extra flavor.

You really only want to use extra virgin oil for things that will allow it to show it's flavor. Salads are good, or if you were goin g to drizzle it on top of that pizza before you eat, that would be great. Otherwise, use a cheaper oil. You'll never know the difference.

[Zenster]

Originally posted by BunnyGirl
<snick> I've got a kick butt black olive spread recipe if anyone wants it. It's got Kalamata olives, a few cloves of garlic, fresh parsley, and olive oil in it. Addictive!!! Put hair on your chest too, the stuff is so strong. Can't get enough of it though!!!

BunnyGirl, please post your wonderful recipe over at this (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=39219) thread.