There is an olive tree in the parking lot where I work and last year they didn’t spray it with that birth control stuff (fruit control stuff?) so now it’s dropping olives all around its base and into the drive where they get mashed into literal grease spots.
Anyway, I got to wondering: Olives aren’t edible before undergoing some sort of mysterious curing process. Do olives that are going to be pressed for oil need to be cured, or does the oil come out edible and tasty as-is?
DD
If they’re falling off, then they’re ripe, I would think - so they’re black?
If so, the process of curing them is simpler; the can go straight into brine for pickling/curing (green olives must be soaked in lye first, apparently).
…or rather, washed, then packed into a large plastic box, evenly mixed with half their own weight of coarse salt. Put the lid on (although maybe leave a corner loose to let gases escape). After a few days, the juices from the olive will be drawn out and the salt will becom brine. Every couple of days, the contents should be mixed by tipping them into another container and back again. In a month’s time or so, you have salt-cured olives.
:o And if I bothered to read the actual question…
No; they’re just pressed, the first cold pressing produces the best oil; after that, the pulp is treated in various ways, including heating/boiling/steam pressure to extract more oil, but of progressively poorer grades.
I know a few people who make their own wine from suburban vineyards-- do others press their own olive oil?
How do you press olives?
You know, I can see a dry-cleaning joke in there. But I’m serious. Do you need a special olive press? Or is there something everyone has in his kitchen that can be… erm, ‘pressed into service’?
With an olive press.
From the description it looks like they’re just maching olives. So could you put the olives into a food processor and strain the pulp through cheesecloth?
That should be ‘mashing’.
Too much heat with a processor. Something akin to a winepress would work, however. Pit, then mash. First oil is the best.
Shayna and Spiny Norman gave me a nice bottle of California Olive Ranch unfiltered extra virgin olive oil for Christmas. It’s really good. You can taste the ‘greenness’. (It won a Gold Medal at the L.A. County Fair, BTW.) I had it with a baguette, and it was a wonderful snack. Too bad I’m avoiding carbohydrates at the moment, because I want some more! I’ve also used it to cook tilapia (with onions, garlic, Roma tomatoes and capers) and chicken breast (with capers). I need to get some balsalmic vinegar so I can have it with salad. Good stuff! 
How much oil do you get out of, say, a pound of olives? Does it take some ridiculous number, or could you grab a handful and have enough to toss a salad?
Well, according to the sites, olives are up to 50% by weight oil. So I would think that a handful of olives would do you for a salad dressing. Press, filter, toss with vinegar.
I’ve seen olive pressing. They used a small grape press which was built for making grape juice/wine. When you press the olives what comes out is mostly dark water – olive juice. This is centrifuged to force the oil to the top. Several pounds of olives yielded a few cups of olive juice. This produced a small fraction of an ounce of oil. You need lots of olives to get a bottle of olive oil.
To answer your question, yes, mostly. They’re about the color of kalamata olives with a few greenish spots here and there. Nobody’s picking them; they’re falling off on their iwn.
DD