Olive pickling

The drought is so bad, this year the olive crops are a disaster. We have no usable olives from Gethsemani and Capharnaum. Instead we have to buy them and they are very expensive not only because of the drought but also because of the war on olive groves between Jewish settlers and Palestinian farmers. The price of olive oil has gone up by a third and the price of bread/flour is also rising. It's going to hit hard the poor people.

Anyway the few bags of olives that we bought have to be prepared for pickling. The good ones are crushed for its oil while the less plump ones are chosen for pickling. This means bruising them one by one with a wooden mallet. Jadallah and I did it for 2 hours this morning. It's backbreaking. And there's a certain technique to employ so that the olives don't skid off the table when you bash them. We had to sweep out many olives that fell under the cabinets. And between bruising the fruit, we had to select the really bad ones out to throw away, as well as separate the leaves and twigs. And after that hardwork, the hands and fingers are black with olive pulp and oil ... which makes the hands really soft and smooth. It was fun and I enjoyed it ... but my back is aching now.

Meantime Nadia had to cook lunch. Looks like beef stew today.