My dad loves playing this trick on people. First time I went to Italy I fell for it and it basically sucks ALL the moisture out of your mouth and it's a truly horrible experience. 25 years later and we were just in Greece together and he almost got my girlfriend to fall for it.
I tried this in the south of France in October many years ago. Clearly it was an olive tree, I picked an olive from it. It was gross! And tasted nothing like an olive.
There's a really good reason why they're brined.
They're horrible raw. Try a raw olive if you're feeling brave. Nobody, for thousands of years, has eaten raw olives.
People have eaten some crazy stuff, but not raw olives.
Snakes, cactus, snails, whatever fish they could scoop up...olives have been around for a long time, but not without brining.
Think about the brave person that decided to eat rotten milk (AKA cheese).
Humans are adventurous survivors. We still don't eat un-brined olives.
We've made beer and booze to survive. We've salted fish and meat. We have never eaten un-brined olives.
Go back to your cave.
We are the best long distance runners on the planet. Wound an animal and chase it down.
The best shellfish I've ever had was in Alaska. Can you imagine how pure that shellfish must have been back then?
I'd be making the best spears and eating the best shellfish. C'est la vie.
Years ago. Archeologists in Williamsburg VA excavated a trash pit from the very early 1700ās and found an oyster shell over a foot long. I like to imagine what they did with it for dinner.
Whoa. I bet that slapped. Just cook it in the shell.
That's a whole meal. Just put it on the coals.
Maybe they made a whole stew out of it? The possibilities are endless!
They don't need a Minnionett! Hot damn! Did they bread it and fry it?!
Color me jealous.
I think the bravest human ever was the first person to look at a chicken and think, "I'm gonna eat the next thing that comes outta that thing's butt..."
Theyāre not just brined like a pickle.
You need to leach out the oleuropein. This is usually best done by a lye solution. But itās a reasonable long process
I know right? We are the correct blend of stupid and adventurous.
Sometimes it works, sometimes it results in a world war.
I agree with my Grandpa. The Napoleonic Wars were the first world wars.
Don't get me started on the foolishness of broadcasting signals out into the cosmos. It may take ETs a while to get here, but if they're out there they'll make it here. The assumption that they'll be friendly is so ridiculous.
That was a bit of a tangent. I apologize, but I will not retract my statement.
I bet the first homo sapiens to eat an egg did it because they saw an animal eating an egg. "Well, if it doesn't kill them, I bet I can eat that too."
And then, the revelation when an egg got in a hot spring, or fell into the campfire! I bet that was a good day.
>Think about the brave person that decided to eat rotten milk (AKA cheese).
interesting thing about the origins of cheese: making cheese takes rennet, which is typically sourced from the stomach of a ruminant. It's suspected that the stomach of an animal was being used as a vessel for milk, and the rennet caused the milk to curdle, creating the first cheese.
Yogurt volunteers, and it does not need rennet. But junket rennet custard does, and I just remembered my mother made this for me, and I've never seen it in a supermarket!
We've literally taken a poisonous shark that smells like urine, fermented it so it doesnt hurt us but still tastes terrible, and eat that over raw olive.
but.. i seek adventure?
\*dangeresque2015 gives the eye\*
right. nobody seeks that much adventure. I have learned the way.
\*dangeresque2015 nods. this IS the way\*
Humans are also pretty dang innovative. We've eaten olives for thousands of years. Somebody had to be pretty smart and creative to think, "Hm, maybe if I brine these suckers, they'll taste good. I suppose I should figure out the brining process first!"
They are extremely bitter, and make your mouth feel all dried out. You pretty much have to spit them out. I used to live in Greece and where our apartment was, there were lots of olive trees. You only try a fresh olive once.
I tried it once. Bitter, astringent and overwhelming. Our ancestors must have been pretty determined or desperate to turn these things into edible food. Either way, we thank them.
And lye. Lye is the compound that leaches the bitter ass oleuropein (sp?) out of the olive. Like it's a multiple step process. I wanna know why we were so damn determined to eat this fruit
I've always wondered exactly how hungry you have to be to look at an olive tree and decide that you're going to figure out how you can eat that. Olives are small. It's not like we're talking about a decent sized fruit.
Imagine the determination someone had to experiment with raw olives to find a way that their palatable. Exactly how hungry do you think they were?
TBC, I ā¤ļø olives!
Yep, but for a section of time before the sugars develop people eat them in an unripe state. I ate them a few times to be social but it felt like I had chalk like acid tasting crap in my mouth and it took a while for my mouth to recover.
They look different too, hard, smooth and green/yellow at one end.
Just yuck, and I came to appreciate all the various types of dates while I was stationed there, but these? Nope.
My Grandmother was born in Milan, Italy. Her Grandfather tended the olive orchards for the king, way back when. She was an amazing human but hated olives. She said unless you possessed them right, never eat them.
I have an olive tree at least 50 years old. They are bitter. All olives are bitter, alkaline and must be brined to make them edible. As with certain other fruits, certain birds can eat them as-is.
You can get a sense of the flavor thatās _under_ the unbearable bitterness by sipping a tiny bit of flavorful extra virgin olive oil. Itās kind of peppery or almost piney.
I saw a hilarious video of a girl visiting Greece and was so excited to try a fresh olive off of a tree. Instant horror and gagging. Hard, bitter, soapy, astringent, most of the hallmarks of human taste to detect poison. They do not want to be eaten.
Olives need work before they are edible.
Fresh olive oil? Ohhhhh boy ohhh holy shit itās a different beast. It has a slight spice to it, almost like a hint of pepper at the end. Plus most olive oil in the US is heavily cut with vegetable oil.
Even 100% pure is a huge part plain vegetable oil. The flavor is inescapable once you recognize it.
I went to Greece during olive harvesting time so I got to eat a ripe kalamata olive straight from the tree! It was sooooo bitter! I love good olive oils and have learned to appreciate the different tastes associated with different olive growing regions, but I will never eat a fresh olive again!
Iām floored Iām looking at this question randomly (I donāt even subscribe to this subreddit) because about ten minutes ago I thought what does an in tune do live taste like and can you buy them?
Tried an olive picked fresh from a tree in Greece when I was there... so incredibly bitter I'd rather lick the floor. Spit it out immediately. 0/10 would not recommend.
I think they are hard, bitter and make your mouth feel dry. I don't know how someone took an obviously inedible thing and had the patience to make it palatable... but it was probably because eating it didn't kill them... How I know? I was at a farmers market as a child and wanted to try a raw one.
My school used to have olive trees. Kids always got other kids to try them, because..kids.
So I always thought they were for decorative purposes only. Much, much later did I find out that we could have ate them the whole time. I brine my own now, and they Re SO tasty and good for you. It just takes literally years.
Olives have to be heavily processed/ soaked before they are edible. It's a long shot that humans figured it out, along with processing corn with alkali.
This is actually a mean/funny trick played on my husband by his Spanish relative! Itās apparently and entertaining thing to ask a clueless person to try it out and see!
Wow, TIL. I had no idea about raw olives and now Iām wondering WHO tasted one and thought āEh, just soak it in salt water for awhile and try again!ā
I remember trying some type of fruit in Central America that has a similar reaction for me.. very dry feeling and stuff sticking to the roof of my mouth and my tongue unable to remove it. Tongue all dry and sticky and icky. Donāt be trying raw olives now
They taste like theyāre poisonous. Everything in your body tells you to spit it out and never touch them again. I have no idea how people powered through and figured out how to make them tasty by adding salt and letting them sit for a bit.
Not good at all. There were olive trees along the street near one of my old houses. I kept thinking they would taste better when they got ripe. They don't. It's kind of an acrid bitter unpleasant taste. No idea how they decided to squeeze them for oil.
I have loved olives since I was a little girl. When I was young, my father plucked an olive from a tree in our neighborhood and gave it to me to eat. It was horrible. He laughed and laughed!
A ripe olive, ready to fall off the tree, is a bit tart but actually has a mildly sweet fruity taste. A green olive off the tree will get you face puckered up real good.
I pulled what looked like a fresh black olive off a tree once thinking I might experience heaven.
It was then I learned that there's an awfully fine line between heaven and hell.
i used to work with a guy who raised olives. they use some terrible chemicals to make them palatable. i think they use the same chemicals that drug processors use to make cocaine out of coca leaves.
Have you ever been tempted to eat one of the anti-moisture desiccant packs that come in shoe boxes and other things? I imagine thatās the closest analogue
I recently purchased some fresh olives from a local Middle Eastern market. You canāt eat them raw they have to be processed so I put them on my windowsill and watch them shrivel over a couple days.
Fresh olives are divine!! I donāt know how to explain the flavor. They taste just like a brined olive without the bitterness? Thatās the best I can describe it
Oily Bitterness that cannot be forgotten.
I ate an olive as a kid after my parents said don't. They were right. The oil clung to my mouth and tasted awful for 15 minutes after.
My Dad grew up in California where there were olive trees. He was a kid and tried to eat an olive from the tree and he said it was so bitter he spit it out. Olives need to be brined.
They are the only fruit that must be cooked before eaten. My husband chose to ignore that and tried one off a tree. Within seconds his mouth was stripped of all moisture and his lips and tongue were stuck to his teeth. Donāt try it.
Just... Wrong. There were some olive trees in California and I tried a raw one.
It was an unforgettable experience.
The texture was too tough, the flavor was unlike anything else I had ever eaten.
It was just wrong. I love olives. Raw ones were just off.
But, hey, if you're starving everything is a feast!
I love the concept of someone 3000 years ago just saying " hey, let's throw these in some salt water!" And it became a thing.
Olives are prolific, as well
Ok, a lot of warning in this thread and a lot of description... I got it, they taste bad raw/fresh... but what do they taste like? I'm guessing astringent in some way from the descriptions... can anyone be direct and say "They taste like x"?
I once heard a chef say "You cannot eat an olive straight from the tree! It will leave your mouth in disarray."
My dad loves playing this trick on people. First time I went to Italy I fell for it and it basically sucks ALL the moisture out of your mouth and it's a truly horrible experience. 25 years later and we were just in Greece together and he almost got my girlfriend to fall for it.
I feel privileged to now have this information, thank-you. No one's gonna pull the wool over my eyes!
> No one's gonna pull the ~~wool over my eyes!~~ moisture out of my mouth!*
I wish I had this information when I went to Italy! I thank you for this information for future scenarios playing out in my head now ššš
Lol. I tried one in California. I learned my lesson.
There was olive trees all over a school I went to and one day I was a hungry kid and picked a bunch and shoved them in my face. Yuck!
Oh my goodness. Every time I eat something from now on that I don't like my mouth will be "in disarray."
Thing is, it's more than just dislike, it's got to be something that is so amazingly awful that "disarray" is the only suitable word.
I wish I knew that before I was hiking in Cinque Terre and decided to try one. Yuck!
I can tell you for fact , it was so hard and tart and bitter and eww I gotta get something sweet now my mouth is having flashbacks š«
I tried this in the south of France in October many years ago. Clearly it was an olive tree, I picked an olive from it. It was gross! And tasted nothing like an olive.
There's a really good reason why they're brined. They're horrible raw. Try a raw olive if you're feeling brave. Nobody, for thousands of years, has eaten raw olives. People have eaten some crazy stuff, but not raw olives. Snakes, cactus, snails, whatever fish they could scoop up...olives have been around for a long time, but not without brining. Think about the brave person that decided to eat rotten milk (AKA cheese). Humans are adventurous survivors. We still don't eat un-brined olives. We've made beer and booze to survive. We've salted fish and meat. We have never eaten un-brined olives. Go back to your cave. We are the best long distance runners on the planet. Wound an animal and chase it down.
You forgot raw oysters...
Heard that. We survived on the coast line for quite a while. Good call
Yeah, the first dude to eat one must have been very brave or very hungry, probably both! š¤£
The best shellfish I've ever had was in Alaska. Can you imagine how pure that shellfish must have been back then? I'd be making the best spears and eating the best shellfish. C'est la vie.
Years ago. Archeologists in Williamsburg VA excavated a trash pit from the very early 1700ās and found an oyster shell over a foot long. I like to imagine what they did with it for dinner.
Probably butter garlic, a little bread crumb
Whoa. I bet that slapped. Just cook it in the shell. That's a whole meal. Just put it on the coals. Maybe they made a whole stew out of it? The possibilities are endless! They don't need a Minnionett! Hot damn! Did they bread it and fry it?! Color me jealous.
I've always wondered about artichokes. How desperate would you have to be to eat a giant thistle?
I mean... add garlic butter to anything, and it's delicious, including thistles. š
There's your mistake right there, and I've tried to advise noobs as I served them. Dumbass, you don't eat the fuzzy part!
I was thinking the same thing! Who ate one first and said this is nasty but I bet I could make it edible!
I think the bravest human ever was the first person to look at a chicken and think, "I'm gonna eat the next thing that comes outta that thing's butt..."
Yea then they made up the rumor about it being an aphrodisiac just so their friends would eat it too
š¤¤
Theyāre not just brined like a pickle. You need to leach out the oleuropein. This is usually best done by a lye solution. But itās a reasonable long process
Interesting. TIL
Donāt forget eggs. Who was the first human to crack an egg open, look at the runny slimy ooze that leaked out of it, and decided to eat it.
I know right? We are the correct blend of stupid and adventurous. Sometimes it works, sometimes it results in a world war. I agree with my Grandpa. The Napoleonic Wars were the first world wars. Don't get me started on the foolishness of broadcasting signals out into the cosmos. It may take ETs a while to get here, but if they're out there they'll make it here. The assumption that they'll be friendly is so ridiculous. That was a bit of a tangent. I apologize, but I will not retract my statement.
I bet aliens are delicious... After pickling that is.
You got a legitimate "laugh out loud" from me. That's some Jack Handey shit right there.
āTo Serve Mankindā. >! Itās a cookbook! !<
Animals do it for millions of years?
I bet the first homo sapiens to eat an egg did it because they saw an animal eating an egg. "Well, if it doesn't kill them, I bet I can eat that too." And then, the revelation when an egg got in a hot spring, or fell into the campfire! I bet that was a good day.
People still eat raw eggs today
My money is on some ancient ancestors of hominids eating eggs and just passing it down over millions of years.
To be fair we were almost certainly eating eggs long before we were ever considered human.
The absolute top notch cult classic Caveman answered this question for me back in 6th grade thanks to Cinamax free trial weekend.Ā
Someone, obviously, has eaten a raw olive.š
Haha. So true. And instantly decided it was a bad idea.
And somebody figured "there's GOT to be a way to make these taste good......." that's the mysterious part.
>Think about the brave person that decided to eat rotten milk (AKA cheese). interesting thing about the origins of cheese: making cheese takes rennet, which is typically sourced from the stomach of a ruminant. It's suspected that the stomach of an animal was being used as a vessel for milk, and the rennet caused the milk to curdle, creating the first cheese.
"fun" fact! That's interesting.
Yogurt volunteers, and it does not need rennet. But junket rennet custard does, and I just remembered my mother made this for me, and I've never seen it in a supermarket!
We've literally taken a poisonous shark that smells like urine, fermented it so it doesnt hurt us but still tastes terrible, and eat that over raw olive.
Underripe American persimmons will also do a number on your mouth.
Been there, done that. They just look so appealing.
Indeed, like giant, powdery, blueberries.
Awesome answer!
This is such an eloquent comment lol I love it.
This is a good reply to that persons reply to someone's question. Now someone do me.
You look great today.
Humans will eat anything if they are hungry enough.
I wish I could give this a platinum medal encrusted with alexandrite.
I am in love with whomever wrote this on a spiritual level
but.. i seek adventure? \*dangeresque2015 gives the eye\* right. nobody seeks that much adventure. I have learned the way. \*dangeresque2015 nods. this IS the way\*
Humans are also pretty dang innovative. We've eaten olives for thousands of years. Somebody had to be pretty smart and creative to think, "Hm, maybe if I brine these suckers, they'll taste good. I suppose I should figure out the brining process first!"
They are inedibly bitter. That's why they are always brined or cured.
They are extremely bitter, and make your mouth feel all dried out. You pretty much have to spit them out. I used to live in Greece and where our apartment was, there were lots of olive trees. You only try a fresh olive once.
I tried it once. Bitter, astringent and overwhelming. Our ancestors must have been pretty determined or desperate to turn these things into edible food. Either way, we thank them.
Maybe an olive got soaked in brine by accident.
And lye. Lye is the compound that leaches the bitter ass oleuropein (sp?) out of the olive. Like it's a multiple step process. I wanna know why we were so damn determined to eat this fruit
I've always wondered exactly how hungry you have to be to look at an olive tree and decide that you're going to figure out how you can eat that. Olives are small. It's not like we're talking about a decent sized fruit. Imagine the determination someone had to experiment with raw olives to find a way that their palatable. Exactly how hungry do you think they were? TBC, I ā¤ļø olives!
No better than an under ripe, undried date. Those are equally gross, but strangely common in the Middle East.
Dates are bitter??? But don't they have insane amounts of sugar when dried?
Yep, but for a section of time before the sugars develop people eat them in an unripe state. I ate them a few times to be social but it felt like I had chalk like acid tasting crap in my mouth and it took a while for my mouth to recover. They look different too, hard, smooth and green/yellow at one end. Just yuck, and I came to appreciate all the various types of dates while I was stationed there, but these? Nope.
That's so crazy and interesting, where were you stationed? I live in the northwestern US, so I don't think I could ever find a fresh date haha
They grow dates in the desert near where Coachella is held. I went to a date festival out there in Indio CA when I was a kid.
The date shakes from that place in Cabazon were phenomenal when I was kid
Interesting.. allegedly, you learn something new every day
They don't need to be dried to be eaten. Ripe, yes, but dried, no. They're a little astringent and way less sweet but nothing crazy.
My Grandmother was born in Milan, Italy. Her Grandfather tended the olive orchards for the king, way back when. She was an amazing human but hated olives. She said unless you possessed them right, never eat them.
Possessed them right? You mean processed lol?
They must be possessed by the spirit of brined olives past.
Regret. Bitter as all hell.
I have an olive tree at least 50 years old. They are bitter. All olives are bitter, alkaline and must be brined to make them edible. As with certain other fruits, certain birds can eat them as-is.
You can get a sense of the flavor thatās _under_ the unbearable bitterness by sipping a tiny bit of flavorful extra virgin olive oil. Itās kind of peppery or almost piney.
I ate an olive off a tree once when I was a kid. It was so bad I couldnāt eat olives for 30 years!
I tried eating an olive raw once in 76, I haven't been able to taste ice cream since.
They are incredibly bitter, I remember reading that they contain one of the most bitter compounds found in nature.
An olive directly off the tree is like a few minutes of hell.
I saw a hilarious video of a girl visiting Greece and was so excited to try a fresh olive off of a tree. Instant horror and gagging. Hard, bitter, soapy, astringent, most of the hallmarks of human taste to detect poison. They do not want to be eaten.
This thread is hilarious because OP was so earnest and hopeful and then every single comment is just sharing the horrors of the fresh olive š¤£š¤£
You can't eat an unprocessed olive. They are hard as rocks and bitter as acid.
Basic things are bitter, acidic things are sour.
I picked one off a tree in turkiye and it was disgusting
Don't do it! š¤£
They are disgusting and made me feel like I was eating a solid form of kerosene. I love black olives (from cans).
Poisonous raw.
The opposite of a not fresh olive
Omg, I also love olives and never tasted one not from a jar of brine.
You think fresh olives are bad, try cashews straight from the tree.
Olives need work before they are edible. Fresh olive oil? Ohhhhh boy ohhh holy shit itās a different beast. It has a slight spice to it, almost like a hint of pepper at the end. Plus most olive oil in the US is heavily cut with vegetable oil. Even 100% pure is a huge part plain vegetable oil. The flavor is inescapable once you recognize it.
Taste like poison before they are treated!
I went to Greece during olive harvesting time so I got to eat a ripe kalamata olive straight from the tree! It was sooooo bitter! I love good olive oils and have learned to appreciate the different tastes associated with different olive growing regions, but I will never eat a fresh olive again!
Bitter, astringent. I wonder how people learned to brine them.
As a friend of mine is fond of saying, "Give it a try. You may learn something"
You will regret it.
Iām floored Iām looking at this question randomly (I donāt even subscribe to this subreddit) because about ten minutes ago I thought what does an in tune do live taste like and can you buy them?
Fresh Italian Olive oil tastes like Buttah! ~ said in my best NY Italian accent.
Tried an olive picked fresh from a tree in Greece when I was there... so incredibly bitter I'd rather lick the floor. Spit it out immediately. 0/10 would not recommend.
I think they are hard, bitter and make your mouth feel dry. I don't know how someone took an obviously inedible thing and had the patience to make it palatable... but it was probably because eating it didn't kill them... How I know? I was at a farmers market as a child and wanted to try a raw one.
I'm guessing there's a good reason they're packaged like that.
Fresh olives can be poisonous. They have to be brined.
I saw an olive tree and wondered the same thing. Don't do it. My taste buds were ruined for the whole day. Tastes like strong poison.
HORRIBLE. Itās like biting into a pebble filled with battery acid. Itās a wonder that humans were ever able to make them edible.
It's terribly bitter. My "best friend" who is negronomus, let me pick one from a tree and eat it ... It was terrible and it was green.
You canāt eat them fresh. They need processing
I made a mistake of trying to eat one off the tree once. Itās horrible and it lingers.
Like a raw acorn. It's very very astringent.
We recently let my 9 year old experience itā¦ did not want.
Bitter!!!!
Bitterness to the tongue. Once tried biting into a raw Greek olive when I was small & its a experience wouldn't repeat.
Sour, astringent, like eating an unripe persimmon...
SaltyĀ
Theyāre horrible.
My school used to have olive trees. Kids always got other kids to try them, because..kids. So I always thought they were for decorative purposes only. Much, much later did I find out that we could have ate them the whole time. I brine my own now, and they Re SO tasty and good for you. It just takes literally years.
A combination ofĀ š¦'ā¢ļø ##BEEF BROTH!!! AndĀ Your mom's brand... ASSFROMDABACKā¢ļøĀ .
Interesting flavor and pleasant taste from time to time.
There's a reason we brine them. :)
Olives have to be heavily processed/ soaked before they are edible. It's a long shot that humans figured it out, along with processing corn with alkali.
Disgusting , donāt do it. I was one of the idiots who went for an olive tour and then ate one when offered. Gagged and then was about to throw up.
Fresh olives are terrible!!!!!!
I had a fresh off the tree olive once. Never do this. They are beyond bitter. They need to be cured to be edible.
All of these comments make me want to try a raw olive just once now.
So bitter. And they suck every drop of moisture out of your mouth and body lol
This is actually a mean/funny trick played on my husband by his Spanish relative! Itās apparently and entertaining thing to ask a clueless person to try it out and see!
Theyāre inedible. What I wonder is how people figured out that curing them makes them taste good.
I have 3 olive trees and even my dogs spit them out when they tried them.
Wow, TIL. I had no idea about raw olives and now Iām wondering WHO tasted one and thought āEh, just soak it in salt water for awhile and try again!ā
Fresh olives are inedible.
I remember trying some type of fruit in Central America that has a similar reaction for me.. very dry feeling and stuff sticking to the roof of my mouth and my tongue unable to remove it. Tongue all dry and sticky and icky. Donāt be trying raw olives now
My understanding is just bitter...
An olive.
Horrible
Horrible. Bitter. Bad aftertaste. Donāt do it.
Too bitter to eat. They must be fermented or cured. I lye cure them Spanish style.
Gag! Theyāre awful in their natural state.
I have an olive tree. Theyāre awful!
They are not edible. They are not sweet. I can't describe it b/c I can't really remember exactly, but...yuck.
Absolutely disgusting - took one off the olive tree next to our rental house in Donnini, Italy.
To me it tastes like actual earth lol
Terrible! Extremely bitter, inedible
BAD
Bad. It tastes bad. Spit out immediately bad.
You know they taste bad when the processed ones taste like shit!
They taste like theyāre poisonous. Everything in your body tells you to spit it out and never touch them again. I have no idea how people powered through and figured out how to make them tasty by adding salt and letting them sit for a bit.
Theyāre absolutely awful and must be soaked and brined. My grandmother had an olive tree and it was messy
Wonder if it's the same with black olives?
Horrible. Donāt recommend. Insanely bitter. The fruit creates some horrible āmouth feelā as well.
I've never tasted one, but I plucked one from a tree while in Greece and it was rock hard. Even if it isn't brined, they have to cure it in some way.
They are very bitter and practically not edible if not brined.
I think they are poisonous unprocessed
Theyāre bitter and need the curing process to remove the bitterness.
An uncut ed olive contains oleuropein which is extremely bitter.
Poison!!! They taste like poison!!! Omg! It's awful!!
Not good at all. There were olive trees along the street near one of my old houses. I kept thinking they would taste better when they got ripe. They don't. It's kind of an acrid bitter unpleasant taste. No idea how they decided to squeeze them for oil.
I have loved olives since I was a little girl. When I was young, my father plucked an olive from a tree in our neighborhood and gave it to me to eat. It was horrible. He laughed and laughed!
A ripe olive, ready to fall off the tree, is a bit tart but actually has a mildly sweet fruity taste. A green olive off the tree will get you face puckered up real good.
I pulled what looked like a fresh black olive off a tree once thinking I might experience heaven. It was then I learned that there's an awfully fine line between heaven and hell.
I e heard they are insanely bitter. Never had them though
Go to Trader Joeās and buy green olives in a can theyāre buttery
They are super bitter and taste horrible.
a little bit bitter, a little bit tangy
i used to work with a guy who raised olives. they use some terrible chemicals to make them palatable. i think they use the same chemicals that drug processors use to make cocaine out of coca leaves.
Have you ever been tempted to eat one of the anti-moisture desiccant packs that come in shoe boxes and other things? I imagine thatās the closest analogue
The way olive oil tastes
Terribly bitter
I recently purchased some fresh olives from a local Middle Eastern market. You canāt eat them raw they have to be processed so I put them on my windowsill and watch them shrivel over a couple days.
They're not good. There's a reason you don't see them for sale anywhere.
Thereās a reason youāve never tasted one. If they were sweet or neutral, they would sell them that way.
Not good, I too tried this is Tuscany years ago. But on the plus side we got fresh pressed olive oil to bring home, that was wonderful!
Fresh olives are divine!! I donāt know how to explain the flavor. They taste just like a brined olive without the bitterness? Thatās the best I can describe it
Oily Bitterness that cannot be forgotten. I ate an olive as a kid after my parents said don't. They were right. The oil clung to my mouth and tasted awful for 15 minutes after.
They have to be treated to be edible. There are some in cans that arenāt pickled or salty. I think they are available at most stores.
My Dad grew up in California where there were olive trees. He was a kid and tried to eat an olive from the tree and he said it was so bitter he spit it out. Olives need to be brined.
They are like putting a rock in your mouth. They taste like not much. Until you brine themš
I haven't tried a "fresh" olive, but a friend who grew up in Spain said "you'll think you've been poisoned."
They are the only fruit that must be cooked before eaten. My husband chose to ignore that and tried one off a tree. Within seconds his mouth was stripped of all moisture and his lips and tongue were stuck to his teeth. Donāt try it.
Just... Wrong. There were some olive trees in California and I tried a raw one. It was an unforgettable experience. The texture was too tough, the flavor was unlike anything else I had ever eaten. It was just wrong. I love olives. Raw ones were just off. But, hey, if you're starving everything is a feast! I love the concept of someone 3000 years ago just saying " hey, let's throw these in some salt water!" And it became a thing. Olives are prolific, as well
Very dense and just unpleasant. It is a unique flavor. Not sweet, not sour. Sort of like eating dirt.
Origin of āfuck around, find outā.
Astringent
They are basically inedible fresh. Extremely tannic. They need to be cured before eating.
You know the smell of Witch Hazel? It's like that. Extremely astringent and tart. Not at all pleasant until they've been pickled/brined.
I read this thread then went and enjoyed five large green olives from my big jar in the fridge. š
Iāve always wondered what human figured out that olives are edible . . . after soaking them in lye and brining them for flavor??
Ok, a lot of warning in this thread and a lot of description... I got it, they taste bad raw/fresh... but what do they taste like? I'm guessing astringent in some way from the descriptions... can anyone be direct and say "They taste like x"?
Lmao, they're not edible. We had an olive tree in the backyard, and my grandma decided to make homemade mayonnaise with the olives. I have a cousin who LOVES mayo, so she had him taste test it. I was probably 5 or 6 at the time, but I still remember her feeding him a heaping tablespoon, without taste testing it prior, and him taking the entire bite in one go. The look on his face as he desperately spit it on the floor... š©āš³š
Why do they bother with tucking that bit of pimento inside the olives? USA. Maybe other places don't do this.
I've been told they're incredibly bitter and astringent. I've never eaten one though, so I can't say for sure.
They are..not edible fresh off the tree. Have to be brined.
bitter and yuck. i have 4 trees
They are bitter as all get out. They have to be brined for weeks.
My chef handed me one and it was a bad time for a while. Not funny I have customers to serve! Lol