This is an Arbequina olive that I purchased on a whim when passing through a hardware store. It was first planted in 2023 and moved early in 2024. Last year it had a mass of flowers but I did not see any fruit. Yesterday I decided to prune a couple crossing branches and imagine my surprise to see this single olive hiding below one of the pruned branches!
My assumption is because the tree hasn’t flowered yet this year that this olive overwintered on the tree from last year’s flowers. Given the deep black and smooth flesh, I assumed it was ripe. So I picked it. Inside was well-formed and juicy but very bitter taste. Maybe it wasn’t quite ripe?
Definitely chalking up even 1 little olive in the win column and now have high hopes for more olives this year!
Congratulations on the olive. I understand they shouldn’t be eaten straight from the tree, but must go through some curing process such as brining. Lots of info online.
Yeah, I’ll need to look up what to do with olive fruit now. I know nothing about them and, honestly, never thought I’d actually ever have fruit to look up how to handle. 🙂