Tomato Rhapsody by Adam Schell

Author:Adam Schell [Schell, Adam]
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 978-0-440-33861-1
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2008-12-31T16:00:00+00:00

In which We Learn

Man’s Father’s Technique

for Curing Green olives

When it came to the curing of olives, just about every village in Tuscany claimed it possessed the most flavorful and delicious olives in the land, and that its technique for curing was totally original and superior to all others. But the truth was, virtually all olives were cured using a saltwater brine bath, with the addition of some herbs and spices being the only local variable.

Mari’s father, though, had created a technique for curing green olives that was truly unique to all of Tuscany. Instead of curing the green olives in an open container and changing the brine bath daily for ten days, as was commonly done, he sealed the container and let the olives ferment for ten days in a manner similar to fermenting crushed grapes to make wine. The fermentation process softened the olive’s skin more than the typical brine. It made the flesh juicier and its bite more pungent, even a bit cheese-like, which was both off-putting and enthralling in a way that only cheese can be, and certainly no other olive was.

In recent years, Mari had perfected the process further. She discovered that fresh-picked green olives were best left unwashed so that their naturally occurring yeasts could promote and enhance the fermentation. Here was how the process worked: the fresh-picked green olives were set into an enormous, chest-high earthen vessel and then mixed with sea salt, water and a few handfuls of leaves from a bay laurel tree. The vessel was then sealed with a heavy clay top with a small hole so the gases could escape and prevent the curing vessels from exploding (a phenomenon that had occurred on more than one occasion when Mari’s father was first experimenting with the process). The vessel was then left to ferment for upward of ten days.

And so it was that on this Sunday afternoon of early September (six days since we left Mari at the piazza and Benito at the tavern, and one week to the day of the Feast of the Drunken Saint), Mari was busy at work inside the olive mill, bent over the large salt bin filling buckets in preparation for the fermentation of the season’s first green olives. Outside the mill, Benito too was supposed to be busy working. Certainly, his body was where it was expected to be, standing before one of the enormous green olive-curing vessels with an equally enormous wood spoon in his hands as he mixed its briny contents of olives, water, salt and bay leaves. But as Benito looked up through the small window into the mill and saw Mari, other things began to stir in him.

With all the awareness of a six-year-old child, Benito pressed his pelvis into the olive vessel’s curve to more fully experience the swelling inside his trousers. These were the delicious first moments of spying, the innocent, boy-like moments when Benito would disappear inside the world of his desire and before the swelling got so great that it would bring on the arrival of La Piccola Voce and its abusive mocking.

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