Tapenade, an irresistible Olive spread from Provence

When the weather starts to heat up, my taste buds board a plane and venture to the South of France. Grab a pastis and join me for a taste of Summer. Coastal Provence is an area long renowned for its golden sunlight and soul satisfying fare. A cuisine largely rooted in seafood and vegetables with flavorful condiments like rouille and tapenado that enhance everything they touch. The dish tapenade is derived from tapeno, the Provencal word for capers. Charles Meynier, chef of the bygone Marseille restaurant La Maison Dorée, invented tapenade in 1880. 

The early tapenade recipes included tuna, something that has all but disappeared from modern tapenade recipes. It’s sad because tuna adds such a creamy texture and lowers the salinity. Not that I have ever feared sea salt. Jean Baptiste Reboul, author of the classic ‘La Cuisiniere Provencale’, gives an early recipe direct from his dear friend Charles Meynier. It includes equal proportions of olives and capers, half as much anchovy and preserved tuna, mustard, olive oil, thyme, pepper, bay leaf and cognac. Over the years the ratio of olives to capers has shifted in favor of olives, from equal billing to about 65% olives and 35% capers. Admittedly I make mine with a far more modern ratio.

I love eating tapenade on everything; artichokes, grilled fish, roast chicken and even smeared on tartines with fresh goat cheese. After spending a life in the kitchen, I have decided on one simple truth, pitted olives suck. They just do not taste the same or have the same texture. Resist your first inclination to be lazy and buy whole olives.  Repeat with me, said in your best  your best B.A. Baracus voice, “I pity the fool”. Pitting is quick and easy to do. Follow my simple regime and you’ll be pitting like a pro in no time. Pour yourself a big glass of wine, close your eyes as you sip, think of the last argument with your wife and start smacking the olives with the flat side of a heavy knife. Release your aggressions as the olive meat separates from the pit. Find your wife and hug her. Marriage therapy and a workout all in one. Stand clear of canned black olives you find in American grocery stores.  I am not even sure how they ruin olives so easily but they do.

Try these tapenades spread thick on tartines (toasted baguette brushed with olive oil, garlic and herbes de Provence) or with fresh goat cheese. Close your eyes as the flavors transport you to Provence!