
I grew up before the advent of self-serve olive bars. To this California kid, olives were spongy, black (possibly dyed), and used primarily to fit over tiny fingertips for dinnertime entertainment. I didn’t develop a taste for them until I moved here and started shopping at the original olive bars, the bastot (stalls) selling a dozen varieties out of bins: wrinkly, oil-cured Moroccans; purple- blushed kalamatas (imported from Greece); the cracked, flat-green local suri variety. Now it’s hard to imagine a meal without a little bowl of olives for snacking. I like to chop up whatever I have around, spread it on fish, and wrap it in chard before simmering it in a lemony, cilantro-y sauce.








