Here’s a fun fact: I used to HATE olives. It didn’t matter how they were served, if olives so much as touched a piece of what I was eating, the whole dish was ruined for me. It was quite a shame, though, because I loved Italian, Greek, and Spanish cuisines, where olives were truly a staple. I resented the fact that my taste buds were so repelled by olives. 

By the time I moved to New York City for a summer internship at a food magazine, I realized that my dislike of olives was not going to work for me anymore. I so desperately wanted to be okay with olives on my pizza or to stick a toothpick in a marinated olive while at dinner parties. I decided I was going to suck it up and force myself to become an olive eater. 

To acquire my taste for olives, I little by little began eating them more frequently. When I saw an olive on an appetizer plate, I would gulp it down and try to summon some positives to the flavor. If a dish looked good on a menu, but it had olives, I would still order it and notice how the olives enhanced the flavor of the dish. I even began buying mixed, marinated olives at the store and serving them on cheese plates in my own apartment. I added Greek salads to my salad repertoire, and found that I loved the simplicity of the ingredients. 

Sure enough, by the end of that summer, I had become not only an olive eater, but an olive lover. So without further ado, let me introduce to you this super simple, tasty, and zesty marinated olive recipe. If you’re an olive lover, these are right up your alley. If you haven’t yet acquired your taste for olives, this is the best way to dip your toes in and start to love them!