Chris and Frank sent us presents from The Olive Press in Glen Ellen (Sonoma County), California.
www.theolivepress.com
They sent us a few jars of olive tapenades and two flavored olive oils (lemon and orange). We have visited The Olive Press before, but several years ago.

The tapenades are wonderful - not creamy olive paste, but chunky mixtures of olives and capers and other things. I put them on fresh bread and tonight I made pasta and mixed it with several spoons of one of the tapenades and then mixed in vegetables - wonderful!

With another pasta dish, I added at the end some of the lemon olive oil - also wonderful.

I added them to my Italy: Travel Notes - Olive Oil page.

Pauline from Slow Travelers

Yum! I used some lemon olive oil the other night on pasta with tuna - delish!
The orange oil sounds intriguing ... when would you use that?
(If you weren't a vegetarian, I'd say with a white fish along with some orange slices in the sauce ... )

Some suggestions I just found on Michael Chiarello's website:

* Dress a salad of shaved fennel, radishes, and a hint of tarragon
* Mix into mashed avocados for sublime guacamole
* Top bruschetta with prosciutto, wilted spinach, and a drizzle of blood orange oil

I think it would also make a wonderful salad dressing. I bought the lemon oil the last time I was there--next time I'll get the orange to experiment with.