Belly up to the olive bar at local supermarkets
"A taste older than meat, older than wine," rhapsodized Lawrence Durrell in "Prospero's Cell." He was referring to the olive, prized by ancient civilizations and modern gourmets alike.
Nowadays people are so enamored with the pungent orbs that olive bars have become de rigueur at many supermarkets around town, from Whole Foods Market to Thriftway Village Market in Mountlake Terrace; from privately owned local chains like Top Foods and Town & Country Markets to big supermarkets. Certain QFC stores boast olive bars, while Albertson's is testing the idea in Gig Harbor and Portland. PCC Natural Markets have them, too.
"We're not the first to jump on trends. We're conservative," notes Jan Thompson, PCC's deli merchandiser.
These self-serve islands may showcase as many as a dozen olives from around the world. They are sold in bulk, usually for about $7.99 per pound. You can also taste before you buy.
Olive bars have proven to be profitable for grocery stores, and as their popularity has blossomed, stores are expanding on the concept, creating what some call "antipasto bars" that offer other marinated or pickled foods, all at the same price per pound as the olives. Peppers, mushrooms, cornichons, caperberries, tapenades, sweet white garlic, cippollini onions, artichokes and other vegetables, as well as fresh cheeses such as mozzarella or feta, are the items most commonly encountered.
"We were one of the first, if not the first, supermarket to have an olive bar," said Jacques Boiroux, director of development for Metropolitan Markets and an owner of the company, which until recently operated under the Thriftway name in West Seattle, Tacoma and Queen Anne. You can taste them. You don't have to buy a whole jar and then find out you don't like them. You can mix and match, all for one price."
Boiroux says the stores sell hundreds of pounds of olives a week and notes prices have gone down from high of $10-$12 a pound years ago.
"Because we can buy them in 30-pound tubs, it keeps the cost down," he said. In the beginning, he says, about 60 percent of the olives they sold were Kalamatas. Those account for about 40 percent of sales now that people have discovered other varieties like Niçoise, Picholine, Cerignola and Spanish olives newly available in bulk.
"People are traveling more, and as they discover new things they want to find those tastes here," Boiroux said. At the Metropolitan Market in Sand Point, customers use wooden ladles to scoop up 10 kinds of olives — such as the ruddy, large green Royal Atlas or the meaty, black Mt. Pelions. There are also long-stemmed Roman-style artichokes, small Italian cippollini onions marinated in balsamic vinegar, and Mama Lil's Kick-Butt goathorn peppers. Adjacent to the olive bar are bean, pea, pasta and potato salads, which also sell for $7.99 a pound.
Larry's Markets installed their first olive bar in the Oak Tree store in 1998, and also have a full selection at their Redmond store. Company spokesperson Elizabeth Bertani says that olive bar sales have been increasing each year, as customers experiment with more exotic olive and antipasti choices.
Not much bigger than an olive barrel itself, Olives Gourmet Foods in Edmonds features an olive bar as its centerpiece. Olives go for $7.99 a pound, while assorted antipasti (grilled eggplant, roasted peppers, dolmas) are available from the deli case ($9.99 per pound).
"People come in and ask for some really obscure olives," says Strom Peterson, a co-owner with Michael Young.
Customers here favor the large green olives stuffed with blue cheese, garlic or almonds. Peppadews are popular too. The bright-red South African fruit looks like a hollowed-out cherry tomato.
"They have a naturally sweet spiciness," says Peterson, "and they're great stuffed with goat cheese or mozzarella."
You'll also find peppadews at Shoreline Central Market and Ballard Market, both part of the Town & Country chain.
Ballard Market's olive bar was added during the renovation last spring, and it's one of the area's more sumptuous, with at least a dozen types of olives, including little Arbequinas from Spain, wrinkly dry-cured black olives, and herb-marinated Sicilian olives.
The bar also offers pepperoncini, roasted tomatoes and red peppers, cherry peppers stuffed with prosciutto and provolone, dolmas, fresh mozzarella and barrel-aged sheep and goat-milk feta.
The recent reincarnation of Alki Market also included an olive bar.
"People expect it these days," says owner Jim McDevitt, who considered putting it behind the service deli but decided people like the convenience of self-serve. "It's definitely paying the rent in the space that we give it."
PCC stores sell olives in bulk along with a variety of fresh feta cheeses, but the newer stores in Issaquah, Green Lake and Fremont have olive bars. "We found that when we pulled the bulk olives out of the refrigerator case, we sold more olives," said Thompson, PCC's deli merchandiser. Customers can expect to see more olive bars as PCC updates its existing stores.
The visual appeal and ease of access makes the self-serve olive bars particularly attractive to customers — sometimes too attractive.
"People nibble," acknowledges McDevitt. "We call them grazers in the business. Obviously we discourage it when we see it." Sampling is OK, even encouraged, but too much sampling can cut into the store's profit margin — and there are some who push the limits of olive-bar etiquette.
"I've seen people help themselves to a little dish of olives and eat them while shopping," says Boiroux. To discourage grazers at Whole Foods, assistant specialty team leader Shina Wysocki says they recently removed the sample cups from the olive bar. "Now you have to ask for them," she said.