Byzantine Country Olives, 5 Pound

Five pounds is a lot of olives, but I eat a lot of them and found myself wasting money by repeatedly buying the same (low quality) olives in jars at the grocery store. By weight, these cost about as much as the ones in my grocery store, but since these come with a minimum of brine, you get more bang for the buck.I am a relatively fussy olive eater, but I will eat basically any kind of olive I can get my hands on if nothing else is available. I far and away prefer olives with pits, and I like having the variety of many different kinds of olives to snack on. I really like the different olives in the mix, and there are about 5 or 6 different kinds in abundance.I really enjoyed the variety in the pack. There is a very even mix, none of that crap you find in some mixes where the worst little green olives predominate. My favorite kind of olives were the atalanti olives. I typically don't get a lot of these, and they taste so good. It's hard to describe but to me they taste kind of buttery.The olives were very high quality. The green olives were all very firm and fresh. In the black and brown olives there were certainly mushy ones but in my experiences that is the norm and I feel like they typically taste the best. There was an occasional under-ripe olive with a slightly astringent taste, but these were rare.As I mentioned earlier, these olives come with a minimum of brine, so be prepared to make your own. I was barely able to fit mine into three large (1 quart) mason jars with saltwater (a bit less than a tablespoon of salt per cup of water) and they have kept fine in the relatively short time it has taken me to eat them. They are seasoned with herbs and have a bit of a floral smell. Personally I liked the addition of the herbs and did not find them overpowering.Overall, I am very happy with these olives. They are relatively cheap, high quality, and much better than anything I can buy locally. Just be prepared for a lot of olives.

I purchased this olive mix to serve at our annual Greek feast. I like olives with a pungent bite, so I was very concerned with "sweet wine vinegar brine with a pinch of classic greek herbs" part of the description. Much to my relief, the brine is not at all sweet. The herbs added a tiny bit too much of a floral note for my taste, but they were still very good. The olives themselves were firm and intact, and I like the fact that they still had the pits.They are not the very best olives I've ever had, but the price was exceptional and I'm quite pleased with my purchase.

These are nice, tasty, good-value. BUT there are only three kinds of olives in the bag I got, not the five kinds of olives stated in the listing.The price per pound include the brine liquid in the bag. Should be completely drained.From Greece.

I hate just about everything about these... Theres a reason they are so cheap per lb.Taste: WAY too much of a weird flavor i have yet to ever encounter in an olive.. or other food for that matter. It tastes like a quasi molded vinegar or rotted over ripened brie - and not in a good way.Its pungent in the worse way, not the best.. its way to floral and just has this funk to them.Variety: Eh, i mean the mix of diff types seems to be ok. A balanced medley thats similar to the picture.Aroma: Disgusting and over powering. I have all of the 5lb bag in TWO zip lock bags (yes thats one bag in another in another etc..) and i can STILL smell the stank from it.. thru the bag?? I got them on Friday, opened and ate a few and couldnt get the smell off my fingers after washing 3 times with soap. Also all weekend, i could leave the house and when i come back home i could smell this junk when i walk in the door. if im in the kitchen i can smell them and they are put away in a cabinet in their bags, on the floor... Even my dogs who eat everything literally went up to it and backed away! lol.. didnt lick the bag either to my surprise.Texture/Firmness/Ripeness: Some were ripe and as they should be. But way too inconsistent.. one green crunchy n ok the next beyond mushy. the kalamata olives just had a weird texture tooComparison: Ive eaten outstanding olives at greek, turkish, n Med restaurants... i also eat them from the olive bar at my local wegmans or giant grocery store. The comparison isnt there... these equal out to like $5.50 a lb i think?? while Giant is $7.99 a lb and Wegmans $8.99 a lb.. after experiencing these horrifc things i will absolutely be shelling out the $8.99 a lb at wegmans. taste, quality, etc is all there.Im a frugal foodie.. i can justify a 5 star or michelin star restaurant but wont hesitate to eat at a Red Robin or even have chuck e cheese pizza... im a food snob but NOT to that degree. Im just showing that i know good quality food but dont avoid food that happens to be cheap if it tastes ok.. My best advice is to avoid these like the plague..... I dunno why these got such good reviews it literally boggles my mind. Have they never had real, good olives??Im not a snob, nor a coneseiur, nor an olive purist lol... i just know good quality.So before u buy these.... think - how is it these are $5.50+ a lb when other places have it for almost double. your giving up quality lol... Just trust me. That weird floral sort of funky stank stunk up my house and fingers horrificly.. and my stomach was paying for it the next few hours

First of all, the picture I had in my mind of what 5 Lbs of olives would look like was much larger than what was received. On a whim I weighed them in my kitchen: the olives, liquid, and bag weighed under. (See pic). The size of the olives themselves fall somewhere between medium and small. The entire lot filled 3 one-quart mason jars, exactly. Only 3. That makes them $11.26 a quart ... Not the value I was looking for.On the other hand, the taste, texture, and firmness were exactly what I expected. They make a nice snack and the variety of flavor across the medley is spot on. No bitterness.