olive, walnut and cranberry tapenade

today was a gorgeous day here in san francisco, high sixties and perfectly sunny with a light breeze. we celebrated by heading over to golden gate park for our first picnic of the year!

i found this tapenade recipe in my tassajara cookbook. it's supposed to be made with pomegranate seeds but pomegranates are nowhere to be found right now so i substituted coarsly chopped dried cranberries. this has a really nice blend of flavors and was a delicious topping for hearty seedy crackers. in addition, we had the last of our farmers market strawberries with some kiwi and our favorite picnic wine in a box - bandit!

olive, walnut and cranberry tapenade
(adapted from the tassajara cookbook)
ingredients:
1 cup unseasoned green olives, such as picholines*
2/3 cup toasted walnuts, finely chopped
1/2 cup dried cranberries, coarsly chopped
1/4 cup chopped cilantro
1 clove garlic, minced
2 tablespoons olive oil
lemon juice
salt

finely mince the olives. in a bowl, combine the olives, walnuts, cranberries, cilantro, garlic and olive oil; stir to mix. add few drops of lemon juice. taste and add salt if necessary.

*i don't know what kind of olives mine are because they're not labeled but they're my new obsession. i suspect they are castelvetranos.

-d