Easy Olive Tapenade Recipe for Traditional French Tapenade from Provence

This easy olive tapenade recipe is based on the traditional French tapenade recipe from Provence in southern France that’s made with only four ingredients – black olives, capers, anchovies, and olive oil. You could add garlic, herbs and spices, but this Mediterranean olive dip is absolutely delicious in its original form, eaten on fresh or toasted baguette slices, pintxos or crostini.

Buy some jars of Kalamata olives, capers and anchovies and keep this black olive tapenade recipe handy if you’ve got family or friends dropping by, as it will make you an incredibly delicious dip that you can serve with homemade crackers, grissini or cheese straws or spread onto toasted baguette slices, crostini or pintxos, and it can be made in minutes.

This black olive tapenade recipe from Southern France is one of the best things to make with a mortar and pestle and yet it’s not a cooking project. You can make this authentic French olive tapenade recipe in minutes using the traditional method, which is pounding the ingredients together with a pestle and mortar. If you enjoy this, also try our tuna, black olive and walnut dip recipe.

Now, before you scroll down to our tapenade recipe, we have a favour to ask. Grantourismo is reader supported. If you’ve cooked and enjoyed our recipes, please consider supporting Grantourismo by supporting our Cambodian cuisine history and cookbook on Patreon; or buying a handcrafted KROK, the best mortar and pestle ever; booking a cooking class or meal with locals on EatWith; or buying something on Amazon, such as these cookbooks for culinary travellers or classic cookbooks for serious cooks.

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Easy Olive Tapenade Recipe for the Traditional Tapenade Recipe with Only 4 Ingredients

Every time we make this olive tapenade recipe I shake my head in disbelief that for so many years we used to buy tapenade – along with hummus, and pesto, and sweet chilli sauce, and Sriracha sauce, and all the things that we make at home these days. But let’s get back to tapenade.

Olive tapenade is not only incredibly delicious and versatile (just don’t tell your French friends if you’re planning on adjusting their tapenade!), it’s also ridiculously easy to make.

Olive tapenade was traditionally made pounded in a mortar and pestle, however, these days it’s typically made in a food processor or blender – which doesn’t change the flavour in the way it does with basil pesto, and means you can make the tapenade within minutes.

Although it really doesn’t take long to make olive tapenade with a mortar and pestle and I prefer the rustic texture of the dip from pounding it in a mortar compared to blitzing it in a food processors.

This tapenade recipe is based on the classic French tapenade recipe from Provence in southern France that’s made with only four ingredients – black olives, capers, anchovies, and olive oil – although I also add a little red wine vinegar or sherry vinegar although that’s not strictly traditional.

You could also add a little garlic, along with Mediterranean herbs and spices, although then it’s not strictly tapenade, according to the French. Whatever you do, don’t add salt, as there’s enough salt from the anchovies and capers.

But if you’re making this dip for the first time, do try the traditional olive tapenade recipe before experimenting. It’s absolutely delicious in its original form with just olives, capers, anchovies, and quality olive oil.

Tips to Making this Easy Olive Tapenade Recipe

While hailing from Provence in Southern France, olive tapenade is a quintessentially Mediterranean olive spread or dip for me, which is why I love to use the juiciest olives from Kalamata, briny capers from Pantelleria, Ortiz salted anchovies from Spain, and grassy extra virgin olive oil from Valencia.

Having said that, my best tip is to not worry too much about the origin of the ingredients – for instance, Australia produces outstanding Mediterranean style ingredients, such as olives and olive oils – just use the best quality ingredients that you can get and afford.

In France, there are two types of tapenade, black olive tapenade and green olive tapenade, but I like to combine mostly black Kalamata olives (and the brand I buy comes in a mix of shades of brown and black) and smaller proportion of green Spanish olives, for texture and colour, so the tapenade is not completely black.

Don’t blitz the ingredients in the food processor for too long. A minute or two is usually enough time to get the rustic look we go for in the images above. By all means, blend for longer if you want a smoother paste, but I think tapenade looks and tastes infinitely better when it’s more rustic and textured.

There are infinite ways to serve olive tapenade. I love to dip grissini, crunchy cheese sticks or crispy sourdough crackers into the olive tapenade, or you can simply spread the tapenade onto fresh crusty olive sourdough, toasted baguette slices or our crispy homemade croutons, a great use for stale bread!

Or get creative and use the tapenade to concoct pintxos or tapas toppings, as we did after tasting an tapenade and red pepper pintxo in San Sebastian many years ago – which was inspiration for the Arabian themed pintxos Terence made for our sunset soiree in Dubai that launched Grantourismo and our yearlong global grand tour advocating slow, local and experiential travel way back in 2010.

Easy Olive Tapenade Recipe

Easy Olive Tapenade Recipe

AuthorLara Dunston

This easy olive tapenade recipe is based on the traditional French tapenade recipe from Provence in southern France that’s made with only four ingredients – black olives, capers, anchovies, and olive oil. You could add garlic, herbs and spices, but this Mediterranean olive dip is absolutely delicious in its original form, eaten on fresh or toasted baguette slices, pinchos or crostini.

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Prep Time 5 minutes mins

Cook Time 0 minutes mins

Total Time 5 minutes mins

Course Dip

Cuisine French

Servings made with recipeServings 1 Large Bowl

Calories 952 kcal

Ingredients

 

MetricUS Customary

 

1x2x3x

• 280 g kalamata olives, pitted - 220 g black & 60 g green
• 2 tbsp capers
• 2 anchovy fillets
• 60 ml virgin olive oil
• 1 tsp red wine vinegar

Instructions

 

• Blend all the ingredients in a food processor.
• Scoop out and into a jar and refrigerate for up to 5 days if not serving straight away.
• Otherwise, transfer the tapenade to a bowl and garnish with a whole olive and anchovy.
• Serve with crackers or cheese sticks or spread onto pinchos or crostini.

Nutrition

Calories: 952kcalCarbohydrates: 12gProtein: 5gFat: 103gSaturated Fat: 14gPolyunsaturated Fat: 10gMonounsaturated Fat: 76gCholesterol: 5mgSodium: 4810mgPotassium: 157mgFiber: 10gSugar: 2gVitamin A: 1126IUVitamin C: 1mgCalcium: 165mgIron: 2mg

Please do let us know in the comments below if you make our olive tapenade recipe as we’d love to know how it turns out for you.