It would be remiss of me to write a blog about food without sharing the story of my signature Olive, Haloumi and Rosemary Loaf.

This loaf was first my signature baked good within my book club, then my extended family (I’m South African Indian. My extended family is not small), then my colleagues at various workplaces, and finally — after baking a loaf to gift to Annabel Crabb and Leigh Sales at a live Chat 10 Looks 3 event, and thanks to the Crabb and Sales effect — with thousands of Chatters (aka. fans of the Chat 10 Looks 3 podcast).

But I was not always an olive fiend.

One of my earliest memories of olives involves twelve-year-old me bringing home a new school friend over for dinner. My friend, being half-Lebanese, spied the jar of olives at the dinner table. Not a gigantic jar — a regular size Moccona coffee jar, washed and repurposed. The olives inside were sumptuous, marinated in thick olive oil and chilli. This jar was normally left untouched by the children in our house, so my parents didn’t bother offering them to us. But my friend helped herself. She sucked them down like candy, leaving my South African Indian parents delighted and amused, but also bewildered.

They were used to me. Being twelve, I wasn’t interested in olives. The word ‘olive’ recalled to my mind rubber tyre rings atop doughy, sticky ‘focaccia’, leeching black dye onto the cheesy crust and penetrating even the tomato undercoat. My parents didn’t bother to correct me. More olives for them, right?

These olives in question were fat and juicy, sourced from Mick’s Nuts, a Brisbane institution. Before ‘bulk food’ and ‘naked food’ shopping was trendy, there was Mick’s. A tiny brick shop on the corner of one of West End’s oldest streets. Opposite one of the earlier sourdough bakeries (and I mean sour. We’re talking several days’ fermentation here.) that I’d visit every weekend after Saturday sport. Squeezing inside Mick’s with one other person for which the shop had room (this may be an exaggeration, but this is certainly my recollection), you’d be met with the sight of large canisters stacked on shelves to the high ceiling, reachable only by ladder. Of course there were nuts, but also dried legumes, grains and spices. But I was always captured by the deli counter. Fat cheeses, wrapped in wax or submerged in brine. Mick’s is where my father first found haloumi cheese and introduced our family to it, before it graced every breakfast menu in the country. And Mick’s is where he would buy our olives. But that haloumi… that was my gateway.

It was years before I came to fully appreciate olives. As I grew older and my palate matured (that’s what they say happens, right?), I slowly stopped picking olives out of salads, or off pizza. But I didn’t go out of my way to enjoy them in their own right.

As a young adult working in a bookstore I stumbled upon a glorious recipe book, High Tea at The Victoria Room, produced by the now-closed-down institution The Victoria Room in Sydney. This was circa 2008 when high tea and cupcakes were the height of entertaining, before macarons and grazing tables made them redundant. The Victoria Room, by its admission, was “an ultra-smooth dining establishment decorated in British Raj style” where the head chef was influenced by his Mediterranean heritage and Middle Eastern travels. Their book offers recipes for delights such as rose petal butter, chai cupcakes with lime mascarpone, and single serve lavender crème brûlée set in a teacup. And of course, THE olive, haloumi and rosemary loaf. I had my Haloumi Blinkers on and didn’t even register the olive component as I was baking, and once the loaf was in the oven I was already in love.

The grated haloumi here melts into the background, working as a salty (and expensive) binding agent, allowing the olives and rosemary to take centre stage. When you bake this loaf, your entire house will be filled with a tantalising savoury aroma, heady with rich olive oil and woody herbaceousness. If 80% of what we taste comes from what we smell, this loaf doesn’t even need to bother with the 20% left for your taste buds.

Since first baking the loaf I’ve made a few alterations, the key being the quantity of olives included in the loaf. The original recipe called for two cups of olives, chopped. I chop the olives first and then pack them tightly into two very generous cups. If we’re being honest, it’s three cups. I can’t get enough olives in this loaf, or in anything for that matter. I have since gone on to seek out any olive-based delicacies I can. Particular favourites include the stuffed, crumbed and fried varieties (such as Yotam Ottolenghi’s served on a bed of yoghurt and spicy, zesty green shatta), or pounded into spreadable deliciousness as per Hetty McKinnon’s olive walnut relish (from Community) or Yasmin Khan’s fig, honey and olive tapenade (from Zaitoun).

The lovely loaf recipe that kicked off my journey is below, since so many people ask for it. But let me be frank. If you loathe olives, this is not for you. If you’re ambivalent or just kind of dislike them, this loaf will likely convert you into a lover (definitely a lover of the loaf, if not of olives). But if you’re already on the far end of the spectrum or are even allergic (is an olive allergy a thing?), and you read on only to enquire ‘What can I try instead of olives?’ my answer will be ‘Another recipe.’

Olive, haloumi and rosemary loaf

Adapted from High Tea at the Victoria Room by Jill Jones-Evans and Joe Gambacorta.

Ingredients

• 1 large onion, finely diced
• 200mL olive oil (strong or ‘robust’ rather than light)
• 4 free range eggs (size large)
• 2.5-3 cups roughly chopped pitted kalamata olives
• 1 tsp minced garlic
• 2 tbs (8 tsp) caster sugar
• 250g haloumi cheese, coarsely grated
• 1 tsp bicarb soda (baking soda)
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp ground black pepper
• 375g plain flour (all purpose flour)
• 250g greek yoghurt
• 2 tbs (8 tsp) finely chopped fresh rosemary
• Optional: Additional 150g haloumi, diced to 1-1.5cm

Method

1. If baking loaf same day, preheat oven to 180°C (160°C fan-forced) and grease two 500g (1lb, approx 20cm x 10cm x 6.5cm) loaf tins, or one large 1kg (2lb) loaf tin, with olive oil.
2. Heat olive oil in large saucepan. Add chopped onions and garlic and cook until soft, then add chopped olives and rosemary. Cook on low-medium heat until the flavours have infused (15 min or so).
3. Set aside to cool. Alternatively, transfer to airtight container and refrigerate overnight.
4. In a medium bowl, sift flours with bicarb, baking powder and pepper. Set aside.
5. In a large bowl or bowl of a stand mixer, beat eggs and sugar until sugar is dissolved, then add yoghurt and beat to combine.
6. Stir through onion olive mixture.
7. Slowly add sifted flour while beating/stirring to prevent lumps.
8. Fold through grated haloumi, and diced haloumi if using.
9. Pour batter into prepared loaf tins, then bake in the centre of the oven for 45-60 min until a skewer comes out clean from the centre. The 500g tins will take closer to 45min, and the 1kg loaf tin closer to 60min.
10. Remove from oven and allow to cool in tin for 5 min before turning out and transferring to a wire cooling rack.
11. Serve in warm slices spread with soft feta or goat cheese. Meredith Dairy marinated goat cheese is the ultimate indulgence.