This Weekend in Pasadena Real Estate

Great Home of the Week

They are not always the gigantic, expensive homes.  This week’s great house is a three bedroom, two bathroom home at 1070 Bella Vista Avenue in Pasadena.  The house looks to be in great shape, cute neighborhood, great garden — the whole package.  1429 square feet on a 7024 lot for $609,000.  If you are a first-time homebuyer you could not do better in Pasadena.  Call me for a private showing!

 

What’s Happening Around Town This Weekend

My personal favorite…

Caltech Olive Harvest Festival

Caltech’s olive trees have been an occasional food source for many people over the years. Although the trees on the Olive Walk were, until recently, sprayed with pesticides making them unfit for food use, the other trees on campus were quite usable. Tom Apostol, Professor of Mathematics, used to make Greek olives from the trees by preserving them in salt water and rinsing them to remove the tannins.

In 2005, Kristen Kozak (’09) tried to preserve some olives by dry curing them, that is, using salt to remove the bitter taste. Unfortunately, the olives were infested by flies. The experiment was repeated with better olives in 2006 by Kristen and four other students  (Alex Roper, Robbie Xiao, Dan Rowlands, and Cathy Douglass, all also Class of ‘09) and met with mixed results. What worked very well, however, was pressing them for oil. These students picked both green and black olives and pressed them with cheesecloth to separate the pulp from the oil and juice, and put the liquids in a jar to separate. The oil rose to the top and was then skimmed off. The students ate the oil plain and on bread.

Also in  2006, undergraduates Dvin Adalian and Ricky Jones did their own olive oil experiment. Using a remedial set of tools and a set of instructions they devised themselves, they managed to purify 550 mL of oil. They distributed the oil throughout their residence (Ruddock House) and the biology division, to Caltech president and first lady Jean-Lou Chameau and Carol Carmichael, and to their friends and families. The verdict? “It was delicious.”

Word of their undertaking spread across campus. The Caltech grounds department joined the project, gathering olives and sending them to the Regalo Extra Virgin Oil company, a non profit organization, who pressed the oil. The grounds department labeled and then bottled the oil.  Once the oil was packaged it was presented to the administration. 
 
Soon a group of Caltech staff and administrators, along with the president of the Santa Barbara Olive Company and a financial consultant, began meeting to plan the first annual festival, which took place November 2, 2007. 

The First Annual Olive Harvest Festival met with great success. Over 350 volunteers managed to pick 1460 pounds of olives on harvest day. The Santa Barbara Olive Company pressed and bottled the harvest into about 30 gallons of Virgin Olive Oil. Due to overwhelming demand, the bottles were sold via lottery through the Caltech Bookstore.

This year’s Olive Harvest Festival will be held on Friday, November 7. In addition to picking olives Caltech will also be holding olive-related events including:

Olive Milling, Pressing, and Brining/Pickling
10:30am – 4:00pm
Court of Man
Last year, the George Housner Student Discovery Fund granted funding to design and construct a mill and press. Constructed at Centerline Welding, a metal shop in El Monte, California. It was tested with olives during last year’s harvest and produced several pints of oil that were enjoyed at the Harvest dinner. It is designed to be operated by hand (pushing 1600-pound wheels) and can be operated by 10 people at once. The whole process will require the olives to be washed, loaded into the mill, crushed, transferred into cheesecloth bags, pressed, collected, centrifuged, and the oil skimmed off. The machines themselves will also need to be assembled, cleaned, and disassembled.

Tastings & Sustainability Exhibits
11:30am – 4:00pm
San Pasqual Mall
Escargot tasting hosted by the Caltech Meat Club; Olive and olive history exhibits with tastings featuring assorted marinated olives, tapenade, LaBrea Bakery bread, olive oil and infused olive oil; Various exhibits by student clubs promoting sustainability

Edible Tour of Campus
12:00pm – 4:00pm
Around Campus (meet at San Pasqual mall)
Tom Mannion will be leading a tour around campus to show people to find, recognize and prepare the plants and herbs around campus. Specific locations have been mapped using Google Earth so that Caltech students can use this resource in the future as a local alternative to shopping for certain foods in the supermarket.

“Green” Tour of Campus
12:00pm – 4:00pm
Around Campus (meet at San Pasqual mall)
Pasadena’s largest-ever solar facility is being completed atop Caltech’s Holliston Parking lot. John Onderdonk, Caltech’s new Manager for Sustainable Programs, will lead tours of the facility while also discussing other efforts on campus toward sustainability such as several new clubs and three new LEED gold certified buildings that are under construction.

Caltech Jazz Band
12:00pm-1:00pm
Red Door Cafe
Come watch musicians chosen from the Caltech Jazz Bands, directed by Bill Bing. The Caltech Jazz Bands’ next formal concert is on January 23, in Beckman Auditorium. The guest soloist at that concert will be the great bass player, Flea, better known for his work with the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

Ice Sculpture Carving
1:00pm – 1:30pm
San Pasqual Mall
An ice carving demonstration will be presented by one of the sous chefs from The Athenaeum.

Harvest Festival Games
1:30pm-2:30pm
Court of Man
There will be a variety of Festival games to play in the theme of the Olive Harvest. Olive Branch Limbo, Hot Olive (Potato), Olive in a Spoon Races, and more. The winners of each competition will receive a certificate to pick up a free bottle of the Caltech Olive Oil when our crop returns from being pressed.

Olive Harvest Dinner
5:00pm – 7:00pm
Olive Walk/Athenaeum Lawn/Outside Winnett
A Mediterranean-themed dinner will be prepared by the Chefs from The
Athenaeum and Caltech Dining Services. Undergrad student waiters will be assisting in serving the family-style dinner. There will be bread and olive oil, beef and vegetable skewers, greek salad, and baklava. Sit near the Athenaeum lawn to see a performance by select members of the Caltech Jazz band.
*Note: Seating at the dinner is limited and priority will be given to students and volunteer Olive Harvest participants. Dinner starts promptly at 5pm. Those who arrive late may be turned away.*

For more information on the Olive Harvest Festival email oliveharvest@caltech.edu or log onto www.olives.caltech.edu.