You can read the authentic Italian recipe for fried olives, Ascoli-style below.
On the blog you can read our version with no cheese for people who have cheese intolerance or allergy.

Prepare the meat. Clean and wash the carrot and cut it into three pieces. Clean and wash the celery and cut it into three pieces. Peel the onion, cut it into four wedges and stud them with two cloves each. Cut the meat into pieces.
Heat three tablespoons of olive oil in a saucepan and add the carrot, celery and onion and sauté. Add all the meat, season to taste with salt and pepper and sauté. Pour in the wine and cook, half-covered, stirring now and then, until the cooking juice is well reduced and the meat is tender. A couple of minutes before switching off the gas add the chicken liver and tomato paste and stir very well. Chicken liver needs few minutes to cook.
Let all the ingredients cool.

Prepare the olives. Meanwhile prepare the olives. Remove the pits with a sharp knife, making a spiral cut from top to bottom without breaking them. Now your olives are ready to be filled with the meat mixture.
If you aren't able to make a spiral cut try to halve them.
This is a delicate step and you need a lot of time if you are completely inexperienced.

Prepare the filling. Wash the lemon and pat dry with absorbent kitchen paper. Now grate the lemon peel and put apart.
Remove the carrot, celery and onion from the meat mixture and finely chop the meat. The best would be to mince the meat. But you can also purée it in a food processor until smooth.
Put the minced or puréed meat in a bowl. Now add the two kinds of cheese, an egg (lightly beaten), the lemon zest, a hint of nutmeg. Stir accurately. You must have a firm filling. If it is too firm you can make it softer adding some crustless bread you should have prepared before, a little at a time. The crustless bread should be soaked in broth and squeezed dry before using.
On the contrary you could obtain a too soft filling. Don't worry! Stuff your olives, put them in a plate and then in the fridge. Chill for at least 30 minutes and then dip them in all purpose flour ...

Prepare the olives. Take a bit of the filling and give it the shape of an olive. Put the olive you've prepared before around it and press among the palms of your hands. Continue until all the ingredients are used up. The olives should become large and fat. Dip every olive in the white flour, then in the remaining egg (lightly beaten) and at last in the breadcrumbs.

Fry the olives. Heat the remaining olive oil in a pan and fry the olives until golden on all their sides. Remove them from the pan with a skimming ladle and put on absorbent kitchen paper to remove the fat in excess.
Serve at once or cold.

Note

• - If possible use large and tender Ascolan olives. If you aren't able to find them choose a good-quality variety of olives whose pulp must be full, fine and dense.
• - You need less time if you have stoned olives.
• - It may be some variations to this traditional recipe especially in the filling. Somebody substitutes one kind of meat with fresh sausage, somebody adds parsley or garlic too ...
• - Season to taste with salt moderately. Remember you have to use two kinds of cheeses ...
• - Ascolana olives are a long-to-do recipe. Generally we prepare the stuffed olives and freeze them unfried when we have enough time. So we have only to fry them just before serving. You can make the filling, stuff it into the olives and freeze them unfried at this time. To freeze the stuffed olives follow our suggestions: put them on a serving tray, well separated. Put the serving tray in the freezer. The day after you can transfer all the frozen olives into a bag. So when you have to fry them you can take only the right number. Allow frozen olives to completely defrost before frying.
• - Serve the Ascolana olives as appetizer (in this case you can serve more people) or second course or in a dinner party buffet with other fried food.

Healthy eating

• - It's very difficult to have the real amount of the olive oil used for frying these stuffed olives. So nutrition facts don't include the olive oil for frying but only the amount used for cooking the filling (three tablespoons). If you want to include this ingredient too, you have to add about 150 kcal per 100 g of this dish. Frying - especially deep frying - adds a serious amount of fat and calories to a meal, and as such should really be used only as an occasional cooking method.
• - You can make a tasty, lower-fat dish of Ascolana olives oven-frying them as a lot of people is trying to do.

What's the right wine for " Stuffed and fried olives, Ascolana style " ?

Our suggestion is: Rosso Piceno (a red wine from Marche-Italy)