We like the full flavor and juiciness of olives that come with their pits still inside. If you're going to cook with olives, though, you'll need to remove the pits. Pitting olives adds a few minutes of prep time to a dish, but isn't hard to do.

You can buy tools made specifically to pit olives, but they often don't work for oddly sized olives and end up living permanently in the back of a kitchen drawer. Instead, we use a dough scraper or pastry cutter. You could use any tool that has a wide, flat surface (the flat side of a knife, a small skillet, etc.)

Just press straight down onto the olive with the flat surface until you feel the olive pop.

Continuing to press down gently, pull the tool back toward you. This will often make the seed pop right out.

If the seed hasn't popped out yet, just squeeze with your fingers to release it. Now you're free to keep the pitted olive whole to toss into a pasta or salad, chop it to stir into a sauce for grilled meat or fish, or toss it into the food processor to make tapenade.

Find more olive recipes on Cookthink.com.