Olive Picking Season - Part 2

Last 2 weeks ago I touched on how olives are picked from the hilltops of Sant’Oliva. This week, I wanted to show you a little behind the scenes about the process of turning olives into that liquid gold we all know as olive oil…

Last year was my first experience seeing how the whole olive oil process works and I must admit, I was fascinated to finally understand the terminology behind ‘cold pressed’ and terms like 'first pressed', which are terms are still commonly use in Italy today.

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I remember us all being squished in the back of a van amongst the crates of olives as we headed to the mill after the sundown. When we arrived, I was surprised to see other familys waiting in line to get their olives weighed and set aside to be processed. Huge crates were lined next to each other filled with mixed green and black olives, usually with the family’s oil drum place on top with their last name neatly written on a tag. Coppolelli, Pagliarini, Moretti are the common suspects around this area ;)

As I walk around the mill with my trusty camera looking like a complete tourist and the only women amongst the Nonni’s, padri’s and figli’s (granfathers, fathers and sons), I was amazed to see these huge granite stone mills crushing all the olives into a grey/green unappetising paste.

The paste was then poured onto rotating rope-like disks that would then be stacked on top of one another and pressed by machine. An incredible several hundred pounds of pressure are exerted during this process to extract the oil from the mats. The green oil dripped down the metal plates almost like something out of ‘Charlie and the chocolate factory’ as it collected at the bottom of the pan. What’s left of the olive paste now resembled something along the lines of cardboard from the extreme pressure and now can be reused as fire starter material in the cool months as its eco-friendly and very slow burning. The oil collected from the mats is mixed with water but collection is made easy as oil always floats to the top.

And that’s it! The oil is simply poured into the family’s oil drums and taken home to be used until next year’s harvest.

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If you’ve ever been confused about all the terminology used to define the quality of olive oil the terms have only really come into play after the industrialisation of the trade to differentiate between high quality and low quality oil, however, if you make your own oil (as many Italians do), you would never subject it to heat processing methods, blenching or adding preservatives as these methods have all been invented to make sure shelf life is more extendable. Italians will keep their olive oil usually in metal tin in the cellar of their home and only collect oil in small batches to naturally avoid oxidation as much as possible. Light, heat and oxygen are the 3 main factors that turn oil rancid so manufacturing companies have had to come up with different methods to prolong shelf life and but inconsequentially losing quality in the process.

The difference between virgin and extra virgin comes down to the acidity of the oil. ‘Extra virgin’ means the oil needs to have the lowest acidity possible (less than 0.8%) and the highest proportion of anti-oxidants. Virgin olive oil has an acidity of less than 1.5% but the quality of flavour and anti-oxidants drops significantly.

Here in Italy, the time it takes to pick the olives and get them to the mill as quickly as possible will define the quality of oil your have… Time equals acidity so getting the community/family involved is the quickest way to get the freshest oil. Or you can buy a €900 vibrating rake and do it x10 faster but I’ve heard it’s not good for the trees…

The term first pressed is only of relevance if the oil is processed using the oil mats method (pictured above). The oil is extracted using no heating and is pressed ONCE only. These days it is rare to find manufacturing companies using this form of extraction so the term is sometimes falsely used for marketing purposes.

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To concluded, the whole experience was actually really lovely… Watching families receive their oil who had worked tirelessly for 2-3 weeks straight to finally see their hard work payed off. There is a responsibility and re-commitment each year to continue this admired tradition not only to produce enough oil to last for the year ahead but to utilise the land harmoniously with the environment and to maintain this glorious culture.

#oliveoil #oliveoilprocess #makingoliveoil