When Life Gives You Olives…

Wow. Hardly Strictly Bluegrass 2009 in SF. Wow. Lotsa love to Benji@315 for the special access! If you miss this festival, you’re crazy. #fb

The latest installment of the Sylverleaf Press is finally available. Head over to the Newsletters section of our website to have a look at the newest newsletter. In it, we have updates for our Sylverleaf Estate and end blend fans, notes regarding the upcoming olive harvest and links to follow Sylverleaf on your favorite social media platform; this blog, Facebook and Twitter. Happy Reading!

This is the first installment of several in a new series of blogs called, It’s a Matter of Taste. In this series, I’ll attempt to clarify how you, as a consumer, can approach olive oils and evaluate them. I’ll also do my best to explain some common myths and misconceptions regarding olive oils. If you have questions along the way, send them to me and I’ll work the answers into a future post.

Search With Confidence

Before one can begin the journey along the path to olive oil addiction, one must learn to differentiate between a good oil and a bad oil. Believe it or not, many people prefer rancid Bertolli olive oil over a high-quality olive oil in their first blind tasting (including your humble narrator). This is because these rancid, horrible flavors are what we, as consumers, have come to expect from olive oils. These flavors are familiar to us. It’s no wonder that many people simply say, “Oh, I don’t like olive oil.” When this series concludes, we hope that you’ll be well-equipped with the knowledge you need to go out to your favorite market, or better yet to an olive oil producer, and choose with confidence an EVOO that you’ll love.

Magic Formula

Unfortunately, there is no magic formula or even a simple test to determine the best olive oil. Although olive oil has been consumed for millennia, we have no truly scientific way to evaluate an oil for quality or flavor. It is a purely personal experience. There are a battery of chemical tests that can be used to predict the shelf life of olive oils, to gauge their worthiness to be called extra virgin and to determine if the olive oil is adulterated with other oils (as discussed in an earlier post). It is a priority for Sylverleaf to always provide the results of the chemical analysis of our olive oils in the Harvest Records section of our website. Other than these chemical tests, which very few olive oil producers make available to the consumer, how does one attempt to choose an olive oil with any certainty as to the quality? It’s simple, consult with your nose and mouth! I’ll tackle these two senses in the next couple of posts. One thing that I can tell you now: The label on the bottle is not going to help you.

Myth #1

Myths and misinformation abound in the industry; here in the US and abroad. One of the first bits of of misinformation comes on the label that sits on each handsome bottle. In the US, the labeling law for olive oil was written in the 1940s, when the terms extra virgin, virgin, and pure were not even in use! So, as of right now, 2009, there is no legal definition for these terms in US law!

An unscrupulous olive oil producer can simply combine a small portion of decent extra virgin olive oil with a large portion of any other oil and still call it extra virgin. Legally.

A producer can also take an old olive oil, with all the terrible flavors that old oil imparts, and run that oil through carbon filters. This filtering removes most all of the color, flavor and smell from the olive oil. Then, the producer can add some EVOO back into the colorless, flavorless and odorless liquid, then call it extra virgin. Again, legally.

I hope that you’ll read the two previous paragraphs again and let that information sink in.

These myths do, however, have one upside. They enable a consumer to walk into a supermarket and buy a gallon of “extra virgin olive oil” for $10. The product on the shelf is not really olive oil, much less an extra virgin olive oil. I’m not trying to say that all olive oils on the supermarket shelves are out to deceive the consumer. There are some large olive oil producers that make a fine product. I hope to give you the information that you will need to find those olive oils as this series unfolds. So, come back for the next installment, where I tackle an olive oil’s color. You’re going to be surprised.

Brrr… It feels like Fall on the farm today. Actually needed to put on a jacket this AM before feeding the critters. #fb

Go ahead, RUB IT IN–Olive oil is a traditional moisturizer. If you happen to spill some, just rub into your skin or on your lips. #fb

Our new screwcapper arrived on Friday. Still waiting to try it out–can’t plug it in tho. The AC plug is VERY weird. #fb

What’s up with the weather? The forecast was for highs in the 70s & 80s, now it’s 100+!?c

Another reminder: Sample Petaluma’s top foods & Sylverleaf’s EVOO at the Taste of Petaluma, tomorrow. We’ll be at @HausFortuna. Come by! #fb