Olive Oil
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We arrived here just in time for the olive harvest and, although I was glued to my computer editing the biography, Neil spent some beautiful autumn days on a ladder jiggling branches with a length of bamboo.
After this hi-tech operation, the olives fall into nets spread under the trees and are scooped up into plastic bins, brought inside and spread on the floor to dry off. It’s a job for lots of friends.
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Then they have to be picked through to take out leaves, mouldy olives, bits of twig etc, before being put into sacks to take to the local Frantoio for pressing. ![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaFW6atfA8uinYkdZPkGobpOlmrnFKEBYLSyr-JrcIg6h5kb5J16EExKcw3O_oeNjhty1zEZTF08mruvn8z8uhDfI6XDTfPGdDOeZtT_CCi_orVdHLaQjqBW79h4e4HjmuLRSxYnyPQPJm/s320/olivesifting.jpg)
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They don’t press in the traditional way any more, mashing the olives and spreading the paste on woven mats before screwing the whole lot down.
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This year it’s yellow rather than green - something to do with the soil apparently. It’s nothing like the olive oil we buy in England - even the posh Extra Virgine. There’s something nectar-like about it - medicinal in the tradition of magic potions and elixirs.
My grandmother used to keep a small bottle in the cupboard for earache - to be warmed on a heated teaspoon! But this stuff is much better ingested, preferably with warm bread, Tuscan tomatoes, some home-made pasta and a sprinkling of Peccarino cheese.
I have never seen or tasted yellow olive oil. Now, I want to.
ReplyDeleteWow.
ReplyDeleteI'm just drooling at the thought. Fresh crusty bread and homegrown olive oil. Heaven.
Nectar is such a beautiful and descriptive word! Do you know what variety of olives yielded this lovely golden oil? In what town is the frantoio located?
ReplyDeleteI love the working pictures. Looks like a really communal enterprise. The egg-yellow oil in the bottle does have a look of magic.
ReplyDeletewx
Glad I was able to make you all salivate! Tuscan food really is delicious. Olio2go - I don't know exactly what kind of olive trees these are - only that they are very, very old. The terraces here go back a couple of thousand years - some of the mule tracks were made by the Romans. the Frantoio is a community one at a place called Vado in a valley called Lombrici, near Camaiore on teh fringes of the Alpi Apuane.
ReplyDeleteKathleen
The egg-yellow oil in the bottle does have a look of magic.
ReplyDeleteWork from home India