I thought I was going to miss the olive harvest, but I haven’t. All around the Abruzzo countryside you can see nets placed carefully below the ripened fruit. Olive growers are beginning to shake the fruit from these twisted trees, taking it to the local frantoio (olive press, oil mill) to have it turned into oil. Although modern methods can be used, often you see people just using rakes to detach the olives.
Abruzzo olive oil is some of the best I have ever tasted and the oil from the area near Loreto Aprutino is just simply spectacular. Yesterday I was thrilled to be allowed to taste olive oil from this year’s harvest made just the day before. There is a world of difference between the oil that is bought in supermarkets and what I tasted yesterday. Its colour was an intense green (most oil I’ve tasted tends to be golden or wheat in colour) and I tasted it in the best way I know, poured over bread with a little salt. I was in heaven.
A friend of mine from Scotland who is in Abruzzo for the first time was shocked by the taste. He couldn’t believe that oil he was tasting had such intense flavours. He suggested that it might be an acquired taste, like peat flavoured Scotch, or Guinness perhaps. He might be right. All I can say is that when I tasted the fresh oil I loved it and instantly wanted to bring some home.
This article, New Oil, from The Flavours of Abruzzo, describes the methods of turning the olives into oil.
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