Cosmetics with olive oil
About once a month Salvador Alamar de Juan sits with nine other gentlemen in a conference room and sips blue glasses. Sometimes with more, sometimes with less joy. Joy is for example: a fruity taste with notes of green apple, almonds, fresh grass, on the finish slightly spicy-peppery and the memory of the aroma of ripe banana. What is currently in the glass, however, is in his opinion: metallic, sound, with nuance of damp earth. Salvador Alamar taps his scathing assessment into the electronic scorecard, the other nine tasters will not judge better, and unfortunately this olive oil has failed. This means that the quality seal of origin will not be maintained, which the City Council's "Consejo Regulador" - the Municipal Council of Olive Oil Control Council - is awarding for particularly good oils from the Córdoba region.
In Andalusia, olive oil is clearly more than a food: it is lifestyle and, above all, the main economic factor. Especially in the hilly province of Jaén, you can see olive trees as far as the eye can see, nestled close to the hills, only interrupted by country roads. Spain is the country that produces the most olive oil - "although many people still think that's Italy, we even export a lot of our oil!" Says Salvador Alamar, sounding almost saddened.
Salvador Alamar, born in 1962, has been in the oil business for 28 years. His grandparents had their own olive tree plantation, now he is the boss of the company founded by him "Aceites Virgenes", the olive oil from Andalusian plantations plugged and exported to the whole world. The trade is going well: "Once upon a time, olive oil was only used abroad for salads, and now word has spread that you can do a lot more with it, and it's not just eaten, it's also used extensively in cosmetics."
One of its customers in Germany is the Hamburg-based Beiersdorf Group, which processes around seven tonnes of olive oil a year in the "Olive Oil" series of the Florena brand. The development is quite new: Although great-grandmother and ancient Greeks knew that olive oil cared for dry skin, vegetable oils did not play a major role in commercial cosmetics for a long time. This has a special reason: "Olive oil, for example, is much more complicated to process than silicone or paraffin oils, because the oil has a certain odor and can turn rancid if it is not taken into account during production", says Anette Bürger, researcher at Beiersdorf, where she is responsible for product development at Florena.
But in recent years, the cosmetics industry has rediscovered olive oil - certainly because natural cosmetics are booming and the demand for natural herbal substances in care has generally increased. Florena orders for their "olive oil" -Peutgeserie at Salvador Alamar exclusively "extra virgin" - quality, with which one could easily prepare salads, from April even from organic farming, although it "only" on the skin. But what does "only" mean here? Olive oil can do a lot of good on the skin, says pharmacist Anette Bürger: First, it consists of 85 percent of essential fatty acids, which are usually lacking in dry skin. The fatty acids - especially linoleic acid contained in olive oil - are necessary for building up the natural barrier that protects the skin from drying out.
The real strength of exclusively high-quality, cold-pressed olive oil, however, is its antioxidant effect: "Other vegetable oils, such as corn oil, which are also used from time to time in cosmetics, contain even vitamin E, but hardly any polyphenols." Polyphenols are powerful scavengers that protect the cells (so olive oil as a food is so healthy). But refined olive oil, purified and processed in a refinery, has lost a lot of its weight.
The full potential of olive oil was recognized only a few years ago. Studies have shown, for example, in "extra virgen" olive oil, among other things, a significant amount of hydroxytyrosol, one of the strongest antioxidants ever. There was almost nothing left in refined olive oil. Olives for the oil, which makes gourmets and cosmetics companies happy, come from the plantation of the Vañó family, for example. Francisco Vañó looks in his well-fitting pocket-sized suit more like a banker than an olive farmer, which does not deceive: for years he worked in a senior position for the Spanish Santander Bank, until he finally, together with his sister Rosa the management of the family business in Andalusia took over. "Castillo de Canena" is the name of the company, in English: "Castle of Canena". This castle actually exists, it is located in the 2132-inhabitant village of Canena, belongs to the family (including two legendary castle spirits), dates back to the 16th century and is certainly one of the most representative corporate buildings you can imagine.
About a quarter of an hour in a jeep away from it extends the olive grove of the Vañó family.On the cool winter days between November and February, the olives are harvested here. Only a few years ago, the harvest workers used only the simple sticks, with which the olives were carefully beaten off the branches.
Meanwhile, however, the technology has arrived here: The workers are supported by the large mobile "vibrating machine", which grabs the olive tree on the trunk and shake vigorously. Lightning fast, the olives fall into the safety nets on the ground and look really delicious. Whether you should bite it carefully. , , ?
"Only tourists always try that," says Salvador Alamar with a grin, while disgusted after the experiment disgusted a piece of the most bitter stuff on earth. Unfortunately pure olives are only edible after they have been in brine for weeks. And even then, not all olive varieties are equally suitable for martini or tapas: "Manzanilla, for example, is a variety that produces an excellent table olive, but we have grown the Picual variety here," explains Francisco Vañó. It contains a lot of polyphenols and therefore tastes bitter, but that's exactly why it produces a particularly healthy olive oil. In less than a minute, the workers and the vibrating machine harvested the olive tree, with around 50 kilos of olives lying on the ground. From this you can win about ten liters of oil - "productive olives are not exactly," says Salvador Alamar. On the first days of harvest, the green olives still have a low fat content, but their oil is particularly aromatic and fruity.
This "olive juice" is bottled in chic bottles and delivered to the gourmet temples and gourmet departments of the world. If, for example, from the middle of December the olives turn black and are full of fat, the Vañós mainly produce the cheaper but still high-quality oil for the mass market. For olive oil connoisseurs, the quality grade "extra virgin" or "extra virgin" (that is, from the first cold pressing, a maximum of 0.8 percent acid in the composition, without taste complaints) alone is not a quality assessment. But a minimum requirement.
Findings at the end of the harvest day: Olive oil is healthy. Olive oil is good to the skin. Olive trees are beautiful. And there are even more picturesque traditional olive mills in Andalusia, where the olives are crushed by granite stones weighing tons, instead of minced in modern stainless steel vats.
Such a picturesque place is the ancient olive mill "Nuñez de Prado" in Baena. In the large dining room for dinner successively olive tapenade, fried in olive oil almonds, refined with olive oil asparagus soup, marinated in olive oil beef medallions and for dessert even with olive oil and honey drizzled oranges of olive ice - there is only one impression important: olive oil can really, to be really delicious. You do not have to drink it straight out of blue glasses.
