Gift of the gods

A touch of artichoke suspected one. The other one tastes grass. The bottles circle, sluggish spills yellow and green liquid. One is trying a spoon. "Banana flavor," he says, delighted. Most of us would just taste olives and just make the salad with the oil. Gourmets meanwhile appreciate the essence as a gift from the gods. They are right. No tree was so revered in antiquity as the olive tree. The Celts saw in him the symbol of balance and devoted it to the 23rd of September, because day and night are then the same length. Noah's dove returned to the Ark with an olive branch in its beak.

Since then, the tree has been a symbol of hope and peace. Athene allegedly sprouted a specimen of this subtropical hard-leaves plant from the rock of the Acropolis. Zeus found that so remarkable that he gave her the patronage over Attica. The ancient Egyptians embalmed their dead, the Greeks their fighters with olive oil. Roman citizens who cultivated large olive groves were exempted from military service. Today, 750 million olive trees grow worldwide, the vast majority in the European and Arabian Mediterranean. Who wants to have one, can already for 52 euros an original Tuscan Olea europaea on the Internet bid.

The tree is in no hurry. After ten years he is blossoming for the first time. Out of a hundred flowers only five fruits develop. After twenty years, the harvest is worthwhile. Twenty kilos of olives can then be shaken off the branches and three to five kilos of oil pressed out of them. When the tree is done with waxes, it can be ten meters high and one meter wide in diameter. And then stand around in the area for up to 500 years. He likes to share the area with a similarly old crop, the wine. Such landscapes are often so pastorally beautiful that photographers and painters can not help themselves: sheep in the olive grove. Jesus with the disciples under olive trees. Pictures from an intimate world.

The tree is a myth. The fruits too. They like to swim in the martini, come in black and green as an appetizer on the table or, cold pressed and sorted into three grades, used as oil. The oil is rich in nutrients, good for the liver, intestines and muscles and makes the heart beat longer. Residents of the Mediterranean, who consume a lot and often olive oil, have been shown to die less frequently of heart disease than northern Europeans.

The Germans came to the taste only with the desire to travel 50 years ago. For the first time (with the permission of the farmer?) Camped under olive trees. Listened to the whisper of silver-green leaves in the wind. In Umbria spaghetti aglio e olio rolled on the fork. Get to know giant olives and feta in Crete. And swarmed everywhere by the Mediterranean luck. The dreams and the taste we took as a souvenir. Today, the finest of the olive tree has become native to every German supermarket. We still have the Mediterranean yearning.

Uncooked olive oil

The color of the olive oil gives a first impression of the taste: Green oils are obtained from half-ripe green to violet olives and taste intense and typical of olive oil, for example herbs, avocado or grass. Gold-yellow oils They are made from ripe black olives, and they usually taste mildly aromatic. The taste is influenced not only by the time of harvest of the olives but also by the olive variety, the soil, the landscape and the climate. Oils from regions where it is not too hot, are lighter, from the very hot areas are rather strong oils.

With olive oil there are different qualities: The highest quality Oil is called "extra virgin olive oil" (Spanish "aceite de oliva virgen extra", Italian "olio d'oliva extra virgin", French "huile d'olive vièrge extra"), it may contain a maximum of 0.8 percent fatty acids and is always cold-pressed, The content of fatty acids is a quality feature: the lower the fatty acid content, the better the quality. As the number of pressings increases, the fatty acid increases, so oils of the first pressing are particularly good.

In quality come after that refined oils, then mixtures of cold pressed and refined oils and as tail light Olive-pomace oilsin which the last remainder of the oil is washed out of the pomace (press residue) with solvents. The more the olive oil has been processed, the less typical is its taste. In general, a good olive oil tastes extremely fresh, has a bright color and a pleasant scent. Harvest is from October to the end of February, in spring the first fresh oils are available!

This olive oil from Crete fits very well with our Greek Easter recipes: freshly harvested and bottled, it now tastes grassy and peppery and spicy, and over time it becomes milder.The special feature of this oil: Customers order and pay their oil reserves for one year in advance, thus eliminating storage costs, and the farmer can plan better.