Extra Virginity: The Sublime and Scandalous World of Olive Oil (2012)

My parents retired to Italy a number of years ago, to a place with a hundred or so olive trees in the garden, and each November some of us head over to pick the olives (much to the amusement of the locals, who think we're crazy to do agricultural work in our spare time) and take them to a nearby pressing plant (where you can wander around and see the process to make sure your harvest isn't being mixed up with other, lesser olives). The end result is much spicier and harsher than anything I've ever bought. Personally I think it's delicious, but I'm hardly an unbiased judge...

There is absolutely no way anybody who is serious about olive oil could mistake a serious Tuscan or Greek olive oil for Bertolli, for exactly the reason the article points out: serious olive oil has a grassy, peppery flavor that fills your throat and sinuses; it&#x27;s unmistakeable, like the difference between a 3 Floyds Dreadnaught DIPA and Bud Light, and the reason Bertolli has &quot;corrupted&quot; extra virgin olive oil is that American consumers won&#x27;t routinely buy it. I find the anecdote at the beginning of the article hard to reconcile with the rest of the piece!<p>(Bertolli-style oil is a fine thing to have in your kitchen, too; you might not want your mayonnaise to taste like strong Greek olive oil.)

Does anyone have any tips for finding quality olive oil?<p>The only way I&#x27;ve had success is to buy inexpensive single-source stuff, even if it&#x27;s inexpensive and non-Italian. Best olive oils I&#x27;ve had were single-sourced from Spain; $2 from a discount store. Maybe no-one wants to fake non-Italian oil?

For more on this, see the <i>New Yorker&#x27;s</i> 2007 article &quot;Slippery Business: The trade in adulterated olive oil&quot; at <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2007/08/13/070813fa_fact_mueller" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.newyorker.com&#x2F;reporting&#x2F;2007&#x2F;08&#x2F;13&#x2F;070813fa_fact_...</a>.<p>I&#x27;m surprised &quot;they&quot; haven&#x27;t worked to further regulate the field; apparently one problem is that developing chemical tests to reliably discern real from fake olive oil is very difficult.

I use olive oil regularly in my cooking and now, I don&#x27;t know what to think.<p>I&#x27;m curious why the original article wasn&#x27;t the one submitted (though it&#x27;s inserted at the bottom of that entry).<p><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/jan/13/extra-virginity-tom-mueller-review" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.guardian.co.uk&#x2F;books&#x2F;2012&#x2F;jan&#x2F;13&#x2F;extra-virginity-...</a>

UC Davis does olive oil testing a little more systematically:<p><a href="http://olivecenter.ucdavis.edu/services/services" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;olivecenter.ucdavis.edu&#x2F;services&#x2F;services</a>

I found my favorite olive oil, Alfar La Maja, in a small shop in San Sebastian, Spain. It comes from Mendavia, Spain, which is part of the Navarra region and is well known for its&#x27; olive production. At the time I bought it I had no idea it would be the best olive oil I&#x27;ve ever had, but I had two things working in my favor: 1) San Sebastian&#x27;s residents and tourists are incredibly serious about food, 2) it was fresh, single source, small production, local, etc.<p>Later, I looked it up online, and found this gem -- according to the NY Olive Oil competition, &quot;Alfar La Maja is one of the world&#x27;s best extra virgin olive oils for 2013.&quot;

Fairway in the NY area has an olive oil bar with about dozen varieties and bread for dipping. Most are domestic and labelled as such. The nuance in flavor is easily detectable. I find most supermarket brands taste about the same. The olive taste is so distinct you&#x27;d never confuse it for canola, corn or anything else.

There are many kinds of olive varieties, some of them growing in the span of one or two towns. Saying it is supposed to taste like this or like that without saying from which kind of olives it was made sounds kind of nonsensical.<p>Another matter is that of honesty. Italy is known to export more olive oil than it produces and it is buying production from quite a lot of towns in my country and then mixing it and packaging it with oils from other places.<p>If you want good olive oil, try to find small productions, ensure that it was stored in the dark if possible and taste it first (dipping bread on the oil not just sprinkling, it should be quite soaked). Supermarket olive oil of any price is only suitable for frying, that much is known.

That the rougher taste is the most original reminds me of that old story I found here: <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3201540" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=3201540</a>

My first experience with proper olive oil was ordering some from <a href="http://www.amphoranueva.com/" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.amphoranueva.com&#x2F;</a> after one of their coratina oils was suggested by someone on some forum who&#x27;d done chemical assaying on a number of oils looking for polyphenol content, as relevant to some moderately supported study results on positive health outcomes.<p>I couldn&#x27;t have been happier with the result... and even if you use a fair amount of oil it still takes a while to go through 750ml of the stuff, so that fact that it&#x27;s $18&#x2F;bottle doesn&#x27;t break the bank. (and it keeps well if kept isolated from air and light) Er, well, I mean used properly: raw in food, not for cooking. You shouldn&#x27;t heat good evo as its smoke point is lower than random supermarket mystery olive oil, and heating it removes most of the flavor anyways.<p>Opinions may differ though, I could certainly see some people really disliking the grassy acidic flavor of strong EVO.

Really interesting article, OP. I love coming across these type of links on HN — just seems like it happens less often these days.

Anyone know a good olive oil obtainable in NYC?<p>(I&#x27;d rather not pay huge shipping fees for some of the other things listed here.)

Personally, I only use grapeseed oil. I&#x27;ve tried olive, it&#x27;s too heavy. Tried canola, it&#x27;s okay. But grapeseed is amazing. It has no particular flavor, you could drink it and not become sick from the heavy load that typical oils will give you, etc.

I thought everybody knew this already. Store-bought (TJ, WF, etc.) doesn&#x27;t look, taste and isn&#x27;t priced anything like the real thing. If you didn&#x27;t see it go in the bottle yourself, it probably has cheaper oils mixed in. Caveat emptor.

Here&#x27;s a plug for my local olive oil producer: <a href="http://www.bvranch.com/" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.bvranch.com&#x2F;</a><p>Quality conscious and low on bullshit.

I use lemon pressed olive oil on almost all my cooking now and it&#x27;s delicious.

Many people buy into the supposed health benefits on olive oil, which probably boils down to its phenolic content. However, this depends on many things and drops over time.<p>The end of this article has some tips to ensure getting the best oil.<p><a href="http://news.discovery.com/earth/plants/olive-oil-health-benefits-1307104.htm" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.discovery.com&#x2F;earth&#x2F;plants&#x2F;olive-oil-health-bene...</a>