How is olive oil made?

Olive oil is a healthy liquid fat obtained from olives. The highest quality olive oil is extra virgin olive oil, which must be unprocessed and extracted "cold", meaning it must be kept below 27º C at all times during the mechanical extraction process.

It must also meet the strict chemical criteria defined by the International Olive Council and adopted by the European Union and the USDA, but it must also have a perfect taste and aroma as determined by certified tasting criteria.

From the olive tree to the table

The first step is to pick the olives from the tree. The traditional way of harvesting olives is to shake the tree or hit its branches with sticks so that the olives fall to the ground. However, if a net is not used to catch the olives before they touch the ground, it can cause some olives to be bruised, which will produce a lower quality oil.

It is necessary to pick the olives carefully to ensure the quality of the final product.

Once the olives have been picked, washed, and the leaves and twigs removed, it's time to crush them. Crushing was traditionally done with stone wheels, but stainless steel rollers are much more common today.

Water is slowly added to the resulting paste so that the oil molecules concentrate. Finally, the mixture is centrifuged to remove the water. What remains is olive oil.