How to choose the best Olive Oil
How to choose the best Olive Oil
The easiest way to ensure that you are cooking great dishes is to stock your kitchen with quality ingredients. And this includes all the basics from your salt to your pepper of course your Olive Oils.
How is Olive Oil Made?
Italy produces thousands of Olive Oils so choosing a good one can be a daunting task. To start you off here is some information on how Olive Oil is made and the three types of olive oils that you see in shops; extra virgin, virgin, and olive oil.
Olive oil is made by pressing olives into a liquid. The process of making olive oil typically involves several steps, which involve harvesting the olives, crushing them into a paste and separating the oil from the rest of the paste. Lastly the oil is stored in a cool dark place to maintain quality. Cold-pressed olive oil is always the best quality olive oil so always look for that indication on bottle when buying Extra Virgin Olive Oil.
The different types of Olive Oils
Extra virgin olive oil is made exclusively from the first cold-pressing of the olives, making it the purest and giving it the strongest flavour. It is great for salads and drizzling over cooked food such as fish.
Virgin Olive Oil: Virgin Oil is the second pressing of the olives. It has a weaker flavour and is best used for cooking. This is because when olive oil is heated over 60 degrees Celsius you lose most of the flavour and goodness of the oil so it would be a shame to use Extra Virgin Olive Oil for cooking.
Olive Oil: When you see bottles of oil that only say Olive Oil or Pomace Olive Oil it means that this is oil from the third pressing of the olives. Personally we would recommend avoiding this. Simply because in order to extract the final drops of oil from the olives both chemicals and heat are added to the process taking away from the healthy and natural benefits of olive oil.
What to look for when buying Italian Olive Oils?
Extra virgin oils from Sicily, Tuscany, Puglia and Lake Garda each have their own particular taste and organoleptic characteristics. For example olive oils from Sicily have a grassy flavour whereas Tuscan oils have a more artichoke like flavour. The choice of Extra Virgin Olive Oil depends very much on your personal taste and how you use it in your cooking. And the best way to choose the best Italian olive oil is undoubtedly by doing a tasting and deciding what you mostly use extra virgin olive oil for and then buy one that you think will best compliment this.
The fruity taste of olives can have three degrees:
Low Intensity/Delicate
Flavour:Smooth and mild, delicate, light, elegant flavor, mellow yet rich with a slight bitterness and fruitiness
Goes well with: Fish, Eggs, Mayonnaise and Tender Salad Greens
Medium
Flavour: Intensely olive fruity, pleasant bitterness and pungency with flavours of artichoke, avocado and a peppery finish
Goes well with: Salads, Grilled Chicken, White Meat, Lamb, Vegetables, Fresh Pasta and great for dipping with bread.
Robust/ Intense
Flavour: Intensely bold and assertive, pungent and spicy with grassy flavours of artichoke, tomato and herbs.
Goes well with: Rich Pasta Sauces, Bitter greens, Spicy dishes, Soups, Stews, Grilled meats & roasts and lastly Bruschetta
We cook a large variety of things so we chose to have a great extra virgin olive oil that we feel comfortable serving with pretty much everything. The Extra Virgin Olive Oil we use is from a great producer and family friend called Marina Colonna and her estate is between Molise and Puglia. She produces very high quality oils and is extremely passionate about her products. You can order her Extra Virgin live Oil dierctly on her website here.
Join one of our Cooking Classes
If you would like to learn more about the wonderful world of Italian Cuisine then we would love to welcome you to one of our Italian Cooking Classes in London where we teach Italian home cooking at its best. Find out more about our cooking classes here.