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The awards were handed out at the California Olive Oil Council’s annual membership meeting and trade show, in the coastal town of Monterey. The COOC is the chief trade group representing the state’s olive oil industry.

About 250 people attended Saturday’s meeting, including olive growers, producers, retailers, educators and chefs.

It was fitting that our Miller’s Blend and Bob were recognized. Bob, you may know, is our veteran miller. His Miller’s Blend EVOO represents a special blend of oils to reflect the fruitiness of our Arbequina and the slight pungency and mellow notes of our Arbosana.

The gold medal was handed out by judges during the COOC’s third annual olive oil competition. More than 140 oils were submitted for the competition, double the number of entrants last year. The gold medal represents “the top tier” of submissions, says Patricia Darragh, the COOC’s executive director.

It’s not the first time our Miller’s Blend has been recognized for it’s quality. Last year it was named one of the top 250 olive oils in the world by a noted German food magazine.

Bob, meanwhile, received the COOC’s annual Pioneer Award for his contribution to California’s olive oil industry. The award, selected by the COOC’s board, has been handed out since 1999.

“Bob is so deserving of this year’s Pioneer Award,” says Nancy Ash, a trained olive oil taster and owner of the consulting firm Strictly Olive Oil.

She worked with Bob many years ago at another company. “He was so generous sharing his extensive knowledge with all of us newcomers back in 1998,” Ash says. “I went on to be trained as a taster. But Bob is a natural. He has a great palate and an encyclopedic understanding of olive oil flavors from all his years tasting all the oils he has milled.”

The COOC’s Patricia Darragh calls Bob “a great resource for the entire industry.”

Bob got his start as a miller in the 1980s at Stonehouse California Olive, based in Berkeley. That first year was a very different time for the California EVOO business.

“We made 26,000 gallons of extra virgin olive oil,” Bob recalls. “But we literally had no market to sell it. We were way ahead of the curve. The frustration was we had a great product.”

In receiving the award, Bob joins an exclusive group of olive oil pioneers. Other recipients include: the late Joseph Sciabica, considered a patriarch of California’s olive oil industry; Nan McEvoy, founder of McEvoy Ranch Olive Oil; and Ed Stolman, founder of The Olive Press.

Congratulations Bob!

Bon appétit,

Claude S. Weiller
Vice President of Sales & Marketing
California Olive Ranch

Our miller, Bob Singletary, is like a winemaker. Only Bob is in charge of crushing our olives and making world-class extra virgin olive oil. He’s a veteran of California’s olive oil industry. Bob has been working for local olive-oil producers for a quarter century, long before American consumers were aware of the quality EVOO being produced in California.

We asked Bob to give us his perspective about last fall’s olive harvest and the flavor of the oil.

How would you characterize the flavor of the 2010 harvest?

The balance of the fruit flavor was pretty similar to what we’ve had in the past. We began with a very fruity, very piquanty style of olive oil at the start of the harvest. The early harvest usually produces a very robust style of flavor.

By the middle of the season the flavor starts to mellow out a bit, but still retains some of that complexity. It’s a more balanced flavor, but you still have a fruity nose impact. It has all the attributes of an excellent oil. By the end of the season the fruit is starting to mature and becoming more delicate, buttery and mild in profile.

How do you keep track of and work with all those different flavors?

Every single truckload of olives — we call it the load ticket — is identified the second it comes into the mill. We know the maturity index of the fruit and its acidity. Each load of olives is run on a designated production line. It will stay on that particular line from start to finish. When the fruit gets to the point where the oil is beginning to be separated out and put into a storage vessel, I taste it. I taste every single batch before it’s sent to a designated storage vessel.

Why do you taste each batch of oil?

I have to be able to identify the particular flavor profile — delicate, pungent, etc. — and then identify where the oil should be stored initially based on its individual characteristics.

You must taste a lot of oil?

It’s a lot. You pull it away from the line and go off to a more secluded spot inside the mill so you don’t have other competing aromas in the mill. You know at the start of the season you’re oil is going to be intense and you identify that oil. In a few weeks, by the middle of the season, it’s still intense but beginning to mellow a bit into a more balanced profile.

It sounds difficult. But after several years of doing it you can identify the profiles so that as the season progresses you begin to get out of the high intense oil to the medium intensity profile. Every varietal and every flavor profile is isolated in a separate storage vessel in our tank room. There, we later blend the oils to achieve the overall desired flavor profile for a particular olive varietal or special blend.

We read how a lot of growers have been struggling to cope with a cool, wet fall. Did this fall’s rains have much impact on flavor?

It did not because of our ability to harvest the fruit rapidly with our harvesting system. Our goal is to have the fruit harvested before any major weather situation has had an impact on the olives, like a freeze.

What was your favorite story from the harvest?

For me the volume of fruit we received — many, many tons — and the way we were able to handle it was unbelievable. We really had very limited production problems. It was a really successful harvest. If there’s anything special it was another year out of my life.

What number harvest was this for you?

It was my fifth at California Olive Ranch and probably the 25th in my life. My hair is reflecting that.

Bon appétit,

Claude S. Weiller
Vice President of Sales & Marketing
California Olive Ranch

In fact, earthy is a flavor associated with olives that have dirt or mud clinging to them. Bottom line: The olives weren’t washed before they were pressed.

Here’s a rundown of other defects you might find when tasting olive oil, based on International Olive Council definitions:

• Heated or burnt: Occurs when oil is exposed to excessive and/or prolonged heat during processing.
• Hay-wood: Flavor of oil produced from olives that have dried out.
• Greasy: Flavor reminiscent of diesel oil, mineral oil, or mechanical grease.
• Vegetable water: Flavor acquired by prolonged contact with the vegetable water that is a by-product of pressing olives.
• Brine: Obtained from olives that were brined (such as table olives) before pressing.
• Esparto: Flavor obtained from using new mats made from esparto (a type of grass) when pressing olives.
• Grubby: Flavor obtained from olives that have been attacked by the olive fly, which causes disintegration of the olives before they are harvested.
• Frozen: Flavor obtained from olives that experienced heavy frost or prolonged cold temperatures before being harvested and pressed.

Stay tuned for more olive oil tasting terms.

Claude S. Weiller
Vice President of Sales & Marketing
California Olive Ranch

Grange restaurant in Sacramento offers a tasting of three northern California extra virgin olive oils on its menu each night. We went there for an excellent dinner after wrapping up our annual Harvest Retreat. Before ordering our meal we requested the artisan EVOO tasting.

The server returned with a metal basket containing three bottles of oil: our Miller’s Blend, as well as an Arbequina from Hillstone Olive Oil in Yolo, Calif., and Rock Hill Ranch from Napa Valley-based Katz & Co. The server also placed a tray before us with three small tasting cups. We poured a little of each oil into the cups.

We then proceeded to swirl, sniff, slurp and swallow each EVOO through the oils, beginning with the Hillstone Arbequina, followed by the Miller’s Blend, and ending with the Rock Hill Ranch. It was fascinating to evaluate the different flavor profiles. All the oils were very good. Their pungency ranged from the Arbequina (the most delicate oil) to the Rock Hill Ranch (a “two cougher” for us). Our Miller’s Blend was right in the middle.

It was Grange executive chef Michael Tuohy’s idea to put a daily EVOO tasting on the menu. “I absolutely love olive oil and have for a long time,” Chef Tuohy told us.

He first put an EVOO tasting on the menu when he was chef-owner of Atlanta’s Woodfire Grill, back in 2002. At that time he was featuring oils from California as well as Italy, Spain, France and Australia.

The idea came to Chef Tuohy during a trip when he saw a cart at a restaurant holding some bottles of olive oil for a tasting. “That’s cool!” he told himself. That spurred him to offer the same in his own restaurant.

The Grange has offered its EVOO tasting for about a year. It’s been a way for Chef Tuohy to educate people about EVOO and its different flavor profiles and uses. “Most people think olive oil is something you make vinaigrette with,” he noted. He added that tasting local olive oils, like tasting local wines, “is part of the California experience.”

And how have customers been reacting when they taste EVOO for the first time? “A lot of people are pleasantly surprised,” Chef Tuohy said. He added that people in the EVOO business, like ourselves, “are appreciative.” We’d agree.

Bon appétit,

Claude S. Weiller
Vice President of Sales & Marketing
California Olive Ranch

It delivers a deliciously robust flavor, and finishes with a pleasant, peppery zing in the throat. Koroneiki oil, which we blend into our other oils, is the most pungent EVOO we produce. We hold EVOO tastings for chefs and other people and, sure enough, our Koroneiki has people clearing their throats.

In addition to a fruity nose and a strong, peppery finish, our Koroneiki is characterized by aromas of fresh grass and artichokes. Our miller Bob Singletary says the complexity of Koroneiki makes it a favorite of people who enjoy a Tuscan-style flavor profile.

We have some 10,000 acres of olive trees under cultivation in northern California. They produce Koroneiki as well as two Spanish varietals: Arbequina and Arbosana. Arbequina accounts for about 70% of our olives and Arbosana 20%. Koroneiki represents the remaining 10% of the olives we harvest using a system known as “super high-density” (SHD) planting.

Koroneiki also happens to be the third largest olive varietal grown in California. A recent report from the Olive Center at the University of California, Davis, finds that Koroneiki accounts for 6% percent of California’s SHD acreage, or 681 acres.

Unlike Arbequina and Arbosana, we don’t bottle our Koroneiki oil as a single varietal extra virgin olive oil. Instead, virtually all the EVOOs we make get a “shot” of Koroneiki, such as our Miller’s Blend and Everyday California EVOO. (One exception: If we bottle something as “Arbequina” — meaning there’s only Arbequina in the oil — then there’s no Koroneiki in that product.)

Blending Koroneiki into our other EVOOs “kicks up” an oil’s flavor and fruitiness, giving the oil a better and more complex taste.

The Koroneiki olive tree has grown in Greece for more than 3,000 years. It’s cultivated there to produce oil. The tree is a prolific olive producer.

In addition to pungency, the little Koroneiki olive delivers a healthful punch. It has a very high level of polyphenols, the chemical substances found in plants that may reduce the risk of heart disease and cancer.

Bon appétit,

Claude S. Weiller
Vice President of Sales & Marketing
California Olive Ranch

I’ve been writing about our olive varietals, starting with the Spanish Arbequina olive. Next up: Arbosana, another Spanish varietal we grow and crush into EVOO.

We have some 10,000 acres of olive trees under cultivation in northern California. They produce three olive varietals: Arbequina and Arbosana, both from Spain, and Koroneiki, from Greece. Last week I focused on Arbequina, our No. 1 varietal. It accounts for about 70% of our olives.

Arbosana is our No. 2 olive, representing about 20% of the olives we harvest using a system known as “super high-density” (SHD) planting. Arbosana also happens to be the second largest olive varietal grown in California. A recent report from the Olive Center at the University of California, Davis, finds that Arbosana accounts for 16% percent of California’s SHD acreage, or 1,688 acres.

Like Arbequina, the Arbosana tree is small in stature. Similarly, the Arbosana tree is a workhorse, producing large numbers of olives.

Our Arbequina and Arbosana EVOOs also happen to be the two single varietal oils we produce. Our Miller’s Blend, by contrast, combines our Arbequina and Arbosana EVOOs.

How do the Arbequina and Arbosana olives differ?

“The Arbosana variety has fruit that looks very much like Arbequina, but matures about three weeks later,” writes olive oil expert Paul Vossen, farm adviser for the University of California Cooperative Extension in Sonoma County.

Arbosana also yields a more “robust” oil than Arbequina, which produces a “delicate” EVOO. In particular, Arbosana tastes more peppery, or pungent. The olive also delivers a higher level of polyphenols – the chemical substances found in plants that may cut the risk of heart disease and cancer.

And the taste? Arbosana delivers hints of green tomato, almond, and green banana.

Olive oil expert and cookbook author Fran Gage recommends serving robust oils such as Arbosana brushed atop bruschetta, in Spanish romesco sauce, and with all things chocolate. We’ve baked chocolate  madeleines using our Arbosana EVOO, substituting the olive oil for butter. They were phenomenal.

Bon appétit,

Claude S. Weiller
Vice President of Sales & Marketing
California Olive Ranch

Hundreds of varieties of olives are grown around the globe. We grow three varietals in California: Arbequina, Arbosana, and Koroneiki. We use the olives to produce single varietal oils — namely our Arbequina and Arbosana EVOOs — as well as blended oils like Miller’s Bend.

I’ll focus on the Arbequina olive here and look at Arbosana and Koroneiki in future posts.

We have some 10,000 acres of olive trees under cultivation across northern California, from Fresno north to Corning. Arbequina is our No. 1 olive. It represents 70% of the olives we harvest using a system known as “super high-density” (SHD) planting.

The Arbequina olive hails from Catalonia, in Spain. It has become a favorite among growers here in the Golden state. A recent report from the Olive Center at the University of California, Davis, found that Arbequina accounts for 78% percent of California’s SHD acreage, or 9,400 acres.

The Arbequina tree is relatively small. It has weeping branches. The oval-shaped olives the tree produces are small, too. The olive resists frost well. It ripens relatively early versus other varietals.

In Europe, you can sometimes find an Arbequina olive tree put in a pot and placed at the front entrance of cafés.

Our Arbequina EVOO is a “delicate” oil that delivers a lot of fruit aroma, balanced pungency, and a very pleasing clean taste. In particular, we find it tastes of ripe tropical fruits, apple, and fresh artichoke.

Our Arbequina EVOO won raves from Cook’s Illustrated for the oil’s “fresh, sweet, fruity flavor and pleasing hint of bitterness.”

Different olive oils, like different wines, pair well with particular foods. Arbequina goes well drizzled over meats to bring out the meat’s sweetness. It also goes well with “strong” pestos such as one made from wild arugula and dishes that use blue cheese. Arbequina makes a delicious ice cream, too.

We recommend using Arbequina for baking, particularly when substituting olive oil for butter. Try it in pound cake. You won’t be disappointed.

Bon appétit,

Claude S. Weiller
Vice President of Sales & Marketing
California Olive Ranch

We recently saw a “Tweet” about the cobalt blue vessels: “Research shows that the blue EVOO tasting glasses don’t even work!” Australian olive oil expert Richard Gawel declared in a message, or Tweet, on Twitter.

I’ve used the stemless glasses to sample extra virgin olive oils. Trained olive oil tasters use them when judging oil and evaluating whether a particular oil should be classified as “extra virgin” or some lower grade. The tasting cup’s blue tint is meant to mask the oil’s color so it won’t influence a taster’s judgment.

But a recent study in the Journal of the American Oil Chemists’ Society suggests black would be more effective.

In the study, researchers from Spain performed high-tech color measurements on 18 blue-tinted tasting cups. They used 10 commercial olive oils in the process.

“Our main goal was to test whether traditional blue-tinted cups effectively conceal the color of virgin olive oils,” the researchers wrote.

It’s an interesting question. To be certified “extra virgin,” an oil must pass a barrage of tests – some conducted by lab technicians, and others done by a panel of professional olive oil tasters.

It’s the taster’s job to analyze the aroma, taste, and pungency of the oil to see if it passes muster. Color doesn’t indicate the quality of the oil. Hence, the blue-tinted cups.

The Spanish researchers found the cups aren’t fool-proof. It turns out you can tell the color in certain instances, according to their tests.

“Blue-tinted olive-oil-tasting cups reduce, but do not completely conceal, oil color,” the researchers concluded. “The use of opaque tasting cups with black walls is suggested.”

You be the judge. But I’m guessing it won’t be the last we hear on the matter.

Bon appétit,

Claude S. Weiller
Vice President of Sales & Marketing
California Olive Ranch

As a trained taster and owner of the consulting firm Strictly Olive Oil, Nancy walked a group of chefs and culinary pros through an olive oil tasting at our recent Harvest Retreat in northern California.

Here’s how she does it.

An extra virgin olive oil (EVOO)  tasting – like a wine tasting – really lets you experience an olive oil’s aroma, flavor and peppery quality, or pungency. You can also figure out what might be wrong. Mustiness or rancidity are “defects” found in lesser quality oils.

To be certified as  true “extra virgin,” an olive oil must pass a barrage of tests – some conducted by lab technicians, and others done by a panel of olive oil tasters, such as Nancy.

“The definition of extra virgin olive oil is based on chemical factors tested in a lab and specific flavors in the olive oil,” she told us.

It’s the taster’s job to analyze the aroma, taste, and pungency of the oil to see if it passes muster.

Here’s how to conduct a thorough tasting  – something you could do with friends at home. (By the way, biting into a tart green apple is a way to cleanse the palate.)

First, pour about a tablespoon of oil into a wine glass, or similarly tapered glass. (Expert olive oil tasters sip from the blue olive oil tasting glass, like the one pictured here.) Cover the glass with one hand while you hold the bowl of the glass in the other hand. You want the oil to be about 70 degrees Fahrenheit – considered the best temperature for tasting.

Next come the “Four S’s,” as Nancy describes them:

1. SWIRL – While you cover the top of the glass with one hand, swirl the oil to release the aromas.
2. SNIFF – Uncover the glass and hold the top up to your nose and quickly smell the oil. The scent is key to the oil’s fruitiness. You want to get one big “sniff impression” of the oil.
3. SLURP – Take a sip of the oil while also “sipping” a bit of air. The slurping action combines the oil with the air and spreads it throughout your mouth. Notice the oil’s “smell” in your mouth – the retro-nasal aromas – as well as the different sensations throughout your mouth.
4. SWALLOW – Don’t worry, it’s just a small amount of oil! Notice if there is a peppery or stinging sensation in your throat, and how long the sensation lingers.

While tasting the oil, keep in mind the three positive attributes of true extra virgin olive oil:

• Fruitiness, which you can sense from smelling the oil.
• Bittery, reflected in a pleasantly bitter taste. “It’s a natural expression of the olive,” said Nancy.
• Pungency, the peppery or stingy sensation in your throat when you swallow the oil.

If you plan to sample another oil, take a bite from that tart green apple I mentioned, followed by a swig of water. That will cleanse your palate.

Finally, here’s something to keep in mind while you taste. Unlike other countries, the United States hasn’t adopted standards defining extra virgin olive oil. The bottom line: Not all “extra virgin olive oil” sold in the United States is the real thing – although EVOO produced in California must be officially certified.

That said, slurp away!

Bon appétit,

Claude S. Weiller
Vice President of Sales & Marketing
California Olive Ranch

Olive oil expert Fran Gage says as much: “Color isn’t an accurate indicator of quality or taste,” she writes in her book The New American Olive Oil (Stewart, Tabori & Chang, 2009).

That’s why professional olive oil tasters use a special blue glass – like the one pictured here – when they taste oils.  The blue tint masks the oil’s color, so it won’t influence a taster’s judgment.

But an olive oil’s color will tell you other things. Olives harvested early in the season, for example, are naturally very green and therefore produce a greener oil.

Australian olive oil expert Richard Gawel offers more details:

“Olives picked early in the season tend to make green colored oil as they contain higher levels of chlorophyll,” he writes in a very informative FAQ posted on the Internet.

“Olives harvested late in the season will typically produce more golden colored oils due to a higher level of natural occurring levels of carotene-like substances. Both oils may be technically equivalent in quality but very different in style.”

What’s more, you want to avoid buying extra virgin olive oil in a clear bottle to see its color. Light is among the enemies of EVOO. Together, heat, light and oxygen promote oxidation and can make the oil rancid.

“If you purchase a very green looking oil, make sure it is stored in a dark bottle in a dark place,” advises Gawel. “The stuff that makes it green (chlorophyll) helps start the reaction that makes oils rancid, but only in the presence of light.”

That’s the main reason we choose dark colored glass to bottle our extra virgin olive oils, including our new Everyday California EVOO.  Stay tuned for more information about that new oil.

Bon appétit,

Claude S. Weiller
Vice President of Sales & Marketing
California Olive Ranch