Oil is obtained by the following steps:
1.Harvesting begins in autumn; black olives
are usually harvested from November to February while green olives are harvested
earlier. Olives can be picked by hand or beaten from the tree (usually with
flexible poles so that the olives fall onto canvases placed at the bottom of
the tree), they can also be harvested using mechanical tree shaking methods.
2. Transportation follows the collection process. The fruit
is placed into bags, baskets or trucks in bulk form and then transported to
be pressed. Care must be taken not to damage the olives during transportation
and to avoid fermentation due to the lack of ventilation. On arrival to the
mill olives are washed and separated from their twigs. Olives must be processed
within 24 hours after they are harvested to obtain quality olive oil.
3. Crushing of the olives including the pit in order to
break the skin and crush the pulp.
4. Pressing in order to extract the liquid from the mass
of pulp. There are two types of oil presses:
 - The
classical or traditional type maintained through the
centuries, where the ground paste is placed between “capachos”, special
round mats and is then pressed to squeeze out the oily liquid. This liquid
is made up of vegetable water from the olive itself and oil. It is later left
to decant. The oil
floats because it is lighter and the water stays at the bottom
- Continuous system by centrifugation, the paste is made
more liquid by adding 1 litre of water per kilogram of paste. The centrifugal
decanter spins the olive paste in a horizontal drum with the heavier flesh
and pit going to the outside and the water and oil is tapped off the centre.
The oil we have from the oil presses at this stage is natural olive oil.
There is still some oil in the residues that accumulate in the oil-presses.
These stacks of residue are called oil-cake and contain some oil, depending
on the efficiency of the oil presses. This oil is known as seed-oil.
5. Storage . Olive oil is sensitive to light oxidation which
speeds up when its colouring substances come in contact with sunlight, room
light, etc. For this reason the storage of olive oil in dark glass bottles
is ideal however if the bottle is transparent, it should be kept in a dark
place. Ideal storage temperature should be 10-15 degrees Celsius.
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