Rox's EVOO(Olive Oil) for sale on Amazon!

[gsganzer]

Rox,
I Love the stories behind your operation and your oils. Every time we share our oil with friends at dinner, we tell a little backstory about your operation.

 

[rox]

Okay, A REALLY quickie update because I am tired having spent so many hours (and frustrations) in the moulin (mill/olive press)
First of all the Salonenque is unbelievable. I think earlier in this thread or perhaps in another thread I talk about the fakeness of olive oil companies calling their olive oil "buttery." It's like a come on, a marketing term that helps sell olive oil, because who doesn't like butter? I have tasted probably HUNDREDS of olive oils that claimed to be "buttery," and were so NOT buttery, just regular olive oil which is not a bad thing. I have to say our Salonenque olive oil is THE most buttery olive oil we have ever produced in 14 years. If you drink it out of our little tasting cups that we include with our tins, after you drink it on your lips will be a flavor of butter. It's crazy! We have never produced such buttery olive oil as our Salonenque.

We pick strictly by varietal, the Salonenque matures first so we pick that first, then next to mature is the Grossane, I just finished pressing the last of our Grossane today. The oils are very mild and dare I say buttery. They are both very mild this year.

We are having our best year yet pressing olives for the public and I can assure you there is plenty, plenty of bitter oil around, only about 3 of our mill/moulin customers had that very distinct buttery flavor to their olive oil. Several really nice, nice oils I pressed for customers. Many people are just to impatient to wait for the olives to be tender before picking. We had really beautiful weather the end of October so with the nice weather people go out and pick their olives because the weather is nice, so their oil is generally going to be pretty bitter, but hey the weather was nice. It is hard to wait when the weather is so nice but if you pick before the olives are tender to the touch you will get bitter olive oil.

A new phenonomon this year is tiny black olives. We don't grow tiny black olives in our area but plenty of our customers and us included, some of our trees produced tiny black olives, however they have a lot of oil in them. They are really HARD to mill though. It took us having our crusher back up, plugged up, four times to figure out how to mill them. We have to add a little bit of warm water into the crusher, we also have to reduce the speed of the screw pushing the olives into the crusher. In other words we have to feed the olives into the crusher more slowly. We finally figured out the right amount of warm water to add to the crusher, one run to much water was added and the paste was to soupy so of course that entire 200lbs of soupy crushed olive paste flooded our centrifuge separator. This phenomenon of tiny black olives is really weird but we finally figured out how to mill them. One thing is universal when there is a back up mess I am always the one that does the cleaning up afterwards so of course I try real hard not to have that happen. I would say we have about 15% of Bouteillan and maybe 15% to 20% of Aglandau olives are tiny black ones. We wouldn't even bother picking them except they contain a high ratio of oil in them (once you figure out how to mill them). On customers tiny black olives some of the oil was delicious and some of them the oil was horrible, really really bitter. I know we should be okay since we are not even close to having a majority of our olives being tiny black ones. I took a picture, tomorrow I will connect up the iPad and post the pick, once you see the picture you will see what I'm talking about.

The yields on the first two varietals are fantastic, terrific yields, best ever. Fingers crossed for the two remaining varietals.

 

[N80]

Rox, I'm coming very late to this long and old thread, but I have searched Amazon and cannot find your olive oil. I would really like to buy some.

I'm a foodie and a cook (not a chef). My primary interest is Italian cooking and I'm pretty good at it (he says modestly).

I am not an olive oil expert but have tried a lot of good stuff and know what I like. I've had some real good stuff from California (DaVero) and tried quite a few in Italy a while back. However, as far as I know I have never had French olive oil and would like to try yours. And even though my interests are Italian and southern US cuisine, what's good is good and its the quality of the ingredients that count.

 

[rox]

Rox, I'm coming very late to this long and old thread, but I have searched Amazon and cannot find your olive oil. I would really like to buy some.

I'm a foodie and a cook (not a chef). My primary interest is Italian cooking and I'm pretty good at it (he says modestly).

I am not an olive oil expert but have tried a lot of good stuff and know what I like. I've had some real good stuff from California (DaVero) and tried quite a few in Italy a while back. However, as far as I know I have never had French olive oil and would like to try yours. And even though my interests are Italian and southern US cuisine, what's good is good and its the quality of the ingredients that count.

Why thank you. Yes we have been out of olive oil on Amazon I think since August. We sold all that we had and had to wait for this harvest before we can ship any more. Last years harvest was a very low harvest so we simply ran out. Next shipment will probably be in January, I'll try to remember to let you know. I better get to bed, I've got over a ton (literally a metric ton) of Bouteillan olives to press tomorrow and my husband wants to get an early start, he always wants to get an early start, LOL.

 

[Kyle_in_Tex]

I really enjoy reading the stories and situations Rox. Thanks for sharing.

I will buy some oil this year too when it comes available.

 

[Egon]

Tomorrow is today and by this time you probably deserve a glass of wine with a nice supper!

 

[ultrarunner]

Too bad the olive schedule doesn't tie in better with the Holidays... I buy gifts for those that would love a tin of exquisite oil and it would mean more if I said I had a connection with the grower.

So glad to hear the predictions for a great harvest are proving true...

Farming is a lot of work, faith with a little luck... at least this is what my Grandfather said.

 

[rox]

Thanks everybody, honestly amto tired to respond to each comment but appreciate them all. FABULOUS NEWS! The Bouteillan came in PERFECT! The Bouteillan year over year has great variation, typically it has a strong citrus flavor to it, but for the last 3 years it has come in more herby flavored, the citrus flavor is back, whoa and is it good. I'm so pleased with it, and the yield is the highest yield we have ever gotten for Bouteillan, 17%. That is high. We pressednthe first Bouteillan today, it gave us a high yield AND we have a LOT of Bouteillan on the trees. A lot. We are not going to run out on Amazon in 2018, that is for sure.

The thing is, you can't pick to early or the oil is bitter, you can't pick to late or the oil has a musty flavor to it. We got an e-mail today from our Farmers Association saying the later maturing olives have reached their flavor profile and are ready to pick. The Aglandau have just started to feel tender to squeezing them between your fingers so by the time we finish the Bouteillan the Aglandau should be perfect, perfetly ripe but no overly ripe to pick. I had a devil of a time holding my husband back this year he SO wanted to pick early, about a week to 10 days earlier than when we started. Through a lot of persuasion I convinced him to wait, you know it takes two in a marriage, and in this case I absolutely knew I was right and so did he, but if I wasn't here he would have picked early. It's hard to wait when you really want to get going, but it's the right thing to do.

I just hope our Aglandau isn't to mild. It is supposed to be peppery, have a pepper kick to it. They are still a wee bit hard yet so rationally I know I should not worry.

We have a customer from Brazil, he is with the Brazilian Air Force and has been stationed at our French Air Force base for maybe 3 years now. He always brings his Brazilian family and friends over to buy olive oil. He says in his home town we are like famous over there. His time in Salon de Provence is ending and he goes back to Brazil in the early spring, he's going to sell our olive oil in Brazil, I bet he follows through, he has been talking about this for a year or so. His father is visiting and i guess his dad works for the Dept of Agriculture so they had a lot of questions for me. they arrived just at the exact minute I was closing down the production line. I was so tired and only wanted to head upstairs but I sat with him & his foather for a good hour helping them as they talked about his venture. Then I came upstairs and made Nico & I great Hot Dogs for dinner, thin sliced dill pickles from USA, finely chopped green onions, finely chopped tomatoes and a sprinkle of celery salt on top. We are to tired to cook elaborate meals during the harvest so decked out hot dogs hit the spot. We even had McDonalds one day last week and we typically only have McDonalds once or twice a year, and you know what, we enjoyed that too.

 

[rox]

I just thought of this. You know how you have a beer, and then you have a beer with lime? It is still a beer but that lime in it makes it citrus-y, that is how the Bouteillan is, it's olive oil but with a citrus flavor to it.

 

[rox]

Update: We started pressing olives Oct 17 for the foolish people who decided that the weather is nice so might as well pick the olives, we didn't start picking our until October 31. The yields started off really great, a lot of oil per kilo of olives. The Salonenque & Grossane had great yields, then came the Bouteillan at first I was pleased, then the yield went down, down down. It's really interesting the difference between the yields in different parcels. At first on the upper parcel I was getting 17% yield out of the Bouteillan which was fantastic, then when the pickers moved down to the lower parcels the yield went straight down to the typical 13%/14%. We have a LOT of Bouteillan olive trees, so a 4% reduction is yield is pretty big. But that is what I got out of the Bouteillan 13% to 14% yield.

Now we are picking the Aglandau, which was the exact same thing, the initial field gave me an incredible 23% yield, I mean the oil was just pouring out of the centrifuge, just pouring out, moved to a new field and way way much less olive oil. For most of our Aglandau I am getting 18% & 19% yield, which is okay. I was just hoping so much we would keep going with that higher yield. Now I won't make 1,000 liters of Aglandau probably end up with around 800 liters. 200 liters difference is close to $4,000 for us. On a 12 acre farm that is a lot of money to us, we have no debt but $4,000 pays a lot of bills, that is over $300 a month that if I could have gotten the higher yield I would have had in my pocket.

But I want to say one thing, if there is a stand out olive oil and every year there seems like there is one, the stand out olive oil this year is the Aglandau. Oh.My.God.! I took a little drink and it opened up taste buds in my mouth that had never been activated before, it was that good, that special. It reminded me of the 2005 Grosanne that 2005 Grosanne opened up taste buds in my mouth I had never known were there, I still remember it. In 14 years we never ever ever produced an Aglandau like this one, it is so spectaular. I am going to enter it in many competitions and I am sure it will win gold medals. Entering in competitions costs us money so I kind of pick & choose, but I knw we are going to win Gold Medals with the Aglandau so I am going to pay the entry fee and enter it. I will blend it a bit with Bouteillan and enter it as an AOC de Provence and probably enter it also as a mono varietal. I'm a pro, actually I am a judge in the regional competitions I know a Gold Medal winner. The 2018 Aglandau is a pure Gold Medal Winner, it's so incredible.