rox
Veteran Member
Last week we took a Bronze Medal in Paris for our AOC Provence Olive oil and today i called the editor of Der Feinschmecker Magazine in Germany and found out that our Bouteillan Olive Oil was selected in the Top 50 in the World. Last year in Germany they picked our AOC as the Best Oil of France. He did not say that at all so perhaps this year they are not doing the Best of each country, or perhaps they are and we were not selected. Jsut being in the Top 50 though I am thrilled with. He also said that several of our other oils are in the Top 200.
I like the der Feinschmecker competition because the judges are world class. The bring in 2 Italian PhD's in Chemistry who's life work is olive oil research. A judge from S-pain who works for the Spanish government controlling olive oil, agronomy engineers who's life work is olive oil etc. The judges are jsut the TOP in the world, so every year I wait and worry if we are gooing to get in or not. I took a deep exhaling breath when he told me.
I also entered our oil in a big olive oil competition in Canada. SAIL (or it might be SIAL) is a huge food show adn they are having an olvie oil competition so I entered our AOC Provence and our Bouteillan in the Montreal competition. Our Oil arrives in Canada tomorrow and I know our new distributor is anxious to get it ont he shelves all over Canada. He is a really great guy and I like him a lot.
There are other competitions we could enter but all fo them have entrance fees plus the value of the oil you need to send, always at least 2 bottles and the Montreal one wants 3 bottles. Our farm is not that big that I can afford to enter in everyone. The Canada competition was 500 CAD. You ahve to sell a lot of bottles of olive oil to make up for that 500 CAD. But since Canada is a new market for us I thought I should enter it and see how it goes.
Other news is that there is about a 1/2 acre lot abutting one of our parcels that we wanted to buy. It has a huge towering electric line straight through it so it will never be buildable and is zoned agricultural anyway so it has not homesite value. The owners stopped by in the fall while my hsuband was home and I was back in the states foreclosing on somebody and asked my hsuband if we wanted to buy it. Of course we were broke at the time but knew we would eventually come out of the bad spot we were in, so when I got back I called them and they said that they were in no rush and we couold do it in the spring. I called them on Sunday and their number is disconnected
! I went to city ahll but the get all their records from some kind of like county organization and the records are not complete. The records had another man owning it so I looked him up in the phone book and my suband called tonight.
They were surprised to hear that the city (or rather this other organization) shows them owning the lot. Seems like they did own land ther at one time but no longer do. They also knew the guy who ahd approached us but my hsuband said that he could tell right away that there is some bad family blood going on there. The woman said "Yes I know him, but I have not talked to him in years and don't have his number" My hsuband says it seems to be a bit of a family fued going on there and that we should wait a couple days for the gossip to get around that family and eventually hope that the first couple comes back to us again. Shucks! First we ahd to foreclose on that guy in the states and now we loose contact with the owners of a small piece fo land we woudl liek to have. Our real estate luck has not been very good lately.
At the moment we are burning branches from prunning. Arrrrrgh, but it has to be done. Actually I felt good working today with my hsuband I ahve been inside all winter which for us is two months, doing marketing and generall office business. It feels good to do the physical labor and I can afford to loose a few pounds I put on this past year. I always drop weight in the spring during pruning and also in the summer picking almonds. It is not so much the act of picking or prunning but carrying crates of nuts or dragging a tarp full of branches to the burn pile. Physical labor when it is not to heavy type labor feels good.
In April Milwaukee Magazine is going to do a nice story on us, if the photographer is right it should be about a four page article. That should help the Milwaukee sales.
The only other bit of news to share is that on Saturday I will be getting a roofing torch so that we can finally for the fouth time fix our roof. It was comments in a different thread here on TBN where I first found out that there is such a thing as a roofing torch and that you can rent them. We have a flat roof and we did not get the tar heated up good enough to stick. Now with the roofing torch I hope we can fix our leaky roof. Tomorrow i will work with my hsuband on buring but also I have to go to the mill and pick up some of our oil. It is jsut same old same old on the olive farm, we live our lives in rythym with the seasons and we enjoy it.
I like the der Feinschmecker competition because the judges are world class. The bring in 2 Italian PhD's in Chemistry who's life work is olive oil research. A judge from S-pain who works for the Spanish government controlling olive oil, agronomy engineers who's life work is olive oil etc. The judges are jsut the TOP in the world, so every year I wait and worry if we are gooing to get in or not. I took a deep exhaling breath when he told me.
I also entered our oil in a big olive oil competition in Canada. SAIL (or it might be SIAL) is a huge food show adn they are having an olvie oil competition so I entered our AOC Provence and our Bouteillan in the Montreal competition. Our Oil arrives in Canada tomorrow and I know our new distributor is anxious to get it ont he shelves all over Canada. He is a really great guy and I like him a lot.
There are other competitions we could enter but all fo them have entrance fees plus the value of the oil you need to send, always at least 2 bottles and the Montreal one wants 3 bottles. Our farm is not that big that I can afford to enter in everyone. The Canada competition was 500 CAD. You ahve to sell a lot of bottles of olive oil to make up for that 500 CAD. But since Canada is a new market for us I thought I should enter it and see how it goes.
Other news is that there is about a 1/2 acre lot abutting one of our parcels that we wanted to buy. It has a huge towering electric line straight through it so it will never be buildable and is zoned agricultural anyway so it has not homesite value. The owners stopped by in the fall while my hsuband was home and I was back in the states foreclosing on somebody and asked my hsuband if we wanted to buy it. Of course we were broke at the time but knew we would eventually come out of the bad spot we were in, so when I got back I called them and they said that they were in no rush and we couold do it in the spring. I called them on Sunday and their number is disconnected
! I went to city ahll but the get all their records from some kind of like county organization and the records are not complete. The records had another man owning it so I looked him up in the phone book and my suband called tonight. They were surprised to hear that the city (or rather this other organization) shows them owning the lot. Seems like they did own land ther at one time but no longer do. They also knew the guy who ahd approached us but my hsuband said that he could tell right away that there is some bad family blood going on there. The woman said "Yes I know him, but I have not talked to him in years and don't have his number" My hsuband says it seems to be a bit of a family fued going on there and that we should wait a couple days for the gossip to get around that family and eventually hope that the first couple comes back to us again. Shucks! First we ahd to foreclose on that guy in the states and now we loose contact with the owners of a small piece fo land we woudl liek to have. Our real estate luck has not been very good lately.
At the moment we are burning branches from prunning. Arrrrrgh, but it has to be done. Actually I felt good working today with my hsuband I ahve been inside all winter which for us is two months, doing marketing and generall office business. It feels good to do the physical labor and I can afford to loose a few pounds I put on this past year. I always drop weight in the spring during pruning and also in the summer picking almonds. It is not so much the act of picking or prunning but carrying crates of nuts or dragging a tarp full of branches to the burn pile. Physical labor when it is not to heavy type labor feels good.
In April Milwaukee Magazine is going to do a nice story on us, if the photographer is right it should be about a four page article. That should help the Milwaukee sales.
The only other bit of news to share is that on Saturday I will be getting a roofing torch so that we can finally for the fouth time fix our roof. It was comments in a different thread here on TBN where I first found out that there is such a thing as a roofing torch and that you can rent them. We have a flat roof and we did not get the tar heated up good enough to stick. Now with the roofing torch I hope we can fix our leaky roof. Tomorrow i will work with my hsuband on buring but also I have to go to the mill and pick up some of our oil. It is jsut same old same old on the olive farm, we live our lives in rythym with the seasons and we enjoy it.
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