We’ve posted a couple of articles on the blog about the flavoured olive oil products that we carry. If you missed them, you can click here to read about what goes in to the Infused Olive Oils that we carry, and you can click here to read about the difference between infused and fused olive oils.
Today, we wanted to explain what Agrumato means – all of our ‘fused’ olive oils are ‘agrumato’ – and it is a very difficult and rare process, involving the crushing of whole, fresh organic olives together with fresh produce or herbs, strictly using cold mechanical extraction.
Making agrumato is time consuming, laborious, and requires a near perfect choreography between farmers to bring fresh, ripe, locally sourced produce to the mill the moment the olives are ready to be harvested. We’re talking mere hours from harvest to crush for both olives and fresh produce at our mill. Furthermore, a recipe must be developed dictating how many tons of fresh herbs, fruit, or vegetables should be crushed with a specific ratio of olives. This process of formulation can take many seasons to perfect. Remember, a mill cannot simply stop production to make tiny test batches of agrumato in order to find flavor harmony. The mill our supplier uses in Tunisia has an Alfa Laval in full swing during fall/winter harvest, and fresh olives need to be crushed immediately! Needless to say, the process of agrumato is a labor of love which requires a level of craftsmanship and dedication to quality. Our supplier (Veronica Foods) has put in the time fine tuning the process, accruing many accolades along the way.
Interested in trying some award-winning Agrumato oils? Swing by one of our locations to try the Green Lemon (Limonato) Fused Olive Oil, the Baklouti Green Chile Fused Olive Oil, or they Cayenne Chile Fused Olive Oil!