Big news! We’re excited to be introducing a brand new line of extra virgin olive oils this month: Ranch Selects. These three oils are crushed from select olives grown exclusively on our own “estate” ranches in northern California. The bottlings are new blends of oil from the olives we press in our mills. You’ll notice the labels are different. You’ll get more information about the flavor profile of the oil in the bottle.

The new Ranch Selects oil are available in select natural food stores and on our website. The suggested retail price: $12 to $13 a bottle. We’ll offer three styles: mild, which has a buttery flavor; medium, which provides a more fruity taste; and bold, which delivers a pleasant, peppery flavor you’ll feel in your throat. Our vice president of marketing, Mike Forbes, fills us in.

Why offer Ranch Selects?

There’s a huge interest among people wanting to know where our oil comes from. We get a lot of questions. What’s the ranch like where you grow the olives?  What distinguishes the soil? So we wanted to give people details about the particular ranch and the olives that produce each bottle of our Ranch Selects oil.

Where will people get the detailed information?

If you want more than what’s printed on the label, email us (ranchselects@cal-olive.com) the code that’s on your bottle. We’ll tell you everything about the oil inside: the age of the trees that produced the olives; the olive varietals used to make the oil; an analysis of the oil’s chemistry; and a geographic description of the ranch itself. We’ll also provide suggested food pairings. We’re the first company in the industry to provide such information on a large scale.

What’s different about the oils?

The oils are crushed from among the best olives harvested at our two estate ranches in northern California, near the towns of Oroville and Artois. We use new blends of Arbequina, Arbosana and Koroneiki olives. So far, we’ve been getting very positive feedback from people who’ve tried the Ranch Selects oils. The other day, for example, a New York culinary instructor who teaches pastry classes told us her students raved about the “mild and buttery” oil. The new olive oils are great for baking and all types of cooking.

The new labels also are different from the labels for the existing line of oils. Why?

We want people to better understand the oil they’re buying before they bring it home. We field a lot of calls from people who aren’t sure what oil to buy: Arbequina, Everyday, Miller’s Blend, etc. They don’t want to invest in a bottle if they’re not sure what it tastes like.  So we’ve tried to address this to make it easier for people to find the oil that’s right for them.

We’ve put an olive ‘pictogram’ on the front label showing the flavor strength: delicate has one olive; medium has two, etc. We heard from people that ‘pictograms’ had helped them understand other foods that were formerly confusing (like dark chocolate and coffee) so we’re trying it with olive oil.

When and where will Ranch Selects be available?

The oils will begin appearing on store shelves this month through Sept. 1. They will be available at:

• Whole Foods stores in the New York area and California now
• Sprouts, Sunflower, Fresh Market stores starting on  July 1
• Henry’s beginning on  Sept. 1
• Additional natural foods stores very soon

And you’ll soon be able to purchase Ranch Selects at our website.

Do you have a personal favorite among the three oils?

I love all three. But let’s just say I’m particularly excited about the ‘bold’ oil. It’s our boldest, most peppery offering yet.  You’ll love it when dipping bread.

Bon appétit,

Your friends at California Olive Ranch

The U.S.-Australian report suggests “most” top-selling European “extra virgin” oils sold in California supermarkets “regularly” fail to meet international standards for extra virgin. Extra virgin olive oil is the top grade, delivering the best taste and the full health benefits of olive oil. It also commands the highest price. (Click here to read the study.)

The researchers found that nearly three-quarters of the top five imported brands failed to pass  “blind” taste tests conducted by two panels of professional tasters. These experts are trained to judge if an olive oil qualifies as extra virgin or is a cheaper grade like “ordinary virgin” or “lampante.”

The results reinforce an earlier study issued last July showing 69% of the imported oils labeled extra virgin failed to meet international standards. The new study is even larger than last year’s, with more than double the number of store-bought oils tested. (Click here to read the July 2010 study.)

We’re happy this report again showed that we make great oil … something top chefs and serious home cooks already know! In the study, we continued to fare better than imported brands, including a couple of brands that cost significantly more than our own bottles.

“These results clearly demonstrate the need for better testing procedures and regulations to adequately protect consumers,” our CEO, Gregg Kelley, said of the study.

The new data show our own extra virgin olive oil as well as an Australian EVOO passed the blind taste tests, based on standards set by the International Olive Council (IOC) and the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture. Our oil also fared better in lab tests.

By contrast, the study found 73% of the top five imported brands — Filippo Berio, Bertolli, Pompeian, Colavita, and Star — failed to pass taste tests conducted by two internationally recognized panels in Australia and at the Davis campus of the University of California. In particular, 66 of the 90 samples tested failed both panels. The tasters found the inferior oils to be rancid or fusty. The latter is caused by fermented olives.

Seventy percent of the top five imported brands also failed to pass an EVOO freshness test, while 50% failed to pass a test for exposure to heat and light; the tests are based on German and Australian quality standards which define defects like exposure to oxygen or adulteration.

As with last year’s study, California Olive Ranch helped fund this new study. And once again we had no influence on the methodology, brand selection, or outcome.

What was behind test European results? The researchers said the results indicated the failed samples: were exposed to oxygen; were of poor quality; or were adulated with cheaper, refined oils.

The researchers wrote that “our findings indicate that the quality level of the largest imported brand names is inconsistent at best, and that most of the top-selling olive oil brands we examined regularly failed to meet international standards for extra virgin olive oil.”

Two our own bottles out of a total of 18 — or 11% of those sampled — failed a test for exposure to heat and light. We were disappointed about that.

We strive to ensure all our bottles meet the highest standards. We want 100% of our bottles to pass every test, every time.

We take extraordinary care to make our oil. Our investment in technology that allows us to identify the olives used to make our oil should help us understand what happened to the two bottles that didn’t pass muster.

Looking ahead, we’ll aim to show people what great tasting extra virgin olive oil tastes like!

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

Miller’s point to this audience, which has been known to gasp at how much olive oil chefs use when cooking: “We need to focus on the  fat quality, not the  fat quantity.”

Miller said that means when people cook healthy foods they should should:

• Use “absolutely no trans fat” like that found in some store-bought cookies
• Use “limited” amounts of saturated fats like those found  in red meat
• Have “no concern” about the use of unsaturated fats like the monounsaturated fats contained in extra virgin olive oil

Miller, who’s also program director for strategic initiatives at the Culinary Institute of America, was among the first speakers to address a health and cooking conference we’re attending at the CIA’s Napa Valley campus. The three-day gathering is focused on cooking and eating food that not only tastes good – but is good for you.

A key question here: “How do we get ourselves, our children, our loved ones, and ultimately our patients to make better (food) choices,” said David Eisenberg, himself an accomplished cook and director of the Osher Research Center at Harvard Medical School, which is co-sponsoring the Healthy Kitchens, Healthy Lives conference with the CIA.

Greg Drescher, executive director for strategic initiatives at the CIA, provided an answer, declaring that “healthy food choices”  must taste “delicious.”

The sold-out gathering has attracted about 450 doctors, nutritionists, nurses and other medical and culinary professionals. The goal: Get more and more people to lead healthy lives by passing along the knowledge of how to cook nutritious foods that tastes good.

Last night we watched three of our chef friends give cooking demonstrations using vegetables: Joyce Goldstein prepared an Italian vegetable dish; Suvir Saran prepared an Indian dish; and John Ash prepared a dish using local produce.

“I’m the one that when I pour olive oil into the pan people go: ‘Oh my god!’” Joyce joked as she sautéed red onions in extra virgin olive oil.

We expect to see more cooking demonstrations over the next three days – many using extra virgin olive oil, as well as whole grains, legumes, fruits, dark chocolate and other healthy ingredients. We’ll be sure to share recipes with you.

We’ll also be listening to medical professionals and others speak about topics like healthy carbohydrates, plant-based foods (yes, that means olive oil), sustainable agriculture, and ways to reduce childhood obesity.

Stay tuned for healthy, good tasting recipes and more reports from the conference.

Bon appétit,

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

In recognition of the good news, you can get 10% off your purchase of Millers Blend from our online store until April 1; type in the coupon code MILLERSBLEND at checkout.  (Click here to go to our online store.)

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

We want to let you know that we’ll be streamlining our blogs at California Olive Ranch in the New Year.

Here’s how it will work:

• Next week we’ll begin publishing a single blog for consumers and culinary professionals, rather than publishing two separate ones.
• At first, the combined blog will be referred to as the consumer blog. But as we revamp our website, we’ll change the name and appearance to reflect the broader audience.
• We’ll typically publish two new posts a week, with recipes, cooking tips and techniques, and information about the health benefits of extra virgin olive oil.
• You’ll receive a weekly email containing the week’s blog posts, and you’ll still be able to find the archives for everything we’ve published so far on our website.

We think this new approach makes a lot of sense because, after all, we know all of you enjoy good food and learning more about extra virgin olive oil. We hope you’ll agree and we always value your feedback.

Thank you for your valued support. And we hope you have a happy, healthy and prosperous New Year.

Bon appétit,

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

What does Jamie Oliver Mean By a “Glug” of Olive Oil?
We’d already answered the question: What is a drizzle of olive oil? (It’s entirely personal and depends on which cook you ask.) We next began coming across British chef Jamie Oliver’s use of the expression, “a glug of olive oil.” We set out to determine what the celebrity chef meant.

Ending the U.S. Dependence on Imported Olive Oil

We figured this topic would elicit some comments. Sure enough. “It can happen!” exclaimed an Australian olive oil expert. “Sorry, but do the math,” said a U.S. olive oil expert. It’s a debate that will be decided over time. But at the very least we’d like to vastly reduce the country’s reliance on imported olive oil.

Olive Oil Primer: Poaching Seafood at Home in EVOO We’d never poached anything in extra virgin olive oil before. So we were blown away when we poached some halibut a friend of ours had caught in Alaska. It was succulent and moist, with a rich yet delicate flavor. Some people raise their eyebrows when we tell them about this cooking method. Our response: Try it! You’ll be amazed.

Meatless Monday and Newly Meatless Mario Batali More and more chefs are getting on the healthy eating bandwagon. Jamie Oliver has been particularly active in a campaign to get kids in this country eating healthier foods. Mario Batali raised eyebrows earlier this year when the “the King of Pancetta” embraced the Meatless Monday concept at his restaurants. We offered up our own Meatless Monday menu.

Filtered vs. Unfiltered Olive Oil: What’s the Difference? We field a lot of questions about extra virgin olive oil. Why do different oils have different colors? (Much depends on when the olive is harvested.) Can you bake with olive oil instead of butter? (Yes.)  Can you fry with extra virgin olive oil? (Yes.) The question we probably hear the most is what’s the difference between filtered and unfiltered EVOO. We explain.

Chef at Golden Globe Uses our Extra Virgin Olive Oil We were psyched by the news that our EVOO would be among the California-grown ingredients chef Suki Sugiura would be using to prepare the 2010 Golden Globe Awards Show Dinner.  The Beverly Hilton chef was serving Tinseltown’s heavyweights a locally inspired menu showcasing the bounty of California’s agriculture.

Bon appétit,

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

© 2009 Oldways Preservation & Exchange Trust www.oldwayspt.org

The Mediterranean diet is rich in olive oil, vegetables, fruit, grains and seafood. The food regimen, Spain’s flamenco dance and Chinese acupuncture were among the cultural practices deemed “intangible” world treasures by a committee of the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization, or UNESCO.

The UNESCO panel — the Intergovernmental Committee for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage — met this week in Nairobi to approve 50 of the 51 nominations presented for inclusion on the list of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. The committee’s list of protected cultural practices now totals more than 200.

The Associated Press reported that UNESCO also gave the nod to Spain’s human towers, built during annual festivities in Catalonian towns, and the chant of the Sybil performed in churches on Majorca. French and Mexican cuisines were adopted, too.

“We are particularly pleased by the decision,” Greek Agriculture Minister Costas Skandalidis said in a statement. “The Mediterranean diet … is considered as the healthiest diet and has acquired the status of a philosophy and a way of life.”

“It should be protected, adopted and promoted,” he said.

You can find plenty of recipes showcasing Mediterranean cuisine in the August issue of our eNewsletter as well as on the recipe section of our website.

Bon appétit,

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

Bob — shown here wearing a hard hat during construction work at one of our mills — is in charge of crushing our olives and turning the oil into world-class extra virgin olive oil. He’s a veteran of California’s EVOO industry.

At 63, he’s a big, burly, genial man. He’s 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.

“When you make as many gallons of olive oil as I do, it’s in your blood,” says Bob, who was born in Corning, Calif. His grandfather and uncle were board members of the California Olive Grower Protection League in the 1930s.

Bob starts his day at 7 am. Here’s what he does.

Once the harvest begins Bob keep tabs on every step of the olive-crushing process at our two northern California mills.  Next, Bob monitors the oil while it settles in tanks for two to three months. The settlement process allows Mother Nature to naturally decant any remaining fruit particles to the bottom.

Bob moves the oil from tank to tank about every month to remove the sediment and clean the tank. The process, called racking, typically is done in late January, which allows our new oil to ship by Feb. 1st or so.

Bob also blends and tastes the oils that make up our lineup of EVOOs. And he produces specialized blends for certain chef and food-service customers.

Come this November, Bob will begin choosing the oils we use to make our freshest EVOO, Limited Reserve. (We previously called the oil Olio Nuovo.) We bottle Limited Reserve immediately after we press the olives, rather than put the oil in settlement tanks. Limited Reserve must be consumed sooner than our other EVOOs, before those flavorful fruit particles in the bottle ferment.

To make Limited Reserve, Bob personally tastes each batch of oil produced from every one of our northern California olive groves.

He records the quality of each batch. After he’s tasted all the oil, Bob selects the best four or five and brings samples to a conference room at headquarters in Oroville.

There, about a half dozen of us sit around a table and taste the oils, and choose the best which will be designated Limited Reserve.

Bob got his start as a miller in the 1980s at Stonehouse California Olive Oil, which today sells its oil in San Francisco’s Ferry Building.

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.”

The big challenge in those days: “Trying to understand what the American consumers wanted,” Bob says.

Bob eventually took ownership of Stonehouse and later sold it to another olive oil company. Bob continued to make EVOO for other companies before joining California Olive Ranch about five years ago.

He’s had a front-row seat watching the huge transformation in California’s olive oil business: “I think we’re getting there. The news media has gotten on board. The chefs have gotten on board. And American consumers love California extra virgin olive oil.”

Bon appétit,

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

Tests conducted at two respected laboratories revealed that 69% of the imported oils labeled extra virgin failed to meet taste, smell and chemical standards established by the International Olive Council (IOC) and the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture. Only one of the 10 California-made olive oils labeled extra virgin failed to meet the standards.

The defective oils included many leading and private label brands. They were bought at supermarkets and big box retailers in San Francisco, Los Angeles and Sacramento.

“The oils that failed our tests had defects such as rancidity and many of these oils did not taste good,” said Dan Flynn, executive director of the Olive Center at the University of California, Davis. “Before this study, we had anecdotal reports of poor quality olive oil being sold as extra virgin but now we have empirical proof.”

Full disclosure: California Olive Ranch helped fund the study. But we had no influence on the methodology, brand selection, or outcome.

The study was conducted jointly by the UC Davis Olive Oil Chemistry Laboratory and the Australian Oils Research Laboratory, a government research center and certified IOC testing laboratory.

Our Everyday California Fresh EVOO was among the brands tested. The study confirmed our Fresh EVOO complied fully with the IOC and USDA’s standards for extra virgin olive oil, as well as stricter standards established by the California Olive Oil Council (COOC).

All three sets of standards stipulate that olive oil labeled extra virgin can’t have any “defects.” The imported oils that failed to meet the international standards were found to be too old, of poor quality, and adulterated with cheaper, refined olive oil. The defective California oil didn’t pass taste and aroma standards created by the IOC and USDA.

For the study, researchers bought 52 samples of 14 readily available imported brands and 5 California brands of olive oil sold under extra virgin olive oil labels.

The oils were divided and analyzed by the California and Australian researchers. They tested the oils for their taste, aroma and chemical makeup.

We like to tell people our oil is significantly better and fresher than mass-produced oils imported into the United States from overseas.

For starters, the olives are grown in California’s unique “terroir” and pressed at our state-of-the-art mills here. Our oil doesn’t sit on a cargo ship for several weeks, journeying across the ocean.

Working closely with our skilled “ranchers,” we’re very careful about choosing the optimal time to harvest the olives in the fall. Our employees then get the olives from tree to mill quickly.

How? We plant our trees using a system known as “super high-density plantings.” It allows us to grow the trees in hedge rows of 570 to 670 trees per acre, versus traditional plantings of 100 to 150 per acre.

That way, employees driving our harvesting machines can harvest the trees more rapidly – and deliver the olives within hours to our mills, where they’re crushed into EVOO. It’s this speed which prevents the olive from decomposing before we extract the oil.

Part of the reason bogus EVOO can be sold in this country is because there are no federal standards governing quality. The USDA recently adopted standards meant to ensure the bottle of extra virgin olive oil you buy at the store is genuine and not some fake EVOO.

The new federal standards, however, are voluntary. They go into effect this fall.

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

The magazine Der Feinschmecker and “Mastri Oleari,” a prestigious Italian-based group of olive oil “masters,” gave us the award. Der Feinschmecker is considered the equivalent of Food & Wine magazine in Germany. It evaluated 850 EVOO brands from 20 countries in its competition.

To echo our chief executive Gregg Kelley, we’re thrilled and encouraged by the recognition. This was the first year we entered the competition.

“The German consumer is one of the most discerning in the world when evaluating olive oil,” Gregg said. “This recognition continues to validate the quality of our products and the care and effort with which our team of professionals produces our full assortment of extra virgin olive oils.”

Our Miller’s Blend is a combination of oils chosen by our veteran miller, Bob Singletary. Bob picks certain oils to produce aromas of fruit on the nose, buttery mid-palate flavors, and a slightly peppery finish. It’s a robust EVOO offering lush notes of artichoke, green tomato, and almond on the palate. It pairs well with flavorful, spicy dishes, sautéed or slow roasted meats, and smoked fish and salt cod dishes.

Der Feinschmecker, which means gourmet in English, has held the Olio Awards since 2002. The magazine gathers a team of international experts and the magazine’s editorial staff to evaluate hundreds of high quality-olive oils from the United States, Greece, Spain, Italy, and elsewhere around the globe. The June issue of the magazine features the highlights of the 2010 competition.

Bon appétit,

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