Official tasting glass for olive oil sensory analysis, International Olive Council

Why is the world of olive oil, one of the world’s purest foods, so rife with rumors, backroom deals, and a complete lack of transparency?  Tomorrow and the next day, the International Olive Council (IOC) is holding a summit meeting in their Madrid GHQ to discuss olive oil testing methods.  For the first time, the IOC has excluded from the meeting distinguished observer chemists from non-IOC countries, including the USA, Australia and Canada.  These observers also lost their access to the IOC website about this “restricted” meeting.  Dr. Rod Mailer, head of the Australian Oils Research laboratory in New South Wales, Australia and a world authority on olive oil chemistry, says that his user account was blocked on the IOC site, and that he was surprised that he and others had not been invited to the meeting.  ”I do usually get invited and I would have expected the new chemist at the Department to also receive an invitation,” Mailer said.

The IOC has given no explanation for this radical change in approach, but I’m hearing, from a range of sources, that among other things they may be about to reduce, or even eliminate, the use of the taste test in determining olive oil quality.  Some say this is the first step towards abolishing the extra virgin grade of olive oil.  In reality, even if the grade remains, removing the taste test from olive oil law would, de facto, mark the end of extra virginity, because sensory assessment is the most important way to determine if an olive oil is in fact top quality (extra virgin) or not.  If this happens, it’s the triumph of bad oil – once again the interests of a few big olive oil traders and bottlers will have trumped those of high-quality producers, and of consumers worldwide.

This elimination of the taste test and consequent loss of extra virginity would fit with recent developments in the olive oil industry.  On 14 December 2010, after testing by the regional government in Andalucia suggested that a number of “extra virgin” olive oils being sold in the region were not, in fact, extra virgin grade at all, several of the larger olive oil organizations in Spain, including ASOLIVA, ANIERAC, INFAOLIVA and the Cooperativas Agro-Alimentarias – essentially the mouthpieces of Big Oil in the Old World, and particularly Spain – wrote a letter to Rosa Agular, the national Minister of the Environment, demanding the immediate discontinuation of the taste method in determining olive oil quality, because, they claimed, the test method was “very subjective,” and had severely damaged the public image of their oils.  More recently, during the California State Senate hearing on “Challenges Facing the California Olive Oil Industry” (watch the proceedings here and here), Bob Bauer, president of the North American Olive Oil Association (the trade group for olive oil importers into the US and Canada – essentially the North American arm of the IOC), suggested that the taste test was too subjective.

And now the star chamber of the IOC may be reviewing olive oil testing.  Any bets that they will declare the taste test “subjective,” and put it on a fast track to extinction?

Let’s get one thing straight: a well-trained taste panel is not subjective.  In fact, it is more objective, and vastly more useful in determining olive oil quality, than the chemical tests currently used on olive oil.  Ironically, it was the IOC itself which invented the test, starting in the early 1990s – back when the organization still served the interests of quality olive oil producers and consumers, and hadn’t yet become what it is today: a trade organization and lobbying group for bulk oil bottlers.  IOC researchers spent years studying the sensory science and robust statistical methods on which they eventually built the official taste test protocol.  They laid out every detail of this protocol, leaving nothing to chance: the training and ring-testing of taste panels, each consisting of 8-12 members; the design of the tasting room with its formica booths and thermostat-regulated glass warmers; even the shape of the official tasting glass.  The result is a highly reliable, mathematically robust system for revealing whether an olive oil has taste flaws or not.  (Tasters can also tell you all about the positive characteristics of good oils, but this isn’t part of olive oil law.)  Remember, the 17 official taste flaws which the IOC identified – “rancid,” “musty,” “fusty,” “grubby” and the rest – aren’t food snobbery, but indicators of specific chemical problems in an oil, which in turn indicate problems in its taste and health properties.  In many ways, the taste panel is more sensitive than machines: after all, our olfactory apparatus can pick up certain aromas in parts per trillion.  Most importantly, while the majority of chemical tests can be gamed, you can’t fool a good taste panel with bad oil.

For this reason, bad oil makers have always hated the official taste test, and see now as a good time to jettison it.  Spain has just had two record olive harvests in a row, each producing more than 1.4 million tons of olive oil, much of which isn’t anywhere near extra virgin grade.  Oil prices are at an 11-year low (producers in Andalucia have racked up 4 straight years of losses, totalling €2.5 billion over four years), and many hundreds of thousands of tons of olive oil are sitting in tanks around Spain – a good deal of which is subsidized by EU and Spanish governments – waiting for the price to rise.  Except that olive oil isn’t wine.  Inexorably, with every passing day, olive oil gets worse.  It’s like storing milk and hoping its value will increase.

Now that Big Oil has a bumper crop of pseudo-extra virgin oil to sell, it seems determined to get rid of the best tool for telling bad oils from good: our senses of taste and smell.

photo by Francesca Mueller

To hone your own sensory skills in olive oil, take a course at ONAOO, the oldest olive oil sensory school in the world, located in Imperia, Italy, or at the University of California, Davis.  (ONAOO also offers an online course.)

(More on this topic here.)

These are historic days in olive oil.  In the last three weeks I’ve participated in several gatherings that felt to me like milestones in oil quality, none of which, I believe, would have happened even a year ago.

On January 12^th, I spoke at the Olive Oil Flavor & Quality, a seminar in Napa valley California co-sponsored by The Culinary Institute of America and the UC Davis Olive Center, to educate buyers and chefs in the retail, food service, and food distribution sectors – people who aren’t buying olive oil off the shelf in supermarkets, but in bulk, often in enormous quantities, for restaurants, hotels, hospitals and elsewhere.  I’ve been to many olive oil conferences before, but this the first time I’ve seen one to educate buyers who usually act on price far more than quality – finally someone is preaching not to the converted, but to those who often have little idea what quality olive oil really is, but buy vast amounts of the stuff.  People who a year ago were, in most cases, asking exclusively for low-cost olive oil are now starting to ask about quality – and to shun fraudulent oils.

There were chefs, oil producers from four continents, importers, food writers, store managers, even a few adulterators in the audience!  Paul Vossen, experienced agronomist and sensory expert, gave a great speech about how olive oil is made and where things can go wrong (which should be available at the conference website soon, along with other presentations), and talks and demos by top chefs Bill Briwa and Paul Bartolotta and by the Culinary Institute’s strategic leader Greg Drescher, highlighted a fascinating and challenging day, during which I saw a remarkable level of interest and wide-open debate.  (See the Olive Oil Times’ coverage of the event here.)

A week later, on January 19^th, at the first annual Olive Conference in Dixon, California, 300 olive farmers gathered to talk about working together to protect and grow their industry, through a federal marketing order that would set and enforce a tough new quality standard in olive oil, first on American-made olive oil, then on foreign product as well.  This time, folks who until recently had preferred not to work together – and who often, in the fiercely independent way of farmers, had mistrusted one another – had now come together to plan a join way forward.  A superb presentation by Gregg Kelley, head of California Olive Ranch, set the tone for the meeting, and the industry overview by Paul Miller, of the Australian Olive Association, was one of the best presentations I’ve ever seen, drawing on his decade-long experience in the trenches of the olive oil quality battle throughout the world.

Then, after one more week, on January 26^th, I testified with a number of others at the California State Senate hearing on olive oil quality, where the widespread problems in the industry, including rampant olive oil fraud, were openly discussed before a panel of state senators, all of whom followed proceedings with rapt attention.  (One senator called this meeting the most interesting informational hearing he’d ever attended.)  Watch the proceedings, including a magnificent outing of olive oil fraudsters by Mike Bradley, which brought down the house.  (More here and here.)

These are just highlights from what has been a remarkable two months in olive oil.  I’ll be writing more about each of these events in greater detail, in forthcoming posts over the coming days, but for now, I’ll say that America is finally taking its first real strides towards taking the lead in world olive oil quality.  An enormous amount of work remains to be done, by oil-makers, regulators and consumers – and everyone in between – but momentum is building.  Up with Truth in Olive Oil!

 (photo by Francesca Mueller)

As announced, I’ve compiled a guide to getting great oil (there’s a permanent tab in my navigation bar under Great Olive Oil, called “Great Olive Oils of the World” that will take you there).  It’s still work in progress, and will grow and evolve a great deal over the coming months and years, so check in again soon for updates.  This is my personal first cut at places to get great olive oil in America, and brands from various parts of the world to watch for.  For now my focus is on the North American market, though this will also evolve with time.

In the Producers & vendors by state section, I mention both producers – growers and millers – who grow their own olives and make their own oil (primarily in California), and retailers who sell fine oils made for the most part by others.  In the list of Selected brands by nation – for now Italy, Spain and Greece – I’ve listed brands that I’ve tried and loved, or know through totally reliable sources, though not all of these brands are currently distributed in the US.  (I’m working on fixing this, too!)

This list does not include all, or even most, of the best oils in the world – I’ll insert many hundreds more oils over time.  Just to take two examples:  1) I haven’t mentioned a single Australian olive oil, though on average Australian oils may be the highest quality on earth – a generous range of Australian oils are coming soon; and 2) by rights Costco should be on this list, because though I haven’t been happy with every oil I’ve found in their stores, I’ve found their Kirkland store brand to be acceptable, and the Corto Olive oils which they sell to be both very good and reasonably-priced.

Despite its current limitations, this list is the first resource of its kind, in a market where labels on olive oil bottles simply don’t indicate the quality of the oil inside, and where trust in a person, a brand, a store, or an institution is the only way to ensure you’re getting excellent oil.

Apologies to everyone who has been asking for — and demanding — the buyer’s guide and list of great oils, promised in bold letters at the top of this website.

First of all, you are right:  these should be available here by now.  Mea culpa, mea tantissima culpa.

Now two confessions.

First, I’m having some technical challenges with this brand new website, which I’m fixing as rapidly as my book tour engagements will allow.  Hence the delay in getting the Buyer’s Guide available.  But it will be available soon.  (Note that a Buyer’s Guide is already available as an appendix in my book, Extra Virginity: the Sublime and Scandalous World of Olive Oil)

Second, as you can imagine, drawing up a reliable list of brands and retailers of fine olive oil, state by state, is an enormously complex task.  Each state, sometimes each county, is different.  What a given retail chain offers in one store may differ radically from what they offer just across town. And since we simply can’t rely on labels to tell us what’s inside an olive oil bottle, I’m relying on my own personal experience, and on the wonderful advice of my olive oil braintrust – the people I’ve come to know and trust over the years, who really know oil.

This information will be available to you, in beta form, as soon as is humanly possible.

Meantime, thanks for your patience.  And for your impatience, which underscores to me how many people are hungering for great oil!

Photo: Simon Lee

Over the last five years, while writing Extra Virginity, I’ve immersed myself in olive oil. I’ve traveled on 4 continents, meeting olive millers and oil-bottlers, lipid chemists and fraud investigators, oil-making monks and oil crooks, chefs and government regulators and oil sommeliers, as well as countless eager consumers, some of them life-long experts, others enjoying their first taste of great oil. In the process I’ve learned a lot about one of humankind’s most magnificent foods, this essence of health and flavor. I’ve met olive growers and oil-makers whose whose divine nectars deserve to be celebrated around the world, treated with reverence and gratefulness. And I’ve seen that they’re losing their shirts.

Yes, losing their shirts. Because for all the things that are right about olive oil, there’s a whole lot that’s wrong. Again and again I’ve witnessed the same bizarre drama. Olive oil bottles labeled with fancy phrases – “cold pressed,” “made in Italy,” “first pressed,” “extra-light,” “pure,” and the ever-present “extra virgin” – that are meaningless, and often downright lies, false virgins selling at a fraction of the price of true extra virgin olive oil, which systematically undercut honest producers. Faced with this situation, governments do nothing, oil buyers turn a blind eye, big bottlers and oil-traders pocket the cash. Consumers everywhere are systematically defrauded, and honest growers go bankrupt. Over the last five years I’ve seen one of the world’s greatest foods reach a breaking point, where the future of quality oil is in question. It makes no sense, but it’s happening now.

Over the last few months, as Extra Virginity has approached publication, I’ve begun to feel a weird sense of déjà vu. Sure, I’ve been writing about this wierdly distorted drama for the last five years, but it seems much longer than that – like I’ve known it since childhood. This situation is so contradictory, so paradoxical, that it feels like a fable. Now, as my book is released, I’ve finally identified this fable. I saw it again while reading a bedtime story to my 4-year-old daughter Rebecca.

Today’s bizarre olive oil market is perfectly captured in Hans Christian Andersen’s classic tale, “The Emperor’s New Clothes.” As you’ll recall, it’s the story of an incurable fashion victim of a monarch who learns of two celebrated weavers who make wondrous and beautiful fabrics – so exalted, in fact, that stupid or unworthy people can’t even see them. The emperor decides he simply must have a suit made from this splendid stuff, and pays the weavers a vast sum of money. The weavers, of course, are clever fraudsters, who day and night make a great show at their empty looms, weaving imaginary yarns and slicing the air with huge shears. But since the emperor and his court believe their fabrics can only be seen by clever and worthy people, none of the imperial ministers dare to admit they see nothing at all. Nor does the worried emperor himself, when the day comes to try on his marvellous new outfit. “It has my highest approval,” he says. Then he knights the swindlers, and gives them little crosses to wear in their buttonholes

The day His Majesty displays his new clothes to his admiring subjects, the weavers undress him, and in an elaborate pantomime, drape him in their airy handiwork. To cries of “Magnificent! Excellent! Unsurpassed!” from the entire retinue, and oohs and aaahs from the bewildered crowd, the Emperor strides buck naked through the streets of the capital.

It takes the voice of a child to bring everyone to their senses. As the Emperor marches along, chilly but dignified, a child calls out, “But he has nothing on!” Soon the whole town is saying the same – saying what even a child can see, but until now, no adults have trusted themselves to speak aloud. Yet the Emperor continues the procession to the end. “This procession must go on,” he tells himself, and he walks more proudly than ever, while his noble subjects hold high a train that isn’t there.

We’ve reached this point in the story of olive oil. The emperor is naked, and has been naked for decades. Now and then a child-like voice has called out this news: detailed surveys in the US, Spain, Australia, Germany, South Africa and elsewhere have revealed that the majority of supermarket extra virgins aren’t extra virgin. Oils like this not only lack the superior taste and health qualities of real extra virgin olive oil, but are often awash in free radicals, sometimes worse. Yet despite this patent misrepresentation, and the relentless damage that cut-rate oils do to the business of honest oil-makers, no government has yet made a clear and courageous stand.

The story of olive oil can’t end like the Anderson’s tale, with the absurd procession going on ad infinitum. It’s time for consumers to learn what good oil is, and then to speak up for it – celebrating great oils and the people who make them, criticizing fake extra virgins and those who sell them, insisting that public officials take action. I hope Extra Virginity, and this new site www.extravirginity.com, will add to the growing chorus, demanding with ever more insistence Truth in Olive Oil.