Depending on the physiological conditions, weather, water supply, age and size, an olive tree bears up to 300 kg of olives. To produce olive oil, five kilograms of olives make up to one liter of oil.The quality of the oil is significantly influenced by the time of harvest.
A basic distinction is made between manual and mechanized harvesting. Manual harvesting is very time-consuming and personnel-intensive and therefore represents an essential cost factor in the production of an olive oil. With this traditional method, nets are spread out under the trees and the olives are separated from the branches by gentle strokes of the sticks, use of combs, etc. Hand picking is even more time- consuming, which is mainly practiced by small companies that do not damage the grapes and want to select them carefully in order to produce very high-quality oils. The mechanized harvest is done by vibrating machines, which can only be used in olive groves, which are suitable for this application due to their topographical position, tree density and pruning. Little time should pass between harvesting and processing, if possible, this should be done on the same day, a time difference of 4 hours is considered the optimum.
The olives are washed in the oil mill, crushed together with the core and finally the juice is obtained from the fruit by pressing or centrifugation.Olive oil can be extracted in batch operation (traditional process) or in continuous operation (modern process). The latter is becoming increasingly popular in Europe for reasons of economy and quality.
Cantina24 only offers good quality extra virgin olive oil.