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Olive oil

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  • Wednesday2000
    Wednesday2000 Posts: 7,371 Forumite
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    I was listening to a Dr Rangan Chatterjee podcast yesterday and he had someone on, a Spanish guy, (Miguel something?) who was talking about olive oil. He was saying that it is best to check that the oil comes from only one country of origin. He said the best olive oils were from Spain, Italy and Greece.

    He said his family in Spain usually use the yellow oils for cooking and the green oils for drizzling over salads and stuff.

    I was actually going to look for some green olive oil to buy today. :)

    I threw away the last of my margarine the other day (luckily, I was almost at the end anyway) as I heard on another podcast how bad it is for your body. The man was saying to just get rid of any cheap vegetable oils and marg from your kitchen.
  • Blackbeard_of_Perranporth
    Blackbeard_of_Perranporth Posts: 7,605 Forumite
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    Olive oil was Popeye’s lass.
  • Katiehound
    Katiehound Posts: 7,557 Forumite
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    maisie_cat wrote: »
    I remember reading a few years ago that more Italian Olive oil is sold worldwide than is produced. The Italians import cheaper olives or olive oil from other countries .
    -

    If I remember rightly Turkey produces a lot of olive oil which is exported and sold as from that country of origin, which I suspect is Italy

    I seem to remember also that food could be labelled as from the country where finally packaged rather than where it was produced ie Polish chickens became Irish!! but maybe that little loophole has been closed
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  • silverwhistle
    silverwhistle Posts: 3,791 Forumite
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    If you read the Italian press there have been various scandals with olive oil over the years and the Finance Police get reported arresting various people.
    If you go for specific areas you'll be safer as the frauds tends to involve generic oils. I buy direct from a specific puglian producer when I'm on holiday in Italy - different styles of EVO including orgnic - and top up in the supermarket here: Aldi's Kalamata and Puglian are decent.
  • Pollycat
    Pollycat Posts: 34,688 Forumite
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    Wednesday2000 wrote: »
    I was listening to a Dr Rangan Chatterjee podcast yesterday and he had someone on, a Spanish guy, (Miguel something?) who was talking about olive oil. He was saying that it is best to check that the oil comes from only one country of origin. He said the best olive oils were from Spain, Italy and Greece.

    He said his family in Spain usually use the yellow oils for cooking and the green oils for drizzling over salads and stuff.

    I was actually going to look for some green olive oil to buy today.     :)

    I threw away the last of my margarine the other day (luckily, I was almost at the end anyway) as I heard on another podcast how bad it is for your body. The man was saying to just get rid of any cheap vegetable oils and marg from your kitchen.
    The problem is - because of the colour of the bottle, it's hard to tell the colour of the oil.
    And - as far as I know - it doesn't mention colour on bottles.
  • bouicca21
    bouicca21 Posts: 6,514 Forumite
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    Lots of interesting comments. I too the plunge yesterday and bought my usual Lidl cheapie (which claims to be Spanish) and also a more expensive Italian. It wil be interesting to see if I can tell the difference!
  • kim81
    kim81 Posts: 15 Forumite
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    We get ours in Litre Coke bottles when relatives visit from Greece. Ours is always really bright green and we use it for everything.
  • Pollycat
    Pollycat Posts: 34,688 Forumite
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    bouicca21 wrote: »
    Lots of interesting comments. I too the plunge yesterday and bought my usual Lidl cheapie (which claims to be Spanish) and also a more expensive Italian. It wil be interesting to see if I can tell the difference!
    Pour a little of each on a saucer and dip some bread in it.
    Suck the olive oil into your mouth from the bread and taste it.


    This is how an olive oil museum does their tasting sessions in Parga, Greece.
    The lady who does the tasting orders special bread from the local bakery with very little taste so you can taste the olive oil better.


    Let us know what you think. :)
  • Wednesday2000
    Wednesday2000 Posts: 7,371 Forumite
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    Pollycat wrote: »
    The problem is - because of the colour of the bottle, it's hard to tell the colour of the oil.
    And - as far as I know - it doesn't mention colour on bottles.

    I looked in my local Turkish shop yesterday and it had quite few bottles of olive oil with lots of countries of origin.

    I ended up buying Filippo Berio Italian Extra Virgin Olive Oil in the end. I have a cheaper yellow one in the cupboard just from Tesco as well for cooking.

    It's probably still an improvement on using margarine anyway.:D
  • Pollycat
    Pollycat Posts: 34,688 Forumite
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    Wednesday2000 wrote: »
    I looked in my local Turkish shop yesterday and it had quite few bottles of olive oil with lots of countries of origin.

    I ended up buying Filippo Berio Italian Extra Virgin Olive Oil in the end. I have a cheaper yellow one in the cupboard just from Tesco as well for cooking.

    It's probably still an improvement on using margarine anyway.:D
    I think it's common to state country of origin but you can't see the colour and it doesn't state whether it's green or not on the bottle.

    I've used Filippo Berio before.


    I usually have some EV olive oil that we've brought back from Greece that I use for salads.
    Low acidity is good.
    I have some from Crete that says 'premium, almost zero acidity' and it's 0.2 acidity.
    IIRC, when I was looking for good quality olive oil in supermarkets here, the acidity wasn't stated on the bottles.

    A friend goes to Spain and Greece and will often bring me a small bottle of good quality oil and we reciprocate on our travels to Greece.
    It's nice to taste different oils.
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