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Olive Oil - Pisa in Tuscany

Olive oil is one of the most typical products of Tuscan agriculture and a symbol of our cuisine, a well-known product which has recently been rediscovered together with the flavours of classic home cooking. Some restaurants even offer a list of choice olive oils in addition to that of wines. Extra-virgin oil is a renowned high-quality oil, but not everybody knows what this quality is due to, or what makes olive oil different from husk oil. Extra-virgin and virgin olive oil are obtained by pressing olives at temperatures which do not cause any chemical alterations. On the other hand, refined olive oil, olive oil and husk oil are extracted through chemical processes, and are therefore lower-quality products. Olive-growing has a very old tradition in the province of Pisa and in the rest of Tuscany. There are several types of olive trees, and consequently of oil, with differences in harvesting times and methods as well as in olive preservation. Further differences are due to such factors as microclimates and soil composition.

OLIVE OIL OF THE PISAN MOUNTAINS: One cannot mention the Pisan olive oil without thinking of Buti, a small town in the Pisan Mountains which has always been widely appreciated for the quality of its oil production. Thanks to a favourable climate and a particularly suitable soil olive groves on small terraces have characterized the western slope of the Pisan Mountains ever since the Middle Ages. In Tuscany, different mixtures of the four main olive species (named leccino, moraiolo, frantoio and pendolino) are used, whereas at Buti and Calci olive trees are chiefly of the green frantoio type, which yields a golden-green oil. Its characteristics are due to careful selection of the olives, which are picked by hand directly from the tree and pressed “on site” without waiting for the natural ripening process to take place. There are different harvesting methods: the “bacchiatura” (pole beating), when the olives are beaten down with poles, the “brucatura” (browsing), with gatherers picking the olives by sliding their hands along the branches and, more recently, the typically orange plastic nets. The best oil is obtained by picking olives while their colour is changing from green to purple; then the olives are mechanically pressed without crushing the seeds. The product undergoes no manipulation or chemical refining, which enhances its flavour and makes it particularly tasty when savoured raw. In the Pisan Hills olive oil is produced almost everywhere: from Lari to Fauglia, from Peccioli to Terricciola. Trade fairs, feasts and festivals connected with locally produced olive oil are frequently held, especially in the autumn. The oil is tasted raw on a slice of bread which, in the different areas, is called bruschetta, fettunta or crogiantina.

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