Harvesting the olives to turn them into liquid gold.

Several members of the Gardening Club joined us on our finca last week  to bring in the olive harvest and learn how the olives are processed to convert them to olive oil.

 

Olives are harvested using nets , which are quite simply the most practical way to ensure that everything that falls off ends up in the mill. As with many dry  fincas, and by dry I mean non-irrigated , our trees were originally planted by the family to catch water where it fell, which means close to waterways to soak up residual waters, so of course this translates into the most inconvenient places they could possibly plant them, on slopes and along the edge of the rambla(natural water course.).

Everything slopes down, the olives rolling off into the rambla, so nets have to be laid below the trees, with a cunning system of propping up  the end nearest to the edge  with small piles of stones to catch the runners.

We normally lay one net either side, overlapping, and use clothes pegs to peg the nets around the trunk tightly as the olives will inevitably find the gap around the trunk and sit in a little pool at the base if the nets aren't secured in this way.

 

Picking is done by running hands down along the branches, one at a time, using the thumb and  forefinger in a  combing action.

Well-managed commercial farms with irrigation use a large comb to do this, which can be run down the hanging branches and those with heavier crops use a mechanized piece of equipment which looks somewhat like a strimmer, but for many smallholdings, the old -fashioned hand combing method is the most widely used.

Olives will quite happily survive without artificial irrigation, but will not crop as heavily as those that are irrigated, and it is important to choose the variety that best suits the soil and your cropping intentions, so it was interesting for the pickers  to see the huge differences in the types of olives that were sitting in the crates for processing, some huge black, shiny varieties, others much smaller, in pinky green tones, whilst others were very green and of medium size.

Our own are small, bur plentiful, and whilst some branches are literally dripping under the weight of olives, some have just a lone fruit hanging on the end, and of course, no matter how thoroughly a branch is worked through, there is always that moment when the ones that got away stand out a mile, just when you think you've finished the tree.

Its slow and laborious work, but there really is nothing quite like bringing in the olives on a warm autumn morning, with a group of friends chatting and working, and the moment when the nets are gathered in and the contents transferred into esparto baskets for bagging up is one of indescribable  pleasure for me. There really is nothing more authentically Spanish than a basket of blushing pink and purple olives, leaves scattered amongst them, set against the rusty tones of a hand woven basket.

These are the moments I came to Spain for

 

Whilst it's a good idea to remove branches and twigs, its not necessary to pick out every last leaf, although when the olives are processed a sample will be taken at random from each bag, so if they're full of leaves, the oil content measured from the sample will be lower and you'll get less oil for the olives.

 

But don't stress too much about picking out the leaves - it takes between four and five kilos of olives to make a single litre of oil, so you can waste a lot of time for nothing.

We often prune as we go along, particularly when top branches have grown too tall for picking easily which shouldn't happen on a well managed fince, but does here .

Pruning is normally carried out once the olives have been picked.

Once picked, olives should be taken to the processor within 24 hours as any damaged crops will start to rot quickly within the humid atmosphere of a sack.

 

On arrival at the processing plant, the full sacks are weighed in, then tipped into processing crates and a sample taken from each bag. Empty bags are then weighed to give a true weight. It's like a pantomime sometimes at the processing plants, the canny old boys jostling the sample to pick out the odd leaf or try to change a dodgy looking olive for a fat one, and accidentally standing on the weighing platform as the olives are being weighed in.

But the weighers are used to these antics and there's always a lot of good humoured banter whilst the crops are unloaded and the  anxious moment as the olives are assessed, crushed and tested, the volume of olive oil given in exchange depending on the oil content across the whole of the samples from every sack.

Theres's no point trying to submit dodgy olives, they'll spot them immediately and can reject the whole batch if there's a risk of them being too old or badly damaged, so don't even try.

If you need to take the crop in over a period of days, a tally is kept and exchanged for oil  at the end.

 

Once accepted, a slip of paper is given showing the amount of oil offered in exchange and  a small fee charged for pressing and the cost of the bottles in which to take it away. It usually ends up around 3 euros per 5 litres of oil.

This is then delivered in 5 litre bottles and that's it.

Simple.

 

Don't be shy to turn up with a couple of bucketfuls of olives, if there's not  enough to make up 5 litres, the extra oil needed to fill a 5 litre bottle can be purchased for a good price.

Whilst we were waiting for ours to be weighed  a car turned up with a solitary builders bucket full and left with a 5 litre bottle , and of course, some of the farmers arrive with trailers full of them, it really doesn't matter how few you have and it's such fun to proudly serve up fresh bread and ham and be able to say that the olive oil came from your own crop.

 

 

All the olives are pooled to make a communal oil. A finca can have its own pressing done if it has sufficient quantities, thousands of kilos,  but this is strictly controlled and quite unusual in this area, most people just pool their olives.

 

 

Processing.

 

Following weighing in, the olives go through a machine which separates out the leaves and any stones that may have ended up in the nets, as these can do a lot of damage to the processing machinery.

 

The second stage is to macerate the olives and mix them.

 The mixing process takes between 20 and 45 minutes and allows small oil droplets to combine into bigger ones. The paste is often heated to around 28 degrees, allowing the oil and water to separate more readily.

 

From here the oil and water is separated from the solids, now known as pomace, which was done by placing large stones on sacks filled with pomace and squeezing them in the past, but which today involves the use of a centrifugal chamber

Finally the oil and water are separated and the oil processed a little to reduce acidity and improve flavour before bottling. As the bottles head along the conveyor belt they're labeled, a process which fascinated the male members of the group, and all were surprised to see how cloudy the oil was when it first emerged, although it will clear within a couple of days to a mid-green colour.

Several people expressed their surprise at the technology involved and admitted that they had been expecting an old fashioned stone grinder instead of the technological processing plant that they actually saw.

 

Many thanks to all those who helped and we hope you enjoy your share of the oil and get as much pleasure out of using it as we do, and if you've still got olives sitting on the tree , don't be shy, get them down to a local processor and convert them into liquid gold.

 

Nets are available from most agricultural suppliers,  co-operatives and ferreterias. If you know someone who is a member of a co-operative, it's worth asking them to get them for you there,as it's usually the cheapest place. That also includes the almond co-operatives who also sell them. Buy larger rather than smaller.

We have some local ones listed for the Mazarron area in the Gardening directory, although this directory is still under construction so there are more to add, CLICK HERE.

 

The local olive processors for this area are

Almazara Gimenez Casanova

Carreterra Alhama-Fuente Alamo

Paraje Lo Jorge

Fuente Alamo

 

Tel 661 857 262

 

On the main road running from Fuente-Alhama, about 2 km out of Fuente. On the left hand side you will see a plastics factory and a sign for Almazara; the building is about 300mtrs down that road.

There is another one on the right hand side just before Totana, heading along the Mazarron Totana road.( If anyone has the address and tel no, please send through and we'll update this.)

 

Please feel free to send through details of your local co-operatives, agricultural suppliers and processors, so we can add them into the l

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