A short guide to extra-virgin olive oil

Published 11:45 am Tuesday, September 1, 2009

I went looking for extra tomatoes at the farmers market this weekend and I got another “extra” as well: a refresher course about extra-virgin olive oil from Keith Voight, who owns All Things Olive, an online retailer based in Kensington, Md. He has sold exclusively California extra-virgin olive oils for five years.

Real extra-virgin olive oil is pure, raw, unprocessed and unrefined, with no defects in taste or odor and with less acidity (oleic acid) than virgin or pure olive oils. And it has to be extracted from the olives within a day of when they are picked, to keep that acidity low.

The designation “extra-virgin” means something different in the United States than it does in Italy, Spain, France or Israel. Those four countries have their own olive oil control authorities; real extra-virgin olive oil from those nations should carry a seal on the bottle. In the United States, the USDA grades olive oils as “fancy,” “choice” or “standard,” with fancy serving as the equivalent of extra-virgin. Many oils produced in the States call themselves extra-virgin, but that may not be the case.

Voight’s line is all-Californian because the state has its own olive oil control board (look for state-made oils with a COOC seal) and takes its olive oil production seriously, with a study center at University of California-Davis and various organizations aimed at standardizing and improving quality.

Olives pressed for extra-virgin oil can be picked early or late in the fall-to-winter season. Those picked early are green and can be used to produce extra-virgin olive oils with a bitter edge. Those picked late are more ripe and black, and can produce with a flavor toward the milder end of the spectrum.