Superior category olive oil obtained directly from olives & solely by mechanical means.
Ever look at the label on a can of olive oil and wonder what it all means? In this blog series, we’ll break it down for you.
In this installment, we’ll start with the words at the very top of our can of single-source extra virgin olive oil. It states, “Superior category olive oil obtained directly from olives & solely by mechanical means.” If you think this seems like an odd way to say “extra virgin olive oil,” you’re right. It’s the labeling requirement of European Union Regulation 2568/91, using their words for extra virgin olive oil, not ours.
So what does that all mean? Let’s go through it. There are three parts to it.
First, the olive oil is “superior category.” European Union law sets upper limits for how much acidity, peroxides, waxes, and ultraviolet absorption an olive oil may contain in order to be considered superior quality or extra virgin. We’ll have more blog posts that explain each of those chemical elements separately. For purposes of this portion of the label, the words “superior category” mean that samples of our olive oil have been sent to the laboratory for testing, and those samples have passed with flying colors. Oils that don’t meet the laboratory criteria cannot be called extra virgin, regardless of how they are made.
For the olive oil to be “superior category,” i.e., the best olive oil, it must also be 100% olive oil that would qualify as extra virgin. It cannot be blended with any non-extra-virgin olive oil.
Second, the oil must be “obtained directly from olives.” If you’ve watched our video on how it’s made, you have seen how at the mill the olives are crushed into a paste and malaxated. “Malaxated” just means the olive paste is stirred and kneaded so that the oil begins to separate from the mashed up olives. This is what it means to obtain the oil directly from the olives. This is also sometimes referred to as the “first press.”
That brings us to the third and final part of the phrase, that the oil must be obtained “solely by mechanical means.” Our oil is decanted from the malaxated paste described in the second step, which is a purely mechanical process. It consists of stirring, kneading, and decanting, without the use of any heat or chemicals. Kollias Olive Oil is always obtained solely by mechanical means.
After the oil has been separated, the remnants of the olive paste, sometimes called a “sludge,” are left behind. People have come up with ways of squeezing some additional, low-quality oil from the sludge using heat and / or chemical solvents and then refining it. This is referred to as “pomace” oil, and it’s how seed oils are commonly made. It’s also part of the reason seed oils are no good for you. Other producers do this, and in our view, they shouldn’t even be allowed to call their product olive oil. We never have and we never will.
In short, our single-source extra virgin olive oil meets and indeed exceeds all the criteria for the European Union labeling requirements, and thus our cans stated that it is “Superior category olive oil obtained directly from olives & solely by mechanical means.”
