Italian Extra Virgin Olive Oil is like “French Wine” or “Swiss Chocolate” or “German Cars”… Italy isn’t the largest producer of Olive Oil (Spain is) but Italian Extra Virgin Olive Oil is in its own class… not to take anything away from any other country as there is certainly high quality products elsewhere, possibly superior (let’s not get crazy) but we’re talking about marketing and image not facts.

In much of Italy, olive oil is produced from small family groves where they care for their own trees, pick their own olives and bring them to local mills to produce their oil.  Many families only produce enough olive oil for personal use but larger groves may also have additional oil to sell.

The small mills that are very common throughout the south (as I’m sure they are in other areas as well) press the olives for area farmers and in turn will take payment in cash or in oil.  Pretty straight forward right?

The mills that have accepted payment in oil now have a good amount of oil that they need to sell, so they call or are called upon by wholesalers.  The mills will watch the market price of oil and hold onto it if it is low, sell it if it is high (the market game.) Once they decide to sell, the wholesaler shows up with a truck, sucks up the oil and takes it away… simple right?  The problem is, there is only one “wholesaler” in our area of Calabria…. you would think there would be some competition wouldn’t you? NOPE.  Is it surprising? NOPE… but that’s another story.

This wholesaler is from another region of Italy, so after he sucks the “life” out of Calabria (or parts of it at least) he returns to his region where the company either sells it in bulk or bottles it or mixes it with seed oil or takes a bath in it… it doesn’t really matter at that point.  So the wonderful oil that is produced in Calabria and other areas of the south is taken away to other regions and sold as “their oil”… so in the eyes of the world, the best olive oil is made where? I would guess that most people would say Tuscany… not because the world has tasted Tuscany’s local oil (which is wonderful) but because the south, which is the leading producer of olive oil in Italy is supplying the company’s based in Tuscany with oil to sell to the world.  I would love to say that I’m upset that southern Italy isn’t getting recognized but to be honest I’d rather not have the world know because by the time they actually taste that bottle of olive oil it may be mixed with Spanish oil, Turkish oil, Greek oil, hazelnut oil or maybe even motor oil!

So the moral of the story is, no matter what region’s olive oil you prefer: buy local or buy from a small company that supports local farmers and you’ll taste a world of difference.

Like many small Italian towns, San Michele, a small village in Calabria (provincia di Catanzaro) is a shadow of what it used to be. We often joke that the sheep and chickens outnumber the people and since I estimate there are 20-30 permanent residence that currently live there, it’s more than likely. It swells slightly in summer as people return to their family homes for vacation. My father was born there in 1950 and left in 1968 for greener pastures, like many of his family and friends.

A large group gathers on the church steps in San Michele (Date and photographer unknown)

Summer Afternoons:
The clock in the piazza would toll every 15 minutes and tell all who heard it the time. Each deep toll would mark the hour and each higher pitched toll marked increments of 15 minutes. This happened day and night 365 and as you can imagine 12:45 was annoying. I would wake from my afternoon nap, walk up the street past the piazza and glare at the clock tower with a look that clearly expressed my thought (stupid clock tower.) I vividly remember the scene of Italian men playing cards as I entered the town’s only bar. The room with cement walls and tiled floor was a cool retreat from the summer sun and there was always a chance that one of dad’s childhood friends or cousins would recognize me, and instruct the barista to get me a gelato of my choice. There was a colorful picture menu of the gelato selection on the wall, most were 200 lire but the good ones were 500. Beyond the chatter of the smoke filled card room and past the pinball machine was a back door that led outside to the bar’s bocce court where I would find the real action. I would carefully and quietly enter, find a spot on the bocce court wall and crouch down to watch. It was a completely different world to me. The fig trees created a boarder around the court and beyond them were walls, so that the only entrance was the only exit. The vegetation among the figs was allowed to grow at will. To me it seemed like a small jungle as I watched the lizards pop in and out of cracks and holes looking for a sun spot. Figs and fig leaves were scattered on the playing surface and would become part of the game as clearing them would only take time that no one seemed to have. The smell of cigarettes would mingle with those of flowers and herbs from beyond the walls and bestemmie would fly from the mouths of unhappy players. The bocce balls would make a loud crack as they slammed each other or the wooden boards that formed the boarder of the court, and teammates would give unsolicited advice on what each should do with their remaining balls. I would examine each player, how they looked, how they played, who they might be…. a cousin or a friend and then wonder how many times they played there before. After a few rounds however, I would bore…. maybe I’ll head to the piazza to see if there’s anyone to play with. I hope I get a gelato on the way out.

A photo from the window of my father’s family home (circa 1987)