I love olive oil. I don’t believe that is anybody who tasted olive oil and didn’t love it. From my childhood the taste, the texture, the color, the feel, the mystique of olive oil, fascinated me.
This precious liquid that Homer called “liquid gold” was a necessity in our home and every one’s I knew. We didn’t only used it to prepare our food, we used it to light the lamp, to sooth our wounds, to massage our skin.
Olive oil has been the magical ingredient for religious ceremonies for anointing kings and in ancient Greece athletes oiled their bodies before participating in any exercises. The gladiators in Rome oiled their bodies before they engaged in any competition.
The Greek Father of Medicine Hippocrates recommended olive oil for treating pain and diseases.
Scholars today believe that olive oil was used to ease the move of stones for the build of the great wonders of the world.
The olive oil was one of the most important commodities and played a major role in the development of the Mediterranean economy. It was a hot trend then and has lasted. Spain who was a part of the Roman Empire in the first century AD, considered to have the finest quality of olive oil and it was transported all over Mediterranean.
In 1500 AD this super food was brought to Mexico, then to South America and later to California. In the beginning olives were used for olive oil and slowly about the end of the nineteenth century, table olives became a hot product.
The Californian extra virgin olive oil is comparable to the European one and is the focus on health and nutrition.