LOCATION AND CLIMATE

 

As you might expect, olives grown in cooler areas where there is more moisture (rainfall and dew) exhibit leaner, more restrained characteristics.  This doesn’t however mean that great oil can now be made in Iceland – you need a minimum amount of sunshine to make your Extra Virgin Olive Oil taste remarkable, similarly to tomatoes or stone fruit.

Olive trees are sensitive to winter freeze (the Casaliva cultivar is more resistant to cold, hence being grown in the Garda region).  It is also easier to farm organically where the climate is more stable and less chemical sprays are required to keep the trees healthy.

OLIVE MATURITY

 

Here’s the thing – all olives are green.  When they become fully mature, they turn black.
Olive maturity at the time of harvest is a major factor in flavour and quality: olives harvested earlier (green olives) feature more bitter, grassy characteristics, with lower yields and with the highest anti-oxidant content.  The oil is a much more intense green colour and has a longer shelf-life.  In terms of production, milling can take longer with green olives (a longer malaxation - the action of slowly churning milled olives to release droplets of oil - is needed and can be more complicated) but the results are far superior!  Don’t choose olive oil from over mature fruit: it lacks all the potential goodness and flavour.

ATTENTION TO DETAIL IN GROVE AND MILL

 

People who care passionately about what they make and follow it personally every day have the capacity to create products with far higher quality, with integrity, and that taste of where they come from.  They are also able to do this by caring for the environment they inhabit.

FRANTOIO DI RIVA BOX

This box contains 6 bottles of extra virgin olive oil made exclusively by Frantoio di Riva from groves on the banks of lake Garda.

Frantoio di Riva, 46°PARALLELO green label x 3 bottles (50cl)
Frantoio di Riva, 46°PARALLELO organic white label x 1 bottle (50cl)
Frantoio di Riva, 46°PARALLELO blue label x 1 bottle (50cl)
Frantoio di Riva, ULIVA Garda Trentino DOP x 1 bottle (50cl)

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Frantoi_Roasted_Seabass
June 18, 2016 In Recipes, Summer

Baked Seabass fillets

This is too easy not to share. The fish itself takes 10 minutes to cook and 2 minutes to prep (if your fishmonger is filleting seabass, a little longer if you do it yourself). It goes well with roasted new potatoes, roast tomatoes and some greens as accompaniment.  It’s a very light and tasty meal. In Italian seabass is branzino.

Ingredients

Per person

1 x 200 gram seabass fillet

a dash of white wine

a little bit of flat leaf parsley

plus side ingredients as you prefer.

Which EVOO to use?

Frantoio di Riva, Uliva. This oil is 95% Casaliva but has an important 5% of Frantoio included which gives it a little backbone to carry the branzino and it works really well with tomatoes too.

Frantoi Cutrera, Grand Cru Nocellara Etnea.  The olives for this oil are grown at high altitude on volcanic soil so the oil is highly herbaceous featuring oregano, Jerusalem sage and cut grass making it a fabulous partner to seabass.

Method

  1. Rinse the fish and place in a piece of tin foil, big enough to enclose it.
  2. Salt, pepper and place a couple of sprigs of parsley on top of the fish.
  3. Sprinkle a little of your everyday olive over the fish
  4. Pour the wine in to the parcel, and securely wrap up so that there are no air gaps.
  5. You can cook immediately or leave in the fridge for a few hours. Cooking time is 10 minutes, in an oven at 180C. But consider that you will want to make your side dishes – roast cherry tomatoes are particularly good with branzino, as well as roasted courgette, roasted new potatoes, baked aubergine and any summer vegetables that lend themselves to roasting.
  6. After cooking, open the parcel and plate each fish with your vegetables and sprinkle some fresh EVOO on the fish before serving.
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