THE TASTE & COLOR

Our olive oil is characterised by a beautiful light green with a fruity aroma and a light biter and spicy taste experience. Both the taste and the colour of oil depends on the time of harvesting and on the type of trees. 

If we harvest in the first period (October) the olive is not still mature and hence the inside there is more chlorophyll that will give to the oil the colour green, while if we harvest later in November the olive is more mature, the chlorophyll is almost completely eliminated and hence is more yellow. This does not mean that a yellow olive oil is bad it just means probably together with author causes it was harvested very early int he autumn. As my ancestor before me I harvest always latest and hence the oil has a beautiful light green.

Our trees are of four different variety that blending together made this special taste derives from the bland of these four cultivation that are the typical of the Trasimeno lake area (the so called D.O.P. Olive oil):

• Leccino tree with green olives
• Frantoio tree with green olives
• Dolce agogia tree with a mix of green and pink olives
• Moraiolo tree with black olive

Its perfect balance is perfect for an healthy Mediterranean diet with lower cholesterol and higher percentage of Omega 3. Is perfect for both your salad, pasta, fish and meat. We use it also for cooking so to avoid the unhealthy fat like butter and other type of fat olive oils.

HOW WE HARVEST

La Dogana is an “agriturismo” which means a farm hotel with 32 hectare of park and many olive trees all around the venue, not even us know the exact number but they should be around 4.000 all with organic certificate, from my ancestors to me we all believe in preserving the nature and its circle without putting any pesticide in our fields.

We continue to follow my ancestors philosophy of sharing our olive trees and their harvest with families of the local town. Each family has its own small number of trees that harvest and take care every year.

Most of our trees are hundreds of years old while another part has about 30/40 years old and were planted by my grand- mother Lucia de Ferrari. You can spot a centenary olive tree looking to its trunk that are very big with lots of knots and normally they one split in the middle.

Our olive trees are all around the property and because of their age they are positioned in natural terracing where is almost always impossible to go with machines, only a small portion of them are in the lower part of the property in a level ground field. As a consequence, we alway pick the olives by hand. We use this method also in the one at the level ground because we like to preserve the philosophy of harvesting of our ancestors and in addition it cause less harm to the tree because is a more gentle harvest respect to machine.

The phase of harvesting are very simple: we put some big nets under the tree and then 2 people have a beam with on the top a rake that shakes and let the olive fall down into the nets. A third person with an ancient beautiful wooden utensil “clean” the olives dividing the leaves from the olives. Then they are ready to be brought to the mill.

OUR AGRICOLTURE PHILOSOPHY

We believe to create something that protects the value of our nature and respects its circle and all the creatures that depend on it. We do not put any type of pesticide in our fields hence also our extra virgin olive oil is completely pesticide free. We fertilise it with our adopted horses that eat the grass on the fields and create the cycle of fertilisation without any additional substances.

The process of creating organic olive oil has an important different first step; as stated by the Italian agriculture law, to produce organic olive oil the olives should be the first to go into the mill press, that is cleaned the night before with specific products to not be contaminated by the other olives that have pesticides. To go in the press for first has a higher price and this is one of the many reasons why organic olive oil is more expensive then others.

We bring our olives to the amazing olive oil Mill called Coopertiva Oleificio Pozzuolese where Emanuele is an amazing manager of the mill. Since the first time we met I spoke with him I had the sensation of have met an incredible person in love with his work and always there for us when we need it. He is THE BEST! Moreover, the mill is a cooperative of many small land owners that supports the work of the small against the big monopolies and this type philosophy exactly represents also our principles, it was love at sight.