Liquid gold – part 3
I can’t believe this is our third olive harvest and they keep coming earlier. Usually it is in November but this year it was mid October. Global warming? Whatever it was, this summer has been very dry and very strange. August was cool and cloudy while September and so far in October it has been scorching. It took its toll on the olives as they ripened very early but also many were dry and shrivelled. We also had a lot fewer and could only muster 6 bins and that was after scouring all our trees and even taking some from the abandoned field next door.
So I was a bit embarrassed to take our paltry crop to the lagar (factory) for pressing. However, I was very pleasantly surprised that our 140kgs produced 22 litres – more than last year which came from nearly 8 bins (240kgs). And in fact it was about the same weight as our first harvest which only produced 15 litres. All rather strange.
When I got the oil back to the house we were keen to compare it with last year’s which we are still using. The major difference is that this year’s crop is green and last year’s a lovely golden colour. Apparently this is normal as oil fresh from the press has the most intense olive flavours (and other taste characteristics such as pepperiness and bitterness) and a correspondingly deeper green colour. As the oil ages it will slowly turn more golden as last year’s has done, and like wine it gets better with age (up to a point) – Luis our neighbour is still using oil from a bumper crop he had four years ago. We also need to keep the bottles open for a week or so to let the oil “breathe” before storage.
In other news the hens have stopped their strike. The unseasonably hot weather in October combined with the shortening of the days seems to have blocked up the hens and one of them was even a bit poorly for a day – unheard of over the last year but not surprising given her state of being bunged up! After a week of hardly any eggs and very hot weather, the temperature has come down and yesterday we were back to three eggs so hopefully it was a temporary blip.
Meanwhile we are waiting for our first autumn rain – it is due to arrive on Saturday. As the ground is bone dry and like concrete it will be interesting to say the least. It should also start filling the well. We are right down to the last few drops and a few scary looking objects at the bottom are appearing through the shallow water…