World Olive Oil Competition 2023 Live Updates

Apr. 24 16:04 UTC

Lisa Anderson report­ing from Cape Town

Algerian pro­duc­ers are cel­e­brat­ing their best-ever results after tak­ing two Silver Awards for Huillerie Ouzellaguen’s medium Chemlali and Sarl Bio Lalla Meriem’s medium blend.

Winning these awards has been no mean feat, with local pro­duc­ers suf­fer­ing among oth­ers the effects of cli­mate change and dev­as­tat­ing wild­fires that rav­aged up to 15,000 hectares of olive trees in 2021.

The North African country’s pro­duc­ers first entered the NYIOOC in 2018, and per­sisted until they tasted their first vic­tory in 2021.

Apr. 21 14:24 UTC

OOT Staff report­ing from New York

After 20 days of reveal­ing the best extra vir­gin olive oil for 2023, NYIOOC orga­niz­ers said the live results roll­out for the Northern Hemisphere divi­sion will con­clude late next week. So far, 605 awards have been bestowed to pro­duc­ers in 21 coun­tries.

Apr. 21 12:56 UTC

Paolo DeAndreis report­ing from Rome

The coop­er­a­tive of Almazaras de la Subbetica, located in the Spain’s Sierra Subbéticas nat­ural park, has just won three Gold Awards and a Silver Award at the 2023 NYIOOC.

More than 6.800 olive grow­ers are part of the huge Cooperative which has won every year since its debut at the 2017 NYIOOC. ​“It means acknowl­edg­ing the work of a team, espe­cially in a year as dif­fi­cult as this, in which we are suf­fer­ing a severe drought,” Carmen Rodriguez Comino, a mar­ket­ing rep at the com­pany told us.

Apr. 20 13:26 UTC

Costas Vasilopoulos report­ing from Athens

Cypriot pro­ducer Atsas Organic Products received a Silver Award at the 2023 NYIOOC, the first acco­lade for the coun­try so far in the eleventh edi­tion of the World Olive Oil Competition.

The pro­ducer was awarded for the Atsas Silver Edition organic extra vir­gin, a medium blend made from Koroneiki and Kalamata olives.

The olive groves of Atsas lie in Cyprus’s buffer zone, also know as the ​“Green Line” — the bor­der strip that sep­a­rates the Greek-Cypriot and the Turkish-Cypriot com­mu­ni­ties of the island.

Apr. 20 13:01 UTC

Paolo DeAndreis report­ing from Rome

The Uncommon Time com­pany in Portugal has scored a Gold Award for its UT Bio, an organic blend from the Cobrancosa, Verdeal Trasmontana and Negrinha de Freixo cul­ti­vars. The pro­ducer had hoped to debut at the NYIOOC with a win.

“This medal is a very impor­tant dis­tinc­tion since it acknowl­edges our efforts and ded­i­ca­tion to this project, shows that we are on the right path and also proves the absolute qual­ity of our olive oil, as well as enhances our moti­va­tion and com­mit­ment to con­tinue to improve and to do even bet­ter,” Pedro Vilares, owner of the com­pany, told Olive Oil Times.

Vilares said the UT Bio comes from a small olive grove in the north of Portugal. ​“A very spe­cial place of unique char­ac­ter­is­tics in The Natural Park of Douro International.”

“We believe that the har­vest­ing of the olives at the right stage of fruit mat­u­ra­tion, the sus­tain­able use of water resources, inno­va­tion and rig­or­ous qual­ity con­trol through­out the entire process, from har­vest­ing to extrac­tion and pack­ag­ing makes all the dif­fer­ence,” he noted.

Apr. 20 12:38 UTC

OOT Staff report­ing from New York

Producers’ pages in the Official Guide to the World’s Best Olive Oils have been redesigned to include images of the farms, pro­duc­tion data and the peo­ple behind the top-rated brands. An expanded time­line details the pro­duc­er’s win­ning record over the years.

The updated pages enhance the edu­ca­tional expe­ri­ence for mil­lions of vis­i­tors and pro­vides for a more com­pre­hen­sive dis­cov­ery of the best extra vir­gin olive oils.

Apr. 20 12:30 UTC

Paolo DeAndreis report­ing from Rome

With its Praemium extra vir­gin olive oil, the Portuguese pro­ducer CARM has achieved yet another Gold Award at the 2023 NYIOOC, the sec­ond in a row for its organic blend. CARM Praemium is char­ac­ter­ized by its fruity and fresh fla­vor.

“As a pro­ducer I am doing what I like the most and thank­fully this is some­thing that is appre­ci­ated,” Filipe Madeira, owner of the Casa Agricola Roboredo Madeira (CARM), told Olive Oil Times. ​“It is very impor­tant that con­sumers have such a tool to guide them to the best choice [of olive oils],” he noted, refer­ring to the Official Guide to the World’s Best Olive Oils.

Apr. 20 12:26 UTC

Paolo DeAndreis report­ing from Rome

From the north­ern areas of Puglia, a net­work of small and very small pro­duc­ers join­ing the Albori project scored a Gold Award for their Albori Monocultivar Peranzana.

“We are very glad for such an award at our debut at the 2023 New York International Olive Oil Competition. Even hap­pier, con­sid­er­ing this is only the sec­ond sea­son we began our olive oil pro­duc­tion,” Luca Iannone, Albori’s project man­ager, told Olive Oil Times.

“We already had some sat­is­fac­tion in local com­pe­ti­tions but this sea­son we wanted to see how our unique prod­uct would fare on a world stage,” Iannone said. ​“It is very sig­nif­i­cant for us to give value to the very spe­cial prod­uct of our land, to acknowl­edge the high qual­ity of a long-stand­ing tra­di­tion.”

Apr. 20 12:08 UTC

Lisa Anderson report­ing from Cape Town

In July and August the chances for some Slovenian pro­duc­ers to win big at the NYIOOC seemed slim, as their olives dried out on the trees due to drought and very high tem­per­a­tures.

But in September heavy rains came and the fruits recov­ered, and the country’s pro­duc­ers had a sat­is­fac­tory har­vest in terms of both qual­ity and quan­tity.

As the fourth week of this year’s NYIOOC is wrap­ping up, Istrian oils from this har­vest have achieved four Gold Awards so far, the sec­ond-high­est num­ber since 2014, and there could be more to come.

Apr. 19 12:49 UTC

Lisa Anderson report­ing from Cape Town

Montenegro has built on their first vic­tory at the 2022 NYIOOC by secur­ing a Silver Award for pro­ducer Uljara Davidovic’s medium blend this year.

Last year, the owner of Uljara Davidovic, Stevo Davidović, won a Gold Award and helped another win­ner at the time, Barska Uljara, to pro­duce a prized oil.

These first wins at the NYIOOC came after Ćazim Alković, the pres­i­dent of the local Bar Olive Growers Association, pro­vided prospec­tive entrants with sup­port to eval­u­ate their oils and to raise entry fees.

Alković’s ini­tia­tive is inspired by his belief that the qual­ity of Montenegro’s olive oils is on par with their Croatian neigh­bors, but that the lat­ter has had the upper hand because of the sup­port they receive from their local pro­duc­ers’ orga­ni­za­tions.

Apr. 18 14:10 UTC

Lisa Anderson report­ing from Cape Town

Albanian pro­ducer The Illyrian Press earned a Gold Award for its organic medium Kalinjot mono­va­ri­etal. It is the first award ever earned by an Albanian pro­ducer at the World Olive Oil Competition, despite attempts going back to 2014.

The award-win­ning extra vir­gin was pro­duced from the country’s recent record-high har­vest, which ear­lier this year was pro­jected to yield an esti­mated 25,000 tons of olive oil, dou­ble the vol­ume of the pre­vi­ous one. Kalinjot is the most widely-grown cul­ti­var in Albania, account­ing for more than half of the country’s groves.

Even though Albania is a pro­lific olive oil pro­ducer, their indus­try is ham­pered by low prices and export­ing chal­lenges.

Apr. 17 15:17 UTC

Paolo DeAndreis report­ing from Rome

In its first par­tic­i­pa­tion in the NYIOOC World Olive Oil Competition, Cesira Olio scored a Gold Award for its blend Cesira Olio D’Oliva.

“As a new com­pany, the Gold Award is such an amaz­ing achieve­ment for us. We have so much trust in our part­ners that we truly believed we would do well in the com­pe­ti­tion. We have set a high stan­dard for our­selves and our oils and being able to achieve this award has pro­vided us with amaz­ing val­i­da­tion,” Brandi Muilenburg, owner of the com­pany, told Olive Oil Times.

According to the pro­ducer, the suc­cess is the out­come of the efforts of the company’s whole team. ​“Honestly, the secret is devel­op­ing a team and part­ners that love the land, the crop, and the oil. We could not have done this with­out them,” Muilenburg added.

Apr. 17 15:13 UTC

Paolo DeAndreis report­ing from Rome

Viveiros Monterosa in Portugal has just scored a new Gold Award with its Monterosa Macanilha, a mono­va­ri­etal which brings with it notes of herbs, flow­ers, almond, ripe olives and rose­mary. It is the ninth time in a row that the Portuguese pro­ducer wins one or more awards at the NYIOOC New York World Olive Oil Competition.

“Winning a Gold Award is very impor­tant for our brand to be rec­og­nized and to reaf­firm its qual­ity among our cus­tomers. In our par­tic­u­lar case, it is a con­sis­tency fac­tor that gives our cus­tomers con­fi­dence year after year in our olive oil grow­ing and pro­duc­tion process,” Antonio Duarte, owner at Viveiros Monterosa, told Olive Oil Times.

Duarte noted how each of the numer­ous details of the pro­duc­tion process is cru­cial to achieve high qual­ity olive oil pro­duc­tion. According to the pro­ducer, in the case of the mono­va­ri­etal EVOO derived from the cul­ti­var Macanilha de Tavira, expe­ri­ence mat­ters the most. ​“This native vari­ety of our region is an olive vari­ety that is very ver­sa­tile and per­fectly adapted to the Algarve cli­mate. As we have grown our vari­eties for 23 years now, we know very well what is the ideal time to har­vest and extract the olive oil,” he told us.

Apr. 17 15:08 UTC

Paolo DeAndreis report­ing from Rome

With its Coratina mono­va­ri­etal, Crea Farm from the Shizuoka Prefecture in Japan has once again tri­umphed at the NYIOOC New York World Olive Oil Competition, win­ning a Gold Award.

“Winning the 2023 NYIOOC is a great achieve­ment and an honor for us. It show­cases the qual­ity and excel­lence of our extra vir­gin olive oil, and it is a recog­ni­tion of our hard work and ded­i­ca­tion,” Tatsuya Okumura, man­ag­ing direc­tor of the com­pany, told Olive Oil Times.
​“The main char­ac­ter­is­tics of our Coratina stay in its fruity fla­vor, with a slightly bit­ter and spicy taste. It is a well-bal­anced oil, with a mod­er­ate com­ple­ment bit­ter­ness and pun­gency,” he shared.

Crea Farm has won awards at the NYIOOC since 2019. ​“I am striv­ing to win the best pos­si­ble award since I have entered [NYIOOC], and I am putting in the effort required to achieve that goal,” Okumura remarked.

Apr. 17 13:14 UTC

Lisa Anderson report­ing from Cape Town

Egypt’s Wadi Food earned a Gold Award for its medium Coratina and a Silver for its medium Arbequina.

The Egyptian gov­ern­ment has been work­ing on dri­ving their olive oil indus­try for­ward, imple­ment­ing ini­tia­tives to get olive oil pro­duc­tion vol­umes on par with their table olives. The Egyptian gov­ern­ment announced in 2019 that 100 mil­lion olive trees ear­marked for oil pro­duc­tion would be planted, and by late-2021 just over half of the tar­get was reached.

Egyptian olive grow­ers are skilled at apply­ing tech­no­log­i­cally advanced olive farm­ing tech­niques and even though cli­mate change has been an increas­ing chal­lenge, they have been mov­ing towards imple­ment­ing adap­ta­tion strate­gies.

Apr. 17 13:07 UTC

Ylenia Granitto report­ing from Rome

In its first par­tic­i­pa­tion in the World Olive Oil Competition, Pometti obtained a Gold Award for the organic blend L’Olio Bio.

“Obtaining this recog­ni­tion make us very happy,” said Carlotta Pometti. ​“In recent years, we have invested a lot in the pro­duc­tion of extra vir­gin olive oil, focus­ing on high qual­ity. We have con­verted to organic and started imple­ment­ing a pre­ci­sion agri­cul­ture sys­tem. Then, we installed weather sta­tions in the orchard and car­ried out other improve­ment works. It is a source of pride to obtain this impor­tant award at our first par­tic­i­pa­tion in the NYIOOC.”

Stretching over 800 hectares (1,977 acres) in the munic­i­pal­i­ties of Trequanda, Asciano and Buonconvento, the Pometti estate is between the Val d’Orcia and the Crete Senesi, an area named after the clay (in Italian ​‘creta’) present in the soil, which gives the land­scape a unique, sug­ges­tive appear­ance. The fea­tures of the ter­rain are also ben­e­fi­cial for olive tree cul­ti­va­tion.

“We have a medium-tex­tured soil that com­bines stone and clay,” Pometti under­lined. ​“It is ideal for grow­ing the typ­i­cal vari­eties of these areas, Leccino, Pendolino and Moraiolo. In our orchard, old plants are flanked by younger ones, born after the frost of 1985. There is a close bond between the olive oil pro­duc­tion and this ter­ri­tory, and show­ing our extra vir­gin olive oil on the world stage is a way to com­mu­ni­cate its beauty.”

Apr. 14 18:07 UTC

Ylenia Granitto report­ing from Rome

The olive groves on the slopes between Assisi and Spoleto are part of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations’ list of Globally Important Agricultural Heritage Systems (GIAHS).

The FAO defines GIAHS as ​“agroe­cosys­tems inhab­ited by com­mu­ni­ties that live in a close rela­tion­ship with their ter­ri­tory […] char­ac­ter­ized by remark­able agro­bio­di­ver­sity, tra­di­tional knowl­edge, invalu­able cul­tures and land­scapes, sus­tain­ably man­aged by farm­ers…”

This is the con­text in which Alessandro Melchiorri pro­duces, in Spoleto, three pre­mium extra vir­gin olive oils: DOP Umbria Colli Assisi Spoleto L’intenditore, Frutto dell’Olivo and Frantoio, which earned a Gold Award and two Silver Awards at the World Olive Oil Competition.

“We are really glad to receive these recog­ni­tions in such a pres­ti­gious com­pe­ti­tion,” the Umbrian farmer told us after receiv­ing the prize noti­fi­ca­tion. ​“They are con­fir­ma­tion of our qual­ity over time. Since our first par­tic­i­pa­tion, sev­eral years ago, we have received some acco­lades in every edi­tion, and this is impor­tant to us since it is a way of show­ing our con­sumers our con­tin­u­ous search for qual­ity.”

Melchiorri con­ceived dif­fer­ent extra vir­gin olive oils to meet dif­fer­ent con­sumer pref­er­ences and food pair­ings. ​“The ideal use of our DOP Umbria, which is a mono­va­ri­etal of Moraiolo, is with fish dishes,” he sug­gested. ​“Our Frantoio, matches very well with meat and struc­tured dishes, and it is excel­lent on pizza, while Frutto dell’Olivo is a har­mo­nious, ver­sa­tile blend for the every­day table.”

“And we must not for­get.” Melchiorri reminded us, ​“that using a qual­ity oil is good not only for our palate but also, thanks to its nutraceu­ti­cal prop­er­ties, for our health.”

Apr. 14 17:09 UTC

Nedjeljko Jusup report­ing from Zadar

Week 3 of the MYIOOC results was more than suc­cess­ful for Croatian olive grow­ers. With a total of 70 awards (64 gold and 6 sil­ver), they climbed to third place. Turkey, in sec­ond place, has only one award more.

“I am sure we will be even bet­ter,” Tomislav Duvnjak, the unof­fi­cial selec­tor of the best olive groves in Dalmatia, told Olive Oil Times today. ​“Together with the peo­ple of Istria, we are hunt­ing sec­ond place for Croatia, which would be our biggest suc­cess so far.”

His expec­ta­tions are not unfounded. Croatia sub­mit­ted a total of 128 sam­ples to the world’s largest olive oil com­pe­ti­tion, 21 more than last year when they took third place at the NYIOOC with a suc­cess rate of 90 per­cent. This year Croatian oils are believed to be even bet­ter.

Croats base their opti­mism on the fact that Turkey, which is cur­rently in sec­ond place, has sub­mit­ted 22 fewer entries than the 128 Croatian brands. If eval­u­a­tions main­tain their cur­rent qual­ity aver­age, Croatian grow­ers could gain the upper hand in the end.

However, we should not for­get Spain, which is cur­rently in fourth place with 67 awards. Italy will most likely keep first place: It already has 113 awards out of a total of 224 sam­ples. In any case, this year’s com­pe­ti­tion of the world’s best oils in New York will be uncer­tain until the end.

The ​“bat­tle” for sec­ond place con­tin­ues between Turkey, Croatia and Spain, and Greece and the United States should not be writ­ten off either, which also have real chances for a bet­ter rank­ing than the cur­rent fifth and sixth places.

So the uncer­tainty con­tin­ues. Until the last sam­ple is eval­u­ated and cer­ti­fied, it can be only safely said: just maybe.

Apr. 14 14:25 UTC

OOT Staff report­ing from New York

As the 15^th day of results con­cluded today, NYIOOC orga­niz­ers said they were nearly three-quar­ters through the world’s largest analy­sis of olive oils from 38 coun­tries. One of the big sto­ries this year is the rise of pro­duc­ers from Turkey who have already set a record with 71 awards so far, with more likely yet to be released.

Croatian pro­duc­ers are watch­ing to learn if they will match or even sur­pass their aston­ish­ing per­for­mance in last year’s edi­tion when they reached a record suc­cess rate of 90 per­cent to gar­ner 96 awards.

Italian brands, of which there are 224 com­pet­ing, account for 113 awards in the cur­rent tally. Fifty-six Greek brands have been awarded so far, from 146 sub­mit­ted entries. Half of Spain’s 135 brands have so far been rec­og­nized, while U.S. pro­duc­ers are well on their way to another strong per­for­mance with 52 Gold and Silver Awards.

Apr. 13 14:14 UTC

Lisa Anderson report­ing from Cape Town

Seka Hills, win­ner of a Silver Award for its medium Arbequina, is the brand of the Yocha Dehe Wintun Nation, one of few tribes with expand­ing agri­cul­ture in California.

The tribe is proud of its Native American her­itage, and the mem­bers strive to be good envi­ron­men­tal stew­ards in all of their ven­tures.
The enter­pris­ing tribe, which owns a casino resort and a few restau­rants, also pro­duces wine under the Seka Hills brand.

Apr. 13 14:10 UTC

Paolo DeAndreis report­ing from Rome

“Winning in NY for the third con­sec­u­tive year is a true honor for the entire team at Istriana,” Rob Anderson, owner at the Istrian olive oil pro­duc­ing com­pany E Pluribus Unum, told Olive Oil Times.

Istriana won three Gold Awards thanks to its mono­va­ri­etal Istriana Leccino and its two blends: Istriana Blend and Hedonist.

“We cre­ated Istriana to honor the cen­turies-long his­tory of olive oil cul­ti­va­tion that earned Istria its rep­u­ta­tion for pro­duc­ing some of the world’s high­est qual­ity oil. We are com­mit­ted to uphold­ing these tra­di­tions as we con­tinue to expand our grove to include native Istrian and Italian olive vari­eties,” Anderson noted.

Anderson shared the 13-year long story of the com­pany, which started exper­i­ment­ing with 100 olive trees and across the years expanded to three thou­sand plants, with the help of col­lab­o­ra­tors and experts. ​“After over a dozen years together, they have become like fam­ily,” he told us.

Apr. 13 14:51 UTC

Paolo DeAndreis report­ing from Rome

BVS Premium Jerusalem Olive Oil cel­e­brated two Gold Awards to add to their grow­ing col­lec­tion. ​“It is a great honor for us to be included among the best in the world. We are excited and happy,” Hani Ashkenazi, Marketing and Finance CEO at the com­pany, told Olive Oil Times

“It is very dif­fi­cult to win an award once, but even more dif­fi­cult to main­tain the high qual­ity and streak of wins year after year. Three years in a row! This is not taken for granted,” she noted.

“in con­trast to many coun­tries, the last sea­son blessed Israel with a par­tic­u­larly high olive yield,” Ashkenazi explained, ​“which is why we were con­cerned about a poten­tial low qual­ity of the oil. Therefore, we devoted a lot of thought to this mat­ter and made sure to har­vest the olives at dif­fer­ent times, each vari­ety at its pre­cise time, to extract the oil prop­erly.”

Apr. 12 13:27 UTC

Lisa Anderson report­ing from Cape Town

A Californian com­pany makes award-win­ning olive oils in a truck.

Olive Truck owner Samir Fayraktar’s mobile fac­tory was launched 15 years ago while he was sourc­ing olives in Turkey and needed to travel long dis­tances to get the fruit to mills that met his stan­dards.

Fayraktar started bring­ing the mill, known as Nar Gourmet at the time, to the groves, and swiftly earned a Gold Award at the 2014 NYIOOC.

A few years later, Fayraktar moved on from Nar Gourmet and, in 2019, cre­ated Olive Truck. He’s been sourc­ing olives in California for Olive Truck’s award-win­ning brands, which have been scoop­ing Gold Awards at the NYIOOC since 2020.

Apr. 11 15:57 UTC

OOT Staff report­ing from New York

Producers from Turkey had a big day, with a string of wins that has set the coun­try’s record for Gold Awards. With just over 60 per­cent of the results revealed, accord­ing to NYIOOC orga­niz­ers, there is already cel­e­bra­tion in Türkiye.

Apr. 11 00:55 UTC

Costas Vasilopoulos report­ing from Athens

Greek pro­duc­ers from vir­tu­ally every cor­ner of the coun­try where olive trees are grown have already started to weave a sparkling glit­ter fab­ric of gold and sil­ver at the 2023 NYIOOC.

Makaria Terra from Kalamata in south­ern Peloponnese, Falcon from Lesbos in the Aegean Sea, Paragaea from Preveza in west­ern Greece, Olithea from Corfu in the Ionian Sea, Androulakis Olive Oil and Anoskeli from Crete, to men­tion a few, have all gar­nered awards in the com­pe­ti­tion.

“We are proud, happy and delighted for another gold and we have already begun prepa­ra­tions for the next har­vest with a strong sense of respon­si­bil­ity,” said Eftychios Androulakis, the Cretan pro­ducer who won a sixth con­sec­u­tive Gold Award for the Pamako mono­va­ri­etal extra vir­gin made from Tsounati olives.

More pro­duc­ers across Greece are eagerly await­ing award win­ners to be announced as results con­tinue to unfold. NYIOOC orga­niz­ers said that the unveil­ing of win­ning brands from coun­tries north of the equa­tor will carry on for a few more weeks.

Apr. 11 00:44 UTC

Ylenia Granitto report­ing from Rome

As the third week of the 2023 NYIOOC World Olive Oil Competition con­tin­ued, four extra vir­gin olive oils from Italy’s south­ern region of Campania appear in the Official Guide. They are char­ac­ter­ized by a strong ter­ri­to­r­ial con­no­ta­tion, express­ing the vari­etal fea­tures of the dif­fer­ent areas from where they orig­i­nate.

Widespread in the province of Benevento, the Ortice vari­ety is used by Olivicola Cassetta to pro­duce on the high hills of Morcone the homony­mous organic mono­va­ri­etal which earned a Gold Award.

Native of Irpinia, cor­re­spond­ing approx­i­mately to the province of Avellino, Ravece lies at the heart of the pro­duc­tion of the Case d’Alto farm, which earned a Gold Award for its organic mono­va­ri­etal Coevo pro­duced between Grottaminarda and Flumeri.

In Ruviano, in the province of Caserta, the Petrazzuoli com­pany cul­ti­vates plants of Frantoio, Ortice and Caiazzana, the main vari­ety of the area – their fruits have been com­bined to obtain the gold-awarded blend Fontana Lupo.

In the coastal area of the Cilento, Vallo di Diano and Alburni National Park, La Casa del Sole pro­duces its sil­ver-awarded organic DOP Cilento, made up of Frantoio, Leccino and Rotondella, one of the prin­ci­pal vari­eties of this ter­ri­tory.

Apr. 11 00:42 UTC

Lisa Anderson report­ing from Cape Town

Darmmess, the Lebanese pro­ducer that was bestowed with a Gold Award for their medium Souri extra vir­gin olive oil, is a social enter­prise that aids local olive farm­ers with tech­ni­cal assis­tance to cre­ate high-qual­ity oils and then buys their prod­uct.

In Lebanon olive farm­ing is an inte­gral part of the econ­omy, with 23 per­cent of the agri­cul­tural sur­face com­pris­ing of olive groves.
Producing award-win­ning EVOO in Lebanon is chal­leng­ing though, with the coun­try gripped in a state of polit­i­cal and eco­nomic tur­moil, result­ing in inter­mit­tent elec­tric­ity sup­ply amongst oth­ers.

Despite all of this, Lebanon’s olive oil exports grew by 11 per­cent from 2010 to 2019.

Apr. 11 00:40 UTC

Paolo DeAndreis report­ing from Rome

The multi­na­tional olive oil pro­ducer based in Tunisia CHO Group has scored two Gold Awards and one Silver Award at the 2023 NYIOOC, con­firm­ing the place of its top prod­ucts among the best olive oils in the world.

“We are glad to be win­ners of two Gold Awards with our brand Terra Delyssa and a Silver for our new­born Moresh,” Salima Ben Jemia, mar­ket­ing and com­mu­ni­ca­tion direc­tor, CHO Group, told Olive Oil Times. ​“This proves that we are on the right path,” she added.

The CHO Group has adopted a blockchain solu­tion to cer­tify the pro­duc­tion process. ​“All olive oils are ana­lyzed in the L‑CHO, the group’s analy­sis lab­o­ra­tory accred­ited to ISO 17025 and approved by the International Olive Council for the three types of physico-chem­i­cal analy­sis and whose cer­ti­fied ole­ol­o­gists ensure a rig­or­ous qual­ity con­trol of the oils,” Ben Jemia added.

Apr. 10 12:08 UTC

Paolo DeAndreis report­ing from Rome

Once again one of the promi­nent pro­duc­ers from the beau­ti­ful Japanese island of Shodoshima, Agri Olive Shodoshima, has won the atten­tion of NYIOOC judges.

“It is a great honor to win the pres­ti­gious NYIOOC award for the fifth year in a row. This is the first time Lucca has won this award and we are very happy to have received it,” Nobuyuki Hiraiwa, owner at AOS, told Olive Oil Times.

Hiraiwa’s AOS’ Lucca high qual­ity comes from a per­fectly timed har­vest which took place right before olive ripen­ing. ​“The out­come is a unusual olive oil, as the less pun­gent and gen­tle fla­vor of the Lucca vari­ety is fur­ther enhanced by its fresh aroma,” the pro­ducer said.

Apr. 10 11:56 UTC

Paolo DeAndreis report­ing from Rome

The 2023 NYIOOC analy­sis team has attrib­uted a Gold Award to Darmmess High Phenolic early har­vest extra vir­gin olive oil. A prod­uct of the Darmmess com­mu­nity of olive grow­ers in Deir Mimas, in south­ern Lebanon.

“This 2023 Gold medal at the NYIOOC is a world­wide recog­ni­tion that despite all, Lebanon can and is pro­duc­ing one of the best world’s olive oils,” Rose Bechara Perini, founder at Darmmess, told Olive Oil Times.

Darmmess EVOO is made with the local Souri olive cul­ti­var. ​“It comes exclu­sively from Deir Mimas mil­len­nial trees, com­monly referred to as the Bordeaux of Lebanese Olive Oils,” Bechara Perini told us.

Apr. 10 11:50 UTC

Paolo DeAndreis report­ing from Rome

Two mono­va­ri­etals, Oro di Milans and Eminens Extra Virgin Olive Oil, both obtained from the local Memecik cul­ti­var, earned the Oro di Milas com­pany two Gold Awards. A first for the Turkish com­pany.

“We have so much grat­i­tude for every­one involved in pro­duc­ing our Gold medal-win­ning extra vir­gin olive oils. This was our first year in our new mill facil­ity, and frankly we did not know what to expect. Winning awards is val­i­da­tion in our belief to take time and effort through­out each step of har­vest­ing and milling,” Mark Colin, co-owner of the com­pany, told Olive Oil Times.

“The Milas province of Turkey is home to the Memecik vari­ety, a very fra­grant vari­ety with high qual­ity poten­tial if processed with the right prac­tices. We felt that with the right equip­ment, knowl­edge, and the exper­tise of our con­sul­tants we could pro­duce an high-qual­ity extra vir­gin olive oil and let peo­ple around the world know how excep­tional this vari­ety can be. All that has paid off and we are very excited about the future for our brand,” he added.

Apr. 7 15:08 UTC

OOT Staff report­ing from New York

After 10 days of rolling out the real-time results of the World Olive Oil Competition, 214 Gold Awards and 73 Silver Awards have been gar­nered by pro­duc­ers in 16 coun­tries. The unveil­ing will con­tinue on Monday, NYIOOC orga­niz­ers said, adding that at the cur­rent pace, the analy­sis team will likely con­clude with entries in the Northern Hemisphere divi­sion in late April.

Apr. 6 15:07 UTC

Costas Vasilopoulos report­ing from Athens

Two Turkish pro­duc­ers were awarded twice in the eleventh edi­tion of the World Olive Oil Competition, now in its eight day unveil­ing win­ning brands from the Northern Hemisphere.

Palamidas from the Akhisar region repli­cated its suc­cess of 2021 earn­ing two Gold Awards for the company’s Gourmet Selection Blend and Gournet Selection Domat mono­va­ri­etal made from the Domat olive vari­ety. Another two Gold Awards were allo­cated to Eminen’s Olive Oil, a pro­ducer that broke into the country’s olive oil indus­try only in 2020; the com­pany was awarded for two medium mono­va­ri­etals made from the Memecik vari­ety, the Oro di Milas and Eminens Olive Oil.

Eminen’s Olive Oil is based in the region of Milas in Turkey’s south­west­ern province of Muğla, where olive farms and coal­fields coex­ist. However, a recent study has pro­moted olive grow­ing over coal min­ing as a bet­ter alter­na­tive to boost the local econ­omy.

Apr. 6 13:01 UTC

Paolo DeAndreis report­ing from Rome

The organic Picual mono­va­ri­etal Verde Divino pro­duced in the Jaén province scored its first Gold Award at the 2023 NYIOOC.

“We are very happy and proud to receive a prize of such inter­na­tional pres­tige. It is the help we need to make our olive oils more val­ued inside and out­side Spain,” an offi­cial of the com­pany told Olive Oil Times. ​“This award moti­vates us to con­tinue improv­ing and pro­duce every year one of the best olive oils in the world.”

Apr. 6 12:53 UTC

Ylenia Granitto report­ing from Rome

“We share the joy of these recog­ni­tions with our part­ners and pro­duc­ers, which makes Entimio pos­si­ble,” Daniele Santini told us after receiv­ing four Gold Awards. ​“We are also incred­i­bly grate­ful to NYIOOC, which has been essen­tial to our growth and suc­cess.”

The awarded blends are the result of a care­ful selec­tion made by Santini of a few batches of high qual­ity extra vir­gin olive oils cul­ti­vated in small, fam­ily groves in Tuscany and cold extracted in local mills within hours of the har­vest.

“We have been par­tic­i­pat­ing in the NYIOOC since we started in 2018,” Santini said. ​“Every year, we accept this chal­lenge to help us improve and achieve our best qual­ity.”

Santini said that the 2022 har­vest was par­tic­u­larly chal­leng­ing due to sev­eral weather issues. ​“Lack of rain and unsea­sonal tem­per­a­tures early in the year across many Italian regions con­tributed to a sub­op­ti­mal yield,” he noted. ​“I must say that unusu­ally high tem­per­a­tures dur­ing the har­vest made it dif­fi­cult to achieve the rel­a­tively low tem­per­a­tures of 20 – 24°C we need dur­ing milling to pro­duce the award-win­ning aro­mas we seek year after year. We should also con­sider the effects of the energy cri­sis in Europe that make it expen­sive to have a tem­per­a­ture-con­trolled milling area. After such a dif­fi­cult crop year, we are par­tic­u­larly proud of these achieve­ments.”

Apr. 6 12:49 UTC

Lisa Anderson report­ing from Cape Town

There are more par­tic­i­pat­ing brands from Bosnia and Herzegovina than ever, and with three Gold Awards at the 2023 NYIOOC so far, pro­duc­ers in the coun­try have already set a new record.

SD Stara Teskera, who took home a Gold Award for their Granic Istarska Bjelica mono­va­ri­etal, is from the south­ern­most region of the coun­try, Herzegovina, where the num­ber of olive trees has grown from 6,000 in 1977 to 87,000 in 2022.

Herzegovina’s 2022 har­vest was three times larger than their pre­vi­ous one and a good one for qual­ity as well. Producers OPG Marko Krvavac and Mandino, who won Gold Awards for their medium blends, are from the Herzegovinian region of the Balkan coun­try as well.

Apr. 5 14:34 UTC

OOT Staff report­ing from New York

More than 200 award win­ners had been revealed when the eighth day of the NYIOOC roll­out con­cluded today at 14:00 UTC. Producers from fif­teen coun­tries have so far earned the indus­try’s most cov­eted qual­ity awards. Results will con­tinue to be unveiled as the analy­sis team works its way through some 1,100 entries in the Northern Hemisphere divi­sion of the world’s largest olive oil com­pe­ti­tion.

Apr. 5 13:15 UTC

Paolo DeAndreis report­ing from Rome

The Israeli pro­ducer Ptora has once again scored a Gold Award with its Ptora Midnight Coratina, a medium mono­va­ri­etal com­ing from the Lachish region. Its olive trees grow atop of the remains of an ancient Byzantine city. ​“Although not unex­pected, I was thrilled with the out­come,” Ido Tamir, owner of the Ptora farm, told Olive Oil Times.

“Ptora Midnight Coratina is cre­ated dur­ing the late hours of the night, uti­liz­ing a metic­u­lously planned pro­ce­dure that aims to shield the olives from light and heat expo­sure. As soon as the sun sets, the olives are hand-picked and promptly trans­ported to the mill, where they are pressed in com­plete dark­ness and at an excep­tion­ally low tem­per­a­ture to safe­guard the green chloro­phyll within the fruit,” Tamir added.

Apr. 5 13:14 UTC

Paolo DeAndreis report­ing from Rome

The Tunisian olive oil pro­ducer Domaine Adonis has repli­cated past wins scor­ing four Gold Awards for its Koroneiki, Arbosana, Chetoui and Chemlali mono­va­ri­etals.

“It is a real plea­sure once again to see that the qual­ity of our olive oils per­sist across time and it feels as true hap­pi­ness even more as our work requires so much effort through­out the year,” Salah Ben Ayed, owner at Domaine Adonis, told Olive Oil Times.

“For the cur­rent sea­son we have not par­tic­i­pated in many inter­na­tional com­pe­ti­tions but the New York con­test remains for us an impor­tant recog­ni­tion, given the qual­ity of the awarded olive oils,” he con­cluded.

Apr. 4 12:17 UTC

Ylenia Granitto report­ing from Rome

“This recog­ni­tion makes us very proud,” Ruggero Masciangelo told Olive Oil Times after earn­ing a Gold Award with his Linea Maria extra vir­gin olive oil. ​“As soon as I received the com­mu­ni­ca­tion, I informed all the staff, who, with their excel­lent work, helped make this suc­cess pos­si­ble.”

In Francavilla al Mare, Masciangelo man­ages almost 2,900 olive trees of dif­fer­ent vari­eties such as the native Gentile di Chieti, Frantoio, Caninese, Bella di Cerignola and Ascolana. Close to the coast of Abruzzo and with the Apennines moun­tains in the back­ground, the orchard enjoys ideal soil and cli­mate con­di­tions. It lies at the heart of Tenuta Masciangelo, a relais that fea­tures rooms and a restau­rant and offers food and wine tours.

“Our extra vir­gin olive oil is named in honor of my mother, and the entire estate is a trib­ute to her,” Masciangelo told us.

Apr. 4 12:01 UTC

Nedjeljko Jusup report­ing from Zadar

Croatia added a total of 20 awards to its tally yes­ter­day. Nineteen Gold and one Silver.

“Things are devel­op­ing well,” said Miro Ivić, an olive grower from Dalmatia. He and his three broth­ers, Ivan, Pave and Branko, grow 300 olive trees as part of the fam­ily com­pany Pasika in the town of Miljevci, which is in the Krka National Park near the towns of Drniš and Šibenik in cen­tral Dalmatia. ​“Our olive trees are in a good fruit-grow­ing posi­tion. We pick the fruit by hand and pro­duce organic extra vir­gin oil, Miro told Olive Oil Times.

The Ivić fam­i­ly’s brand Ulje dide mog repeated last year’s suc­cess and won a Gold Award at this year’s NYIOOC. ​“We are proud, this is a new con­fir­ma­tion of qual­ity,” Miro said, who has an addi­tional rea­son to cel­e­brate. On the same day news of the award arrived, his grand­son was born. ​“The feel­ing is inde­scrib­able,” he said. ​“We cel­e­brated long into the night.”

The fam­i­ly’s his­tory of grow­ing olives is long. ​“We pro­duced the first extra vir­gin olive oil in the early 1900s,” Miro noted. Today, he and his three broth­ers con­tinue the tra­di­tion. Year after year, they strive to make the best oil from the autochtho­nous Oblica and Krvavice vari­eties, and the proof of their suc­cess is their win­ning streak at the NYIOOC, the largest and most pres­ti­gious eval­u­a­tion of olive oils in the world.

Apr. 3 13:24 UTC

Lisa Anderson report­ing from Cape Town

Noor Fès, the medium Picholine extra vir­gin olive oil cre­ated by Moroccan pro­ducer Ixir fac­tory that has won a Gold Award, is made from Moroccan Picholine (Picholine Marocaine) olives, a dif­fer­ent cul­ti­var than French Picholine (Picholine Languedoc).

Picholine Marocaine is the most widely grown olive cul­ti­var in the Maghreb coun­try, and it shares genetic sim­i­lar­i­ties with Mission olives. It is pop­u­lar due to its suit­abil­ity for thriv­ing in Moroccan cli­matic con­di­tions, and it pro­duces extra vir­gin olive oils with rel­a­tively high phe­no­lic con­tent.

Mar. 31 20:32 UTC

OOT Staff report­ing from New York

Last year, the first result of the world’s most pres­ti­gious olive oil com­pe­ti­tion was revealed on April 4. This year, around 150 win­ners will be unveiled by then, allow­ing award-win­ning pro­duc­ers to ben­e­fit from the indus­try’s high­est acco­lade ear­lier in their cam­paigns.

New judg­ing peri­ods tai­lored to the oppos­ing har­vests mean that Northern Hemisphere pro­duc­ers can send sam­ples at their peak, while Southern Hemisphere con­tes­tants will no longer need to rush their oils before the cut­off.

For the first time, results for Northern Hemisphere entries were released in March. Southern Hemisphere results will begin rolling out in September, just when the world looks south to find the fresh­est high-qual­ity oils.

Mar. 31 16:07 UTC

Costas Vasilopoulos report­ing from Athens

Chants of ​“We won!” were heard in the vil­lage of Sigri in west­ern Lesbos, imme­di­ately after the win­ning announce­ment at the 2023 NYIOOC.

Local pro­ducer Falcon made an impres­sive debut in the com­pe­ti­tion with three Gold Awards for organic extra vir­gin olive oils: the Ol’eve Faros Sigri, a medium blend from Koroneiki, Arbequina, and FS-17 Signore; the Ol’eve Early Harvest Kolovi mono­va­ri­etal; and the Ol’eve Early Harvest Kalamon mono­va­ri­etal.

“We had high hopes of win­ning despite it was our first time in the com­pe­ti­tion,” owner Antonis Tripintiris told Olive Oil Times. ​“This is a great moment for us.”

Falcon grows 40,000 trees of 12 dif­fer­ent olive vari­eties spread over 200 hectares on their Faros estate. The com­pany pro­motes bio­di­ver­sity: cypresses, pome­gran­ate trees and fig trees are grown on the estate along with the olive trees. Falcon said the company’s oper­a­tions can coun­ter­bal­ance the car­bon foot­print of 2,000 peo­ple.

Mar. 31 14:43 UTC

Lisa Anderson report­ing from Cape Town

Gansu Times Olive Technology, this year’s first win­ner from China at the World Olive Oil Competition, earned a Silver Award for their Ezhi‑8 mono­va­ri­etal.

Gansu Times Olive Technology is one of the more than 6,000 busi­nesses in over 60 coun­tries that are part of the B Lab move­ment. Founded in 2006, B Lab is a non-profit orga­ni­za­tion that is chang­ing the global econ­omy by enabling com­pa­nies that aim to ben­e­fit com­mu­ni­ties, the planet and work­ers.

Mar. 30 00:20 UTC

Ylenia Granitto report­ing from Rome

The NYIOOC’s Official Guide is not only where one can find the world’s best extra vir­gin olive oils, but it is also a great show­case where to dis­cover the immense wealth of world’s olive vari­eties, which con­sti­tute a true pat­ri­mony – a rich bio­di­ver­sity sig­nif­i­cantly con­tribut­ing to the well-being of species and ecosys­tems and, there­fore, of all liv­ing beings.

Combining the use­ful to the pleas­ant, olive vari­eties trans­late into count­less fla­vors among which one can choose when it comes to pair­ing oil with foods. Working with many of the over 2,000 known olive cul­ti­vars (and those yet to be doc­u­mented) award-win­ning pro­duc­ers obtain their pre­mium extra vir­gin olive oils.

From Hojiblanca, mainly grown in Spain, to Oblica, cul­ti­vated in Croatia; from Tonda Iblea, native to Italy, to Chemlali, wide­spread in Tunisia; from Mission, cul­ti­vated in California, to Ayvalik, found in Turkey; from the French Bouteillan to the Greek Lianolia Pargas – using the drop-down menu in the right cor­ner of the Official Guide to the World’s Best Olive Oils means explor­ing the pro­duc­ing regions through their olive vari­eties.

“Keeping the genetic diver­sity of cul­ti­vated plants” is one of the short-term objec­tives to be achieved in the frame­work of the broader goal of ​“erad­i­cat­ing hunger, achiev­ing food secu­rity, improv­ing nutri­tion and pro­mot­ing sus­tain­able agri­cul­ture” estab­lished by the 2030 Agenda of the United Nations.

“Since 1900, the agri­cul­tural sec­tor has lost 75 per­cent of the vari­ety of crops,” the UN warns. ​“Better use of agri­cul­tural bio­di­ver­sity can con­tribute to more nutri­tious diets, bet­ter liveli­hoods for farm­ing com­mu­ni­ties and more resilient and sus­tain­able agri­cul­tural sys­tems.”

Mar. 30 13:52 UTC

Paolo DeAndreis report­ing from Rome

Aires de Jaén has once again scored two Gold Awards at the NYIOOC thanks to its medium blend Consum and its blue-bot­tled, early-har­vest Finca Badenes.

The new wins were received as a con­fir­ma­tion of years of hard work on qual­ity and sus­tain­abil­ity by Lin Lin Ichun, export man­ager of the com­pany. ​“It encour­ages us all: the milling fac­tory and olive oil mas­ters, work­ers, sales­men… It makes us proud of what we do,” Ichun told Olive Oil Times.

Mar. 30 12:37 UTC

Lisa Anderson report­ing from Cape Town

There are more organic extra vir­gin olive oil entries in this year’s NYIOOC than ever before. Nearly half of all sub­mit­ted brands — and 39 of the 73 win­ners revealed so far — are organ­i­cally pro­duced.

Organic pro­duc­tion has tra­di­tion­ally been asso­ci­ated with smaller brands. But com­pa­nies such as Goya from Spain, win­ner of a Gold Award for their medium organic blend ear­lier this week, are part of a grow­ing num­ber of larger food busi­nesses devel­op­ing organic ranges.

Mar. 30 00:54 UTC

Nedjeljko Jusup report­ing from Zadar

On the third day of the world’s largest eval­u­a­tion of olive oils in New York, Croatia has added five new awards to its account. Now, there are a total of nine.

It may come as a sur­prise to some, but extra vir­gin olive oil from the Krk Monastery of the Serbian Orthodox Church won a Gold Award for Croatia today.

The monastery is three kilo­me­ters east of the town of Kistanje in cen­tral Dalmatia. The most famous monastery of the Serbian Orthodox Church in Croatia is offi­cially pro­tected as part of the Krka National Park. Dating back to 1350, there is an agri­cul­tural farm within the monastery includ­ing vine­yards and 500 olive trees.

“Every year they have excel­lent olives and oil,” noted Duška Kolar, a mul­ti­ple award-win­ning Croatian olive grower. ​“There will be more awards,” added Tomislav Duvnjak, a famous Dalmatian olive grower from Vodice who this year coor­di­nated the send­ing of oil sam­ples from the best Dalmatian oil pro­duc­ers to the NYOOC.

Mar. 29 17:16 UTC

Ylenia Granitto report­ing from Rome

“I am immensely happy to receive this Gold Award — that is a great result for a small com­pany like ours,” said Massimo Romiti, who earned the indus­try’s most cov­eted qual­ity award with his La Madonnuccia brand, an organic blend of Frantoio, Moraiolo and Leccio del Corno.

Leccino, Pendolino and Ravece com­plete the range of vari­eties present on the farm, which is on a hill in the heart of Umbria, in Castel Ritaldi, stretch­ing for about 4.5 hectares.

“This land has belonged to our fam­ily since the 1800s, and the first olive trees were planted in 1865,” Rimiti said, not­ing that the name ​‘La Madonnuccia’ came from a statue of the Madonna that stands in an ancient church on the estate.

“The orig­i­nal plants had to be cut due to the dam­ages caused by the great frost of 1956, but later they were reborn from the stumps,” Romiti told us. ​“When I took the reins of the farm in 2013, my chil­dren wanted to relaunch it. We planted more olive trees with the goal to pro­duce high qual­ity extra vir­gin olive oil. This recog­ni­tion con­firms that we have achieved the objec­tive.”

Now, there is a plan to add another 250 olive trees to the exist­ing 1,350. ​“Our entre­pre­neur­ial vision will be always focused on a sus­tain­able man­age­ment of the grove and on the safe­guard­ing of our beau­ti­ful ter­ri­tory,” Romiti said.

Mar. 29 16:01 UTC

OOT Staff report­ing from New York

As the third day of the long roll­out of this year’s top-rated extra vir­gin olive oils came to an end, 73 brands had earned the indus­try’s high­est acco­lades.

Producers from Spain led the way in early results with 20 awards gar­nered, fol­lowed by Italy, Greece, the United States and Croatia. There’s a long way to go, how­ever, as the NYIOOC analy­sis team con­tin­ues, one at a time, tho­rugh the nearly 1,100 entries sub­mit­ted in the Northern Hemisphere divi­sion.

Mar. 29 10:47 UTC

Lisa Anderson report­ing from Cape Town

Extra vir­gin olive oils rep­re­sent unique char­ac­ter­is­tics of the ter­roirs from which they came. The Gold Award-win­ning Mas de Bories AOP from Provence, France car­ries the acronym AOP on its label that stands for Appellation d’o­rig­ine Protégée, also known as Appellation d’Origine Contrôlée.

Appellation d’Origine Contrôlée (AOC) is a French cer­ti­fi­ca­tion that guar­an­tees the geo­graphic ori­gin and tra­di­tional meth­ods used to pro­duce cer­tain food and drink prod­ucts. This des­ig­na­tion ensures qual­ity and authen­tic­ity and is sim­i­lar to other coun­tries’ pro­tected des­ig­na­tion of ori­gin (PDO) or geo­graph­i­cal indi­ca­tion (GI) labels.

Another win­ning brand, Unio PDO Siurana from Spain, is a PDO extra vir­gin olive oil that expresses the unique char­ac­ter­is­tics of the province of Catalonia. A PDO extra vir­gin olive oil has to be entirely crafted within its des­ig­nated area of ori­gin, which includes all stages of pro­cess­ing up to pack­ag­ing.

Mar. 28 18:33 UTC

Nedjeljko Jusup report­ing from Zadar

Olive grow­ers from Istria are respon­si­ble for two new awards for Croatia at the NYIOOC. The fam­ily busi­ness of Suzana and Emanuel Grubić won a Gold Award for their Grubić Buža brand. ​“This is a new con­fir­ma­tion of qual­ity,” Suzana Grubić told Olive Oil Times. It is an extra vir­gin oil from an autochtho­nous vari­ety.

All fam­ily mem­bers are involved in agri­cul­tural pro­duc­tion. ​“The great love for the olive is passed down from gen­er­a­tion to gen­er­a­tion,” Emanuel Grubić noted.

The olive groves of the Grubić fam­ily, cre­ated by clear­ing for­est and old vine­yards, is spread over an area of 8 hectares in west­ern Istria, near the pic­turesque town of Bale. Emanuel Grubić’s extra vir­gin olive oil is obtained from 1,600 olive trees, many of which are more than 300 years old. The assort­ment of cul­ti­vars rep­re­sented in the groves of the Grubić fam­ily is exclu­sively domes­tic autochtho­nous, such as Buža, Buža žen­ska and Rošinjola.

“We pro­duce oils of autochtho­nous Istrian Buža and Rosinjola vari­eties,” revealed Suzana.The fam­ily also has an olive mill that was founded in 1927. They turned it into a unique museum, which today also serves as a tast­ing room. The museum and the tast­ing room are only sep­a­rated from the mod­ern olive pro­cess­ing plant by a glass door.

The award-win­ning Grubić Buža brand is a pre­mium EVO oil with a defined and rounded aroma, rich in ele­gant green notes, from chicory and conifer to mint and basil, com­bined with the fresh scent of spring grass. Its taste is sophis­ti­cated and com­plex, with char­ac­ter­is­tic touches of green toma­toes, white apples, almonds and black pep­per. Stronger spici­ness and mod­er­ate bit­ter­ness come together in a pecu­liar and har­mo­nious rela­tion­ship, mak­ing this oil go nicely with any food.

In the vicin­ity of Bala is the small com­pany Valencano, which includes an eco­log­i­cal olive grove with around 400 olive trees of var­i­ous Italian and Croatian cul­ti­vars. The award-win­ning Valencano Blend oil was cre­ated from these hand-picked vari­eties. ​“The only goal of our com­pany is the pro­duc­tion of organic extra vir­gin olive oil,” noted the own­ers Conny and Jörg, who bought the Valencano com­pany in the spring of 2022 and thus ful­filled their dream of own­ing an organic farm.

The first day of the NYIOOC results revealed two awards for grow­ers from Dalmatia, and the sec­ond day cel­e­brated as many for pro­duc­ers in Istria — the two most famous olive grow­ing regions in Croatia.

A good start for Croatian olive grow­ers at the World Competition raises hopes that they could repeat last year’s suc­cess when they won 96 awards (69 Gold and 27 Silver) in the com­pe­ti­tion of 1,244 entries from 28 coun­tries, tak­ing third place over­all. Only Italy (158 medals) and Spain (128) — two of the world’s largest pro­duc­ers of olive oil — were awarded more than Croatia.

This year, nearly 1,100 entries from the Northern Hemisphere arrived at the NYIOOC, of which 126 were from Croatia. ​“If we con­tinue with good results, we have a chance for sec­ond place,” said Tomislav Duvnjak, an award-win­ning olive grower from Dalmatia. ​“Anything above that would be sen­sa­tional.”

Mar. 28 17:37 UTC

Ylenia Granitto report­ing from Rome

In the sec­ond day of the 2023 World Olive Oil Competition, Azienda Agricola Ca’ Crespana achieved a well-deserved place in the Official Guide to the World’s Best Olive Oils. Located in San Massimo, a dis­trict of Verona, in Veneto, the fam­ily com­pany earned a Gold Award with its Paneolio Amethyst.

“We are very happy with this recog­ni­tion that, adding to those already received over the last years at the NYIOOC, is fur­ther con­fir­ma­tion of what we aim for, that is, con­stant qual­ity over time,” Johannes Pan, told Olive Oil Times. ​“Unlike other prod­ucts, oil can be dif­fer­ent every year, and con­sis­tency in qual­ity is also a way to show our steady com­mit­ment toward con­sumers.”

Their 8,000 plants, mainly Leccino and the autochtho­nous Grignano, ben­e­fit from the prox­im­ity to Lake Garda, which mit­i­gates the cli­mate of this lat­i­tude, cre­at­ing an ideal envi­ron­ment for grow­ing olive trees. ​“The awarded extra vir­gin olive oil is a very bal­anced prod­uct and it gave us great sat­is­fac­tion when paired with haute cuisines dishes,” Pan pointed out.

Mar. 28 16:17 UTC

Paolo DeAndreis report­ing from Rome

“Winning a Gold Award at the New York com­pe­ti­tion can be extremely reward­ing and can give a sense of val­i­da­tion for our know-how and recog­ni­tion for our hard work and com­mit­ment,” Donia Sfar, export man­ager at Fermes Ali Sfar, told Olive Oil Times imme­di­ately after Tesoro del Rio, Plaisir range won a Gold Award at the 2023 NYIOOC..

It was the first award won this year by a Tunisian pro­ducer in the open­ing day of the eleventh edi­tion of the con­test. And today, the pro­ducer has earned a sec­ond award, a Silver for Tesoro del Rio Excellence range.

“This medal gives us more respon­si­bil­ity to live up to expec­ta­tions and moti­vates us to always want to go fur­ther,” Sfar com­mented.

Tesoro del Rio Plaisir is known for its fruity taste, with notes of grass and sweet almond. ​“The color of the oil is intense green, as it is rich in antiox­i­dants and polyphe­nols,” Sfar noted.

“Our main farm is equipped with an authen­tic stone grind­ing mill, cold press­ing olives with hydraulic pres­sure. This allows the oil to be extracted from the dough in a nat­ural way and with­out the incor­po­ra­tion of hot water or other exter­nal inputs,” she added.

“There is no sin­gle secret to pro­duc­ing good olive oil, but rather a com­bi­na­tion of fac­tors that con­tribute to the qual­ity of the oil. To pro­duce high qual­ity olive oil, it is nec­es­sary to select the best vari­eties of olives, grow olive trees in ideal ter­roirs, use appro­pri­ate pro­duc­tion meth­ods to guar­an­tee max­i­mum fresh­ness,” Sfar told Olive Oil Times.

See Also:Tesoro del Rio Chemlali in the Official Guide

Mar. 28 13:14 UTC

Lisa Anderson report­ing from Cape Town

Two early har­vest extra vir­gin olive oils, Finca Badenes Early Harvest from Spain and AOS Early Harvest Lucca from Japan, were awarded with Gold Awards yes­ter­day on the first day of the unveil­ing of the win­ners of the eleventh edi­tion of the NYIOOC World Olive Oil Competition.

In recent years early har­vest EVOOs, which are pro­duced from olives that are har­vested before the fruits ripen, have become increas­ingly pop­u­lar even though har­vest­ing early can reduce oil yield by as much as 50 per­cent.

Some of the many ben­e­fits of these EVOOs include a higher phe­no­lic con­tent and intense, herba­ceous fla­vors. Harvesting early also reduces the risks posed to groves by weather chal­lenges, such as hail and frost.

Mar. 27 22:34 UTC

Ylenia Granitto report­ing from Rome

In Contrada Scintilia, close to the Valley of the Temples in Agrigento, Francesco Di Mino man­ages 5,000 plants of Nocellara del Belice, Biancolilla and Coratina, rep­re­sent­ing the third gen­er­a­tion of a fam­ily of engi­neers devoted to olive farm­ing.

The pro­duc­tion of the estate was once unpre­ten­tious, intended for per­sonal con­sump­tion and for friends, but, when his father Salvatore passed away, the Sicilian farmer decided to carry out a spe­cial har­vest ded­i­cated to him, doing his utmost to obtain the high­est qual­ity. This hap­pened in a very dif­fi­cult time for farm­ers, when Italy and the whole world was under lock­down due to the Covid-19 pan­demic. The fol­low­ing year, the newly born brand Olio Di Mino was already in the Official Guide to the World’s Best Olive Oils.

In the first day of unveil­ing of the win­ners of the 2023 World Olive Oil Competition, its organic mono­va­ri­etal of Nocellara del Belice IGP Sicilia again obtained a Gold Award.

“I am so glad to receive this pres­ti­gious recog­ni­tion,” Di Mino told Olive Oil Times. ​“All this is a trib­ute to my father, who instilled me the pas­sion for olive farm­ing. My idea of pro­duc­ing high qual­ity was con­ceived in such dif­fi­cult cir­cum­stances, and yet, in a short time, we suc­ceeded in bring­ing our extra vir­gin olive oil on the world stage. This makes us very proud.”

Mar. 27 17:47 UTC

Daniel Dawson report­ing from Montevideo

Twenty pro­duc­ers from nine coun­tries com­bined to earn 24 awards on the first day of the 2023 NYIOOC World Olive Oil Competition.

Among the biggest win­ners so far were Gold Ridge Organic Farms from Sonoma County, California, which earned three Gold Awards for organic Tuscan, Arbequina and Picholine blends.

Three other California pro­duc­ers also cel­e­brated acco­lades from the world’s largest olive oil qual­ity com­pe­ti­tion, includ­ing Seka Hills, Tofino Estate and Pitchouline.

Across the Atlantic, pro­duc­ers in Italy, Spain, France, Croatia, Greece, Tunisia and Turkey also cel­e­brated their suc­cess on Day 1 of the NYIOOC.

From Spain, two of the three win­ning pro­duc­ers – Aires de Jaén and Aceites Moral – hailed from Jaén, the world’s largest olive oil-pro­duc­ing province. Colival, a coop­er­a­tive of 750 fam­i­lies from the south­east­ern autonomous com­mu­nity of Murcia, also earned an award.

Meanwhile, Mas des Bories from Provence became the first French pro­ducer to tri­umph at the NYIOOC, with Annalife Gıda col­lect­ing Turkey’s first win and Fermes Ali Sfar boast­ing the same dis­tinc­tion in Tunisia.

Despite a his­tor­i­cally chal­leng­ing har­vest, four pro­duc­ers from Puglia, Sicily and Tuscany claimed Italy’s first five NYIOOC awards.

Oleificio Asaro dal 1916, Donato Conserva, Francesco Di Mino and Clivio degli Ulivi over­came extreme weather, drought and ris­ing pro­duc­tion costs to yield some of the world’s best extra vir­gin olive oil.

While Western Europe suf­fered from a his­toric drought, pro­duc­ers in Croatia and Greece enjoyed more boun­ti­ful har­vests. On the first day of judg­ing, three Greek and two Croatian pro­duc­ers reaped their rewards.

AMG Karabelas, Paragaea and Androulakis Eftychios were all awarded for mono­va­ri­etal extra vir­gin olive oils care­fully crafted from local cul­ti­vars. Vodice and Eva Marija Čurin farm were also awarded for mono­va­ri­etals pressed from local vari­eties.

Rounding out the first day of the 2023 NYIOOC, Olive Shodoshima claimed Japan’s first award at the NYIOOC for a medium Lucca mono­va­ri­etal early har­vested on the south­ern island of Shodoshima.

Judging con­tin­ues tomor­row at 8:00 AM in New York (12:00 UTC).

Mar. 27 16:29 UTC

Nedjeljko Jusup report­ing from Zadar

“Bravo Tom, Bravo Eva!”

The con­grat­u­la­tions to the Croatian olive grow­ers, win­ners of the first prizes at NYIOOC 2023, do not stop. ​“Finally Oblica,” replied Tomislav Duvnjak, not hid­ing his sat­is­fac­tion that his oil from the autochtho­nous vari­ety has been dec­o­rated with Gold this time. Last year, at this same eval­u­a­tion, his extra vir­gin oil St. Ivan Oblica won the sil­ver medal.

Duvnjak is the man who two years ago encour­aged olive grow­ers from Dalmatia, Croatia’s largest olive grow­ing region, to send oils to New Work in an orga­nized man­ner. Since then, Croatian olive grow­ers, mostly from Dalmatia and Istria, have recorded growth and greater suc­cess, win­ning 96 awards (69 Gold and 27 Silver).

“We are third in the world. It is the biggest suc­cess so far,” Duvnjak said of last year’s results. Only Italy (158 medals) and Spain (128) — the world’s largest olive oil pro­duc­ers — are ahead of Croatia. In terms of qual­ity, Croatia is fol­lowed by the United States (94 awards), Greece (79), Turkey (65), Portugal (35) and many oth­ers.

This year, 126 oils arrived at the NYIOOC from Croatia, of which 61 were from Dalmatia. Along with Duvnjak’s S. Ivan Oblica, the award also went to the brand Eva Marija Levantinka, owned by OPG Eva Marija Čurin from Gdinje on the island of Hvar. It is an extra-vir­gin oil char­ac­ter­ized by fruiti­ness, freshly cut grass, green apples, bananas and trop­i­cal fruits. The taste is dom­i­nated by almonds, arti­chokes, olive leaves and green toma­toes. The oil has a bal­anced and pleas­ant bit­ter­ness, piquancy and a com­plex aroma of leafy veg­eta­bles and tomato leaves– har­mo­nized and per­fectly bal­anced.

Eva Marija Čurin Farm was founded in 1997 and is located in the favor­able area of Gdinj, on the east­ern side of the island of Hvar.

The estate con­sists of five hectares of spe­cial­ized olive groves with 1,000 trees and over­looks the Adriatic Sea (225 meters). ​“All the fruits are hand-picked in the first half of October and processed within 24 hours using a cold extrac­tion sys­tem,” noted Eva Marija Čurin.

In a WhatsApp group where the best Dalmatian pro­duc­ers dis­cuss the NYIOOC, the con­grat­u­la­tions to Eva Marija Čurin and Tomislav Duvnjak con­tinue. Perhaps the Croatian olive grow­ers will repeat last year’s suc­cess and, in sports terms, win another bronze.

Mar. 27 15:21 UTC

Costas Vasilopoulos report­ing from Athens

Joy and excite­ment over­whelmed Alexis Karabelas of AMG Karabelas, a fourth-gen­er­a­tion olive grower and pro­ducer, imme­di­ately after the orga­niz­ers started to release the first results of the NYIOOC World Olive Oil Competition.

AMG Karabelas, based in Ancient Olympia in west­ern Peloponnese, was the first among par­tic­i­pants from Greece to earn a Gold Award at NYIOOC 2023 for its Laurel and Flame Fresh extra vir­gin olive oil made from early har­vested olives of the indige­nous Tsabidoelia vari­ety.

“We feel amaz­ing to win a gold award for our local Tsabidoelia in the world’s most pres­ti­gious com­pe­ti­tion for the sec­ond year in a row,”Alexis Karabelas told Olive Oil Times. ​“We sense that the Tsabidoelia vari­ety is start­ing to take the place it deserves among Greek olive vari­eties and this gives us the sat­is­fac­tion and the energy to con­tinue our efforts and hard work.”

Mar. 27 15:16 UTC

Ylenia Granitto report­ing from Rome

The unveil­ing of the award win­ners of the 2023 World Olive Oil Competition has just started, and already three extra vir­gin olive oils from Italy earned a place in the Official Guide to the World’s Best Olive Oils. Among them is Le Radici IGP Toscano (Le Radici IGP Toscano by Clivio degli Ulivi), a blend of Frantoio, Leccino and Pendolino pro­duced in Capalbio, in the south of Tuscany, at the Clivio degli Ulivi estate.

“What a won­der­ful sur­prise to see our Le Radici among the world’s excel­lences,” Laura Maria Berti told Olive Oil Times just moments after she learned about the Gold Award assigned by the panel of the com­pe­ti­tion. ​“We had a very com­plex crop year, espe­cially due to the high tem­per­a­tures and drought in the warmer months. Reaching such a result now make us over­joyed and repays all the effort we have made to keep the qual­ity high.”

Mar. 26 13:39 UTC

OOT Staff report­ing from New York

The daily unveil­ing of award win­ners will begin at 8:00 AM New York time (12:00 UTC) and con­tinue for two hours, with a new result released approx­i­mately every 5 min­utes.

Mar. 25 20:48 UTC

OOT Staff report­ing from New York

That’s how many Northern Hemisphere entries are vying for the indus­try’s most cov­eted qual­ity awards at the World Olive Oil Competition, accord­ing to NYIOOC orga­niz­ers. The results will start to roll out at 9:00 AM in New York (UTC-05:00), with around 25 win­ners unveiled daily until all of the entries have been eval­u­ated. Southern Hemisphere entries will be com­pet­ing this sum­mer fol­low­ing the har­vest sea­son for pro­duc­ers in Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Argentina, Chile, Brazil and Uruguay, among oth­ers.

Mar. 23 13:29 UTC

Daniel Dawson report­ing from Monevideo

With judg­ing for the eleventh edi­tion of the NYIOOC World Olive Oil Competition set to get under­way next week, olive oil pro­duc­ers again face immense uncer­tain­ties. While upheavals caused by the Covid-19 pan­demic and ensu­ing sup­ply chain dis­rup­tion have sub­sided, pro­duc­ers in every region face new chal­lenges.

The ongo­ing fall­out from the Russian inva­sion of Ukraine and ram­pant global infla­tion has increased pro­duc­tion costs from California to Turkey. At the same time, poor har­vests across much of the west­ern Mediterranean due to unprece­dented heat and drought have dri­ven up olive oil prices at ori­gin. In addi­tion, some experts fear a dry start to the year and low snow­pack in the Alps may por­tend another low har­vest in Europe in 2024, keep­ing pres­sure on prices.

While some pro­duc­ers cel­e­brate higher prices, which help off­set ris­ing pro­duc­tion costs, oth­ers are hes­i­tant to pass them along to cus­tomers, fear­ing some will be priced out and con­sump­tion will fall. Data from the International Olive Council and the Spanish gov­ern­ment have borne out some of the fears.

Agriculture is a busi­ness char­ac­ter­ized by uncer­tainty, and 2023 will be no excep­tion. As a result, receiv­ing recog­ni­tion at the world’s largest olive oil qual­ity com­pe­ti­tion becomes all the more crit­i­cal. ​“It means greater recog­ni­tion of our brands in dif­fer­ent mar­kets, as well as an increase in sales,” con­firmed María Carmen Rodríguez Comino, sales man­ager at Andalusia-based Almazaras de la Subbética.

Mar. 23 12:47 UTC

OOT Staff report­ing from New York

This is the first time the NYIOOC has been split into two judg­ing peri­ods tai­lored to the oppos­ing har­vests in the Northern and Southern Hemispheres. The imminient results for Northern Hemisphere entries will allow pro­duc­ers to ben­e­fit from their achieve­ments ear­lier in their cam­paigns. Southern Hemisphere results will begin rolling out in September, just when the world looks south to find the fresh­est high-qual­ity oils.

Mar. 22 12:08 UTC

OOT Staff report­ing from New York

Organizers of the NYIOOC World Olive Oil Competition said the first results of the 2023 edi­tion will be released Monday, March 27 at 8:00 AM New York time (12:00 UTC) and con­tinue until every sub­mit­ted entry has been judged and cer­ti­fied, some­time in May.

It is another record-break­ing edi­tion in terms of the num­ber of entries in the world’s largest olive oil qual­ity con­test, with sub­mis­sions near­ing 1,100 — not includ­ing Southern Hemisphere brands that will arrive later this year.

The win­ning brands will be unveiled on the Official Guide to the World’s Best Olive Oils and in spe­cial sec­tions of Olive Oil Times.

This is a devel­op­ing story. Check back for updates. (Updated Apr. 25, 2023 15:08)

More updates

Continuous cov­er­age of the 2023 NYIOOC World Olive Oil Competition

• 2023 World Olive Oil Competition cov­er­age on OOT
• #NYIOOC social feed
• Live stream of the results
• Official Guide to the World’s Best Olive Oils
• News arti­cles in the Official Guide
• NYIOOC Help Center and Press Room