Tag: oil

The best extra virgin olive oils in Italy 2024: the ranking – Italian cuisine reinvented by Gordon Ramsay

By popular demand, here we are at the ranking of best extra virgin olive oils of Italy 2024 as winners of the XXXII edition of the Ercole Olivario national competition. EVO oil is an important business, in fact. Perhaps not everyone knows that they exist in Italy more than 500 varieties of oil and that our country is on the podium of the major world producers, in second place, with 290 thousand tons in 2023 alone – important numbers for Yellow Gold. Over one million hectares cultivated with olive trees, present in practically all regions of Italy, each with its own characteristics, but in particular in Puglia, where half of Italian extra virgin olive oil is produced.

That said, it is more than reasonable to be interested in finding out what the best extra virgin olive oils in Italy. Excellent reference is the prestigious national competition called Ercole Olivario, organized by the Italian Union of Chambers of Commerce since 1992, which every year in Perugia gives the names of the best national producers and their flagship labels.

The best extra virgin olive oils in Italy: the 2024 ranking

The 12 awarded labels come from all over Italy, which represent the best productions in the country, which stood out in the two categories provided, Extra Virgin and Dop/Igp certified Extra Virgin Oils. Here they are award-winning labels for the 2024 edition as the best productions in Italy.

For the Dop/Igp Light Fruity category

1st Place – Batta DOP Umbria Colli del Trasimeno from Frantoio Batta, Umbria

For the Dop/Igp Medium Fruity category

1st place – Colleruita DOP Umbria Colli Assisi – Spoleto from the Viola di Foligno (Pg) company, Umbria

2nd place – Brioleum Garda Dop Trentino from the Brioleum farm in Arco (Tn), Trentino Alto Adige

3rd Place – Agrestis Nettaribleo DOP/BIO PDO Monti Iblei – Monte Lauro sub-area of the Agrestis agricultural cooperative society of Buccheri (Sr), Sicily

For the Intense Fruity Dop/Igp category

1st place – Hirpinia Dop Irpinia – Colline dell’Ufita from the San Comaio di Zungoli (Av) company, Campania

2nd place – ORGANIC Bio Igp Toscano of the Frantoio Franci of Montenero (Gr), Tuscany

For the Extra Virgin Light Fruity category

1st Place – Molensis of the Marina Colonna company of San Martino in Pensilis (Cb), Molise

For the Medium Fruity Extra Virgin Category

1st place – Gangalupo of the Bisceglie Maria di Santo Spirito (Ba) agricultural company, Puglia

Extremely creamy spaghetti with garlic, oil and chilli – Italian cuisine reinvented by Gordon Ramsay

Garlic is stripped of its soul and left to sizzle together with the chili pepper; the parsley is finely chopped to give color and freshness to the entire dish. The spaghetti with garlic, oil and hot peppers they are the most famous and traditional dish of Italian cuisine; a first course as simple as it is elaborate to prepare. Yes, because the secret for one good garlic and oil lies in cooking the garlic, which must release its aroma without ever burning.

Depending on your taste, the chili pepper can be more or less pronounced, reduced to powder or cut into larger, more spectacular rounds.

The cream, then, is a whole programme: not simple oil to season the pasta, but a thicker sauce with an enveloping flavour.

Spaghetti with garlic, oil and chilli pepper is a very quick first course, the classic Italian dinner saver that is impossible not to love.

The secret to a tasty thick cream lies in the cooking of the pasta: risotto in the pan, with the seasoning, will allow the thickening process thanks to the release of the starch from the pasta.

Cook the spaghetti in boiling, salted water.

Pour plenty of oil into a pan and add the cored garlic cloves and the chilli pepper cut into thin slices.

Add a little cooking water (be careful, the oil must not be hot) and risotto the spaghetti for a few minutes.

Stir in the finely chopped parsley and extra virgin olive oil off the heat.

Serve the spaghetti with the emulsion created during cooking.

Now we can make extra virgin olive oil ourselves: here’s how – Italian cuisine reinvented by Gordon Ramsay

You warm each glass with your hands, smell it and that’s where we begin. And the first step, which serves to identify the olfactory scents of the oil: whether it is “green fruity”, typical of olives pressed at the beginning of maturation, or “ripe”. Then we move on to the actual tasting, to understand if the oil is “bitter”as often happens with young olives rich in polyphenols, or “spicy” when it gives a pungent sensation behind the long one (as happens with crushed olives when they are green). Then the oil is swallowed or expelled (as professional tasters more often do, who carry out hundreds of tastings a year), and finally is reflected in the aftertaste, which can be sweet, herbaceous, but also taste like apples, almonds, or tomatoes (this happens with spicy oils). Color? It is not a relevant factor and by participating in the experience you will also discover why.

The 5 cultivars

The operation is repeated five times, because There are five cultivars that Fratelli Carli grows directly or purchases from its trusted producers: the Taggiascatypical Ligurian, sweet and delicate, the Coratinavery rich in polyphenols and very intense in flavor which is instead typical of Puglia, the Sicilian one Biancolilla which is among the finest in Italy and loved for its balance. Finally the Greek Athinolia which is an ancient cultivar that gives very fresh and fruity oils rediscovered by the company, and the Spanish Arbequinawith a velvety and harmonious flavour.

Why try

Discovering them in a guided tasting will not only teach you to better understand the great world that revolves around one of the cornerstone foods of the Mediterranean diet, but it will even make you learn something more about your tastes, because you will have to think before choosing. In fact, your personalized bottle will contain a blend of your favorite cultivars. At the end of the tasting you will also return home with a certificate of participation, and above all much more awareness.

How to participate

«This project was born from the desire to share, in a simple way, the peculiarities and richness of the work of Fratelli Carli who, every day, creates oils with a unique and characteristic organoleptic profile, signing them with his own name and certifying every drop, writes Fratelli Carli in presenting it. There are 18 stages of the “L’Origine sei tu” event, between different cities in Northern Italy, each session lasts an hour and each date includes 4 sessions with these times: 10:00, 11:30, 15:00, 5pm.
The cost of the experience is 15 euros, and to participate you must book. All the details on www.oliocarli.it/lorigineseitu together with the dates and other useful information to participate.

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