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The oil of olive constitutes the base condiment of the kitchen of the coastal zones of many Mediterranean countries, distinguishing the gastronomy in a determining way as well as that their civilization can be defined like the oil one,  in contrast to the butter one typical of the northern central European countries.

The quality and the typicality of the Marches typical oil of Extravergine olive are determined from the combination of various factors, between which the varieties of olives concurring to the production. The Leccino and the Frantoio are the base of nearly all the oils produced in the region. In some zones the local varieties, always present, constitute a consisting percentage. We find the Mignola in the zone of Cingoli, the Orbetana in the San Severino and Poggio San Vicino ones, the Carboncella in Ascoli zone, the Raggia and the Rosciola in many municipalities of the province of Ancona, the Raggiola in others of Pesaro, the Piantone di Falerone and the Sargano in the zone of Fermo, the Coroncina in the zone of Caldarola, the Piantone of Macerata (or Mogliano), the Maurino, the Ascoli one, Pendolino and the Moraiolo. The quality of the oil is affected also from the time of the oil-harvest that, if lightly anticipated, can improve the organoleptic characteristics. The total surface in production is about 6.670 hectares , approximately 1,5% of the total of marches agriculture. The oil-presses are distributed for 70% in the provinces of Ascoli and Macerata, in particular in the province of Ascoli approximately the 50% of the olive-growing patrimony comprising also the catering production of olives is concentrated. In the last years it has been recorded a medium production of approximately 200,000 quintals of olives and 35.000 quintals of oil. In the Marches typical extravergine, the sweet and light taste prevails, medium fruicy, sometimes with a pleasant smell of bitter and spicy conferred thanks to the olive-yards located  in high medium hill and to permeable, limestone-argillaceous lands rich in minerals . It is also very important the harvest carried out  nearly exclusively by hand (mungitura) and the method of extraction of the oil rigorously cold for single squeezing. The Marches Consortium Extravergine propose to protect just these characteristics. 

OLIVE FEATURES

It's the fruit of the olive tree very longeval plant (it can live even various hundreds of years) of ancient Asian origins. The tree can catch up advanced heights to 20 m, has a stocky, twisted log and often cracked and dug. Its leaves are oadstead and light, evergreen, the leaves are small, long and grips, of tough consistency, translucent and of dark green color on the superior face and silverplated white on the inferior one. The olive is a pulpy berry (drupa), has a green color peel at first and a black-violet color at its complete maturation. Its pulp is oily (the oil amount grows to progressing of the maturation), firmly adherent to the wood , hardest, wrinckled kernel, containing oily 1or 2 seeds too. The olives for the oil production are collected before their complete maturation, when they contain a concentration of oily substance that can reach 30% of the weight. The harvest is made in the months between November and January so as to obtain a light and little acid oil , with a good taste and not too much strong. It is considered that from a squeezing of 100 Kg approximately 20 liters of oil of olives is produced . 

WORKING METHOD 

The harvest is made between November and January when the olives are nearly mature or mature. There are numerous systems of harvest but the two fundamental ones are the handly and the mechanical ones. 
The first can be made detaching the olives by hand from the plant making them fall to the ground where, previously, it has been put a cloth, or shaking manually the branches so that the olives are detached and fall on the cloth, or passing with a large brush between branches. 
There is then the "bacchiatura" that is beating down the branches with long perches of wood until making the olives fall on the ground, or, finally, to collect from ground only the olives naturally fallen to the ground (raccattatura). 
The mechanical collection, instead, consists either of the brushing, carried out by a machine making the olives fall to ground and then it aspires them, or in the shaking, that is a machine that, through the shaking of the log or the largest branches, makes the olives fall  in a thing-like-umbrella turned over. 
The the olive harvest warehouses must maintain a temperature between  8 and 10 degrees in an airy atmosphere, and the olives do not have to be piled up in  layers superior to 12 cm of thickness in order to avoid that they are crushed one-another. 
Their permanence in the warehouses does not possibly have to exceed the week  if they are perfectly healthy olives, two days if they have dents. Before bringing them to oil-press the olives must be cleaned up from possible branches or leaves (sometimes with a real washing). The extraction of the oil comprises three fundamental phases:

 - THE OIL-PRESS WORKING (or grinding) 

it consists in the crushing of the olives and the kernels so that the pulp, breaking, allow the extraction of the oil. The traditional method executed still today  is that  of  mullers that is two large wheels of granite, that, rttating over a great plate of granite too, crushes the olives.

 - THE KNEADING 

it consists in a remixing of the paste obtained to reduce the volume, but above all in order to separate to the water from the oil united (emulsifyingi) in the course of the oil-press working.

 - THE EXTRACTION 

That is the division of the kneaded paste between oil, water of vegetation called must and solid part more properly called husk. At this point there is the decanting, in fact the oil is not still ready being " a must oil " composed from oil water and vegetation plus residual solids. 
With the decanting the oil is put in appropriate containers  where the oil will stretch to float on the vegetation water and the residual solids will be put down on the bottom. After 24 hours a pouring-off is carried out that will be repeated after two or three days, and after 5 or 6 days again. Today some centrifugal separators are used acting on the difference of specific weight between the substances. According to the duration of its period of seasoning the oil can be classified: 

 HOW TO IDENTIFY THE QUALITY OF AN OIL

It is not difficult to be able to understand the quality of our oil , it is necessary to learn how to know it and to make this, one must look at it, smell and taste it. 
At  first we must know that the quality of an oil depends on the type of olives used , each has its own taste, from the climate of the places in which they are cultivated, the north produces a lighter oil comparing the south where there is a more marked production, from the maturation of the olives, the most mature have a golden coloration while the sour ones have a tonality on the green, the important is not to choose color branch, brown or ocher yellow extra-vergine oil, because they are indicative of excessive ancientness or badly conservation. 
Other factors regard the treatment of the olives after their harvest (if they aren't brought immediately to the oil-press the olives risk to go bad with consequent taste of "mildew" for the gained oil) and the way with which we conserve it at home. 
The oil in fact is  conserved in not too much illuminated atmosphere (better if dark) and coolness, the sun in fact beyond clearing it, makes its taste get worse. 
Watching the bottle in backlighting we can notice the clearness, obtained thanks to the filtration but many producers, above all craftsmen, prefer not to filter to make it more aromatic, in this case the torbid result turn out to be a quality but it shortens the duration of the quality of the oil in a few month time. 
Be careful, because the opacity of the oil can be given also from a bad filtration that renders the product poor. Beyond the clearness it is necessary to observe the density of the oil, but it is not indicative of the quality but subjective of the consumer's taste. 
The olfactory aspect is very important and it must be tested more times but in various times in order not to make the olfact get used to the type of smell. Let's talk now about the tasting aspect through the tasting of the oil that must be made expiring from the nose in order  to better perceive the taste and the aromas.

HISTORIOGRAPHICAL OUTLINES

The olive tree has its roots in Middle East, is restricted in the Babylonian code of Hammurabi around 1760 A.C.. In Italy it appears in 600 A.C. carried from the  Greek settlers and cultivated  from the Etruscans first. The Roman had classified five oil categories that then they transported in all  theMediterranean sea on appropriate flat-bottomed ships with appropriate amphoras. They are:   

- "Oleum ex albis ulivis", extracted from light green olives; 
- "Viride", extracted from blackening olives;
- "Maturum", extracted from mature olives;
- "Caducum", extracted from olives spontaneously fallen from the tree and collected in the ground;
- "Cibarium", extracted from olives hit from parasites, destined to the slaves.  The Barbarians, with the fall of the Roman Empire , expected of being able to graze the crudes oil in every place with great damage of agriculture. The olive-tree survived thanks to the abbeys that used it also for the Sacraments (above all Benedictine), and the Marches are a very rich testimony. In the Middle Ages there was a strong impulse to the dissemination of the olive tree, restricted from very strict laws. The olive-yard was given to the peasants through a contract called "laborandum" guaranteeing them part of the harvest. From 1228, we find mention of the oil of olive of the Marches, when the Marches ships landed to the Ferrara shore it was asked a toll called "ripatico", consisting in twenty-five pounds of oil. The same "ripatico" was asked the Puglia but to the Marches oil it was given a greater value as confirmed in the commercial regulations of Venice (1263) that they sold the oil " de Marchia "at a greater price keeping it separated from the productions of the other regions. In 1300 the Marches oil was sold also in Florence until the half of the '600 as confirmed from Botero in its " Universal Relations "where he cites " Abounds grain Marca". In 1600 the Italian panorama was more and more characterizing with the strong and sweet print of the olive-yards. In 1900 King Umberto prohibited the felling of the olive-trees on the Italian land; still enforced law on great partof Italian territory. 

It is estimated that 800 million plants exist, only for the oil production, of which 700 million are found in the Mediterranean river basin.

OIL STORIES  

- Mythology wants it was born from a dispute between Poseidon and Athena that fought for a protectorate of a Greek city. They relied therefore on people's choice, Poseidon donated a beautiful horse as a force symbol, courage and war, Athena planted in the land her lance and from this a plant sprouted from whose fruits gushed out a gilded liquid. The goddess promised the people eating them that they would always hate violence. The people chose the olive tree that, since then, is the symbol of peace, work and serenity and they called the city Athens. 

- Adam prayed his Lord to give him " the promised oil of  mercy " of Heaven. The word Christian  derives from Christ that in Greek meant " Lord grease"; 

- On the Tabor mount 3 plants were born, a cedar, a cypress and an olive-tree;

 - On the Ararat mount  Noah, once the universal deluge ended, was received from a dove with an olive branch; 

- Pallas Athena, goddess of antiquity, became the preferred one from the Athenians as she gave a plant of olive tree to the city in contrast of Poseidon. 

- Apollo God of Beauty was born in Delo under an olive-tree; 

- Approximately in 1400 A.C.  the Egiptians placed  olive branches on Pharaohs's graves;

- The night of passion took place between the olive-trees in the Getzemani garden; 

When the Church fought the pagans and their cult of trees, it saved only the olive-tree.

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