Passion Unites Italy's Award-Winning Producers

Several win­ners of the 2018 NYIOOC World Olive Oil Competition reached this goal after a suc­cess­ful his­tory of qual­ity which con­tin­ues thanks to pas­sion, ded­i­ca­tion and deter­mi­na­tion.

Among them is Massimiliano ​‘the Iron Man’ D’Addario, who received two Gold Awards, one with the blend Oliomania and the third one in a row with his monocul­ti­var of Dritta L’uomo di Ferro.

“We are so glad that our qual­ity once again was attested by the expe­ri­enced and skilled team of tasters of the New York com­pe­ti­tion,” said Cesare Bianchini of Domenica Fiore after receiv­ing three awards with Olio Monaco, Olio Reserva and Olio Novello.

“Every time we par­tic­i­pated in the NYIOOC, we obtained awards in recog­ni­tion of our good work,” he pointed out spec­i­fy­ing that in this case, the suc­cess at the NYIOOC came at the clos­ing of a chal­leng­ing dry sea­son which required an increased effort.

“The qual­ity of Domenica Fiore olive oils is the result of the skills and pas­sion of our Master olive oil maker, Cesare Bianchini, com­bined with the unique and min­eral-rich land where our trees grow,” said the pres­i­dent of Domenica Fiore, Anna Wallner. ​“Recognition from the NYIOOC con­tin­ues to inspire us to cre­ate the finest Italian food prod­ucts on earth.”

The num­ber and value of the prizes which joined Tamìa, Olio Traldi and Frantoio Tuscus in this edi­tion of the NYIOOC are greater than the num­ber of miles that sep­a­rate their olive groves.

“We are glad because the NYIOOC is an impor­tant con­test,” said Pietro Re after receiv­ing awards for the mono­va­ri­etal Tamìa Maurino and the blend Tamìa Gold Organic.

“We always par­tic­i­pated in the New York’s com­pe­ti­tion with our organic extra vir­gin olive oils which received recog­ni­tion over the years,” Re remarked, high­light­ing their effort and invest­ment in pro­mot­ing qual­ity. ​“I think we played an impor­tant role in rais­ing the aver­age price of olive oil in this area. We worked hard but we reaped the rewards,” he pointed out, adding that the last sea­son was very good except for severe drought. He explained that they had to obtain a good prod­uct from fruits with a pit mass higher than usual– healthy fruits but with dif­fer­ent lev­els of ripeness. Therefore, the work in the mill was essen­tial for the cre­ation of a great prod­uct. ​“I am sat­is­fied not only for us but also for the other oils of the ter­ri­tory which won at the com­pe­ti­tion,” he added. ​“Tuscia, thanks to the qual­ity extra vir­gin olive oils of Vetralla, showed itself to the world at its best.”

And in fact, a Best in Class Award went to the Tuscia PDO mono­va­ri­etal of Caninese Athos, appre­ci­ated by the inter­na­tional panel of NYIOOC judges for its com­plex aro­matic pro­file con­tain­ing arti­choke, almond, pep­per, cin­na­mon, arugula and herbs. ​“We are happy with this award,” said Francesca Boni of Olio Traldi, who takes care of every step of the prod­uct cre­ation, from the man­age­ment of plants to the bot­tling.

“We are also glad for our ter­ri­tory, which is his­tor­i­cally ded­i­cated to the pro­duc­tion olive oil and recently received a boost from the qual­i­ta­tive point of view,” she said, adding that her fam­ily has been run­ning the orchard since 1960. She fol­lowed her grand­fa­ther foot­steps focus­ing on olive grow­ing and qual­ity, achiev­ing suc­cess. ​“We recently built an irri­ga­tion sys­tem as we con­stantly improve our pro­duc­tion method,” pointed out the pro­ducer who chose the names of her oils to pay homage to the Greek, Etruscan and Roman peo­ples and cre­ate an even stronger link with the ori­gins and the ter­ri­tory.

Arcangelo has been tak­ing care of his olive trees since the sec­ond half of the last cen­tury, maybe sooner, as his grand­par­ents planted the olive grove in 1920. ​“Every year, my father Arcangelo works with strength and ded­i­ca­tion to pro­duce our high-qual­ity extra vir­gin olive oil,” Costantino Russo pointed out, explain­ing what is behind the name of the award-win­ning Penisola Sorrentina PDO mono­va­ri­etal of Minucciola.

“In every bot­tle of this prod­uct there is his essence and heart, trans­mit­ted by means of a tire­less work,” remarked the man­ager of the farm located close to the sea, on the hills of Montechiaro di Vico Equense. Here, on a cal­care­ous land sup­ported by ancient dry stone walled ter­races, olives are organ­i­cally grown and hand-picked. ​“We are delighted with this award that grat­i­fies our work in the olive grove,” he affirmed. ​“Our extra vir­gin olive oil gave us great sat­is­fac­tion while, as a mono­va­ri­etal, every sea­son, it has a some­what dif­fer­ent sen­so­r­ial pro­file for which this year once again we received a recog­ni­tion by the top-level NYIOOC panel.”

Olio Taibi’s pro­duc­tions of Sicilian Nocellara del Belice and Biancolilla earned two recog­ni­tions. ​“It is very sat­is­fy­ing to have achieved this result,” affirmed Giuseppe Taibi after receiv­ing the awards for his remark­able work from Curtis Cord in New York. He was present at the event, hold­ing the Agrigento’s olive groves in his heart. Taibi’s great-grand­fa­ther bought them in 1867 and now he man­ages 20 hectares (49 acres) of organic olive groves with his father.

“We have always par­tic­i­pated in the com­pe­ti­tion and the Gold Award we received this year gave us great sat­is­fac­tion, above all because the con­test was maybe the most dif­fi­cult due the high num­ber of par­tic­i­pants.” He observed how the pro­duc­tion work became more and more com­plex and you must be care­ful to antic­i­pate as much as pos­si­ble the effects of the cli­mate which seems to many grow­ers to be increas­ingly sub­ject to dra­matic changes. ​“We already made an early har­vest, but we will fur­therly antic­i­pate it. So, from the begin­ning of October, it will be moved up to the last week of September,” he spec­i­fied.

“We started to par­tic­i­pate in 2013 when we did not know yet the poten­tial of our oil,” Massimo Mosconi revealed from his farm in the Marche region. ​“We always won, and we are very fond of these awards which are not only a source of pride but also a feed­back for us. When you prove your­self and suc­ceed at this inter­na­tional level, it is a demon­stra­tion of objec­tive qual­ity,” observed the physi­cian who man­ages some olive groves with Angelo D’Auria in the province of Pesaro.

To their main farm in Serrungarina, with plants of Raggia, Moraiolo and Leccino, they recently added olive groves of Peranzana and Gentile di Chieti in Abruzzo ​“in order to vary the types of oil and add hints of tomato, spices and banana that we do not have here,” he explained after receiv­ing two Gold Awards with Risveglio and Ménage à Trois. This name derives from the fact that it is a blend of three dif­fer­ent cul­ti­vars, now includ­ing Frantoio, Leccino and Moraiolo, while the third ele­ment gen­er­ally depends on the har­vest (last year’s pro­duc­tion was blended with the Pendolino).

“We are so glad for this acknowl­edge­ment of our qual­ity, that is the result of a team­work in which great atten­tion is paid to each small step and facet of the pro­duc­tion chain,” Savino Muraglia observed, rejoic­ing at the awards earned for his Coratina mono­va­ri­etals, the pit­ted medium blend Denocciolato and the intense fruity Essenza.

“Extra vir­gin olive oil is really made from olives unlike other prod­ucts, so awards like these, every year, are a recon­fir­ma­tion not only of qual­ity but above all of the work, which is going in the right direc­tion,” he remarked.

“Every har­vest is a unique test and one hun­dred and fifty years of com­pany his­tory are noth­ing.” Every sea­son Muraglia updates his extrac­tion tech­niques and makes improve­ments in the olive grove, start­ing from the soil which he ana­lyzes often to under­stand how to enrich it. ​“There is a com­mer­cial aspect, but these awards give a sat­is­fac­tion that goes beyond for me and my team,” said Muraglia.

“This sea­son we have been favored by a good cli­mate, but we are already iden­ti­fy­ing the ele­ments to work on to obtain an even bet­ter extra vir­gin olive oil next year. We never stop.”