Olive Harvest 2011

Posted on December 6, 2011 by Still Waters Vineyards

As the grape harvest comes to an end, the olive harvest is just beginning.  We are lucky at Still Waters to have amazing olive trees on our property not only for the beauty they add to the landscape but also for the Estate Olive Oil we produce each year. This year was a light producing year, but it looks like the flavors are going to be outstanding!

When harvesting olives you have to choose between machine harvesting using the shaker method or the traditional style of hand harvesting. Just like in the vineyard we choose to hand harvest our olive trees. Since our trees are over 100 years old and much larger than most commercial productions,  the process of harvesting the olives can be a little tricky. We comb the branches using plastic rakes on the end of long poles. Each branch gets raked to collect the olives onto the ground where we have tarps ready to receive them.

This year we decided to stay local when processing our olives and used Foxdale Farm Olive Mill. The following pictures will take you through the steps of making our wonderful olive oil.

The olives are in the hopper ready to become oil. They first go into the deleafer to remove leaves, twigs and any other debris.

The olives get washed and go into the hammer mill where they will be crushed.

The crushed olives move to the Malaxor which stirs the crushed olives to help in the separation of liquid.

In the next step, the oil starts taking form. The Decanter separates the solids from the liquid oil.

Cheers and Enjoy!