#140 About olive trees

Hello friend,

As the morning's ice over and the days shorten with the looming clouds of winter, the descending temperature puts the earth to sleep, and the olive harvest approaches. Unlike other traditional crops, olive farming has thrived and developed worldwide.

Harvesting in Sicily happens around November and December every couple of years, as the olive tree usually rests for one year before it produces a decent crop. In the fertile area in the plains of Catania, the milder climate makes the olives ripen earlier, and they are gathered a couple of months before the internal and the mountainous regions.

Olive oil is a staple in Italian and Sicilian kitchens, so it is in demand. Often, families with some property in the country will have a few trees to make enough oil for their family.

The Italian government also rewards oil manufacturers by giving them a financial contribution for maintaining such a valuable product. After they are planted, olive trees take many years to mature and produce a good harvest; often, those who grow the trees don’t see the fruit of their labour. Therefore, those who have trees usually inherit them from their parents and even grandparents, who planted them decades before.

The Greeks imported the olive into Sicily and educated Sicilians on harvesting and oil-pressing techniques, which have changed very little over time. The harvesting of olives is a laborious process; many kilos are required before yielding a decent amount of oil so no olive is wasted, so first, those on the ground are gathered.

Large nets are placed at the base of each tree as the ground is covered in a light green blanket, and long, sturdy canes are used to shake the olives off the trees so they drop into the nets below. In areas which are flat and easy to negotiate, large olive harvesters are used. Still, harvesting is done by hand or with battery-operated vibrating racks in the pocky, uneven terrain of the Sicilian mountains.

The nets are delicately laid under trees not to let one ‘chicco’ escape. They are gathered up with leaves and twigs, and all are removed by hand. The olives are put into hessian sacks and transported to the press, where they are cleaned and the oil extracted through a natural method, producing a translucent, golden honey-coloured extract of extra virgin olive oil.

Olive collecting techniques vary from area to area in Sicily, depending on how the oil will be used. Extra virgin oil is made from slightly green olives that must not be bruised. Therefore, they are collected by hand from the tree with a comb-like implement, which does minor damage to the olives.

Usually, those who pick olives for their family store of oil will wait until the fruit is well ripened and collect the fruit that has fallen to the ground. The quality of this oil isn’t at a commercial level, but the fully ripened fruit usually produces more oil.

Olive harvest is a custom that dates back to the rural traditions in Sicily's agricultural history for many generations. Men used to hit the trees with canes to shake all the olives onto the ground, while women collected the full nets to separate branches and leaves from olives.

Harvesting was practised even during the harsh winters; when it snowed, workers would warm their frostbitten hands with blazing coals kept alight in large copper bowls filled with hot embers, known as concas, placed at the base of the tree to warm the frozen worker's hands.

Olive harvesting is a time-consuming and arduous undertaking. The vibrations from the poles hitting the branches cause hands to blister and arms to ache; as they are stretched out to reach each branch, the dust is agitated by the trees’ movements and gets into the eyes.

Gathering the olives on the ground by the end of the day makes you stiff, with strained knees and stained hands from the dirt and oiliness of the olives. Often, when a net is gathered up, there are more twigs and leaves than olives.

It is slow, painful, and meticulous work, measured only by the quantity of oil produced. It takes many kilos of olives to make a decent amount of oil. For example, sixteen kilos makes one tumulo of oil, an antique Sicilian measurement equivalent to two and a half to three litres, depending on the quality of the year's production.

The olive pressing process is as ancient as the olive, undertaken at the local trapito or press. The contemporary olive press takes the traditional method. It combines it with present-day technology to clean and crush the olives, putting them through a series of presses that extract a dark mix of oil and impurities. The contaminants are separated from the oil using either hot water or a cold press, allowing the pure oil to float to the top and be easily gathered and bottled.