Socrates Oil

All Greek (Olives and Olive oil) to you

In our company, we are selling olive oil from mainland Greece, Peloponnese and Crete. Our philosophy is simple: olive oil has different sensory properties depending on olive variety but also the microclimate of each region. We want to bring to Ireland these different and unique olive oils. And let our customers choose the one which matches their palate.

Socrates olive oil

One of our olive oil suppliers is Socrates Oil. This company is a family business, created by love for their place, olive and quality olive oil.
From Delphi, the center of the Earth in antiquity, and since 2014 they have been producing the extra virgin olive oil “SOCRATES” and the olives of Amfissa “SOCRATES OLIVES”.
With the main purpose of producing exceptional and premium virgin olive oil and based on the traditional ways of cultivating and caring for olive trees, they produce olive oil of excellent quality, with special aromas and characteristic aftertaste.
They are situated in Amfissa, near the ancient city of Delphi.
Their olive oil has been awarded in a high number of competitions worldwide.
The taste of their oil is mild (very low acidity) and it’s a great oil for cooking, salads, frying or just as starter with bread or crackers.
Their olive oil comes in packaging ranging from 250ml to 3l.

Socrates olives

All Greek to you is sourcing olives from two suppliers, one of them is Socrates Oil. The following lines explain the reason of our choice.
Socrates oil produces green and black olives in their unique way resulting to olives with amazing sensory properties, like eating fresh olives in a Greek taverna by the sea.

Black olives

They harvest the black olives from 15th December onwards, depending on the weather conditions (rainfall and temperature). When harvested, the olives need to be black and they focus on the olives without any defects. Olives being black outside, they may not be black inside the fruit.
When olives have been black for at least 15 days, then the interior of the fruit should be black also. The mild fermentation procedure results to olives that they don’t have a uniform black colour; some olives are deep purple, some dark brown and some black.
The mild fermentation is carried out by putting olives in water containers with added salt. Every 3 days, the levels of salt are checked and if needed, more salt is added. During fermentation, the levels of salt are reduced so it’s important to keep the levels of salt constant. This procedure lasts for 6 months.
After this step, the olives are put in new containers with different levels of salt and also vinegar. This solution (salt and vinegar) is the preservation solution. Here, the producers at Socrates Oil, they can see olives having different colours, i.e., not all olives are black, which is completely natural.
Commercially, olive producers use a much different approach. They use a colourant solution to make all olives look black. Therefore, when we see a packet of olives that are all uniformly black, this is sign that a colourant solution was used. These olives are produced on a commercial basis but they have much inferior flavour and texture. They are soft and they don’t taste as proper olives!

Green olives

Green olives are harvested from 15th September onwards. They are collected directly from the trees, one by one! Only the hard and green olives are picked up.
The problem with the green olives is this: when they are harvested, they are bitter. Therefore, they need to be treated in order to render them less bitter. Socrates Oil people use this process in order to extract in a natural way the bitter compounds out of the fruit flesh: each olive is engraved with a sharp knife and they are then put in a container that has water. This process takes place for about 15-20 days. After this time period, olives are put in a solution of salt. After one week, the olives are ready for packaging, and in these jars, oregano, gresh lemon or pepper can be added.
Commercially, the industrial producers of olives have to deal with tones of green olives, so they can’t engrave the olives one by one. What they do instead is this: they put the green olives in containers containing potase for few days. This process makes the olives having a sour and a strongly salty taste.

The philosophy of All Greek to You

This blogpost is one of many blogposts that are going to be published at our website. The philosophy and the purpose of these posts is to present the unique food story behind each one of our products. Because, behind each food, there are people with dreams and a passion to produce top quality food with a Greek flavour. All Greek to You is a team; our suppliers are our important teammates!

You can read about the Socrates Oil here.

*Solution in this text has the chemistry meaning; e.g., a solution of salt is salt diluted in water.