Alessandra and I decided to go to the olive mill, called "frantoio" in Italian, next to the little restaurant we often have lunch at.

It was busy, as we are in the middle of the harvest season.  This mill was completely different than the one we had gone to press Bridget and Luke's, they were using the old grinding stones to crush the olives.



The crushed mulch then passes through this machine that stirs it around.



The mulch is then poured out onto straw mats that are placed on top of each other into a big pile.





All of which then goes into the press.



The oil then drains out through a filter into a big vat that also filters it again and then drains directly into the container it is going to be taken home in.  And Keith explained to me that the press pushes on the mats and then when some of the oil has been extracted and the mulch has relaxed a bit it pushes on it again... kind of a ratcheting up the pressure over time



The presses are pretty amazing.  They press it up to 400 pounds of pressure to extract every bit of oil left in the mulch.



The Frantoio stores it's own oil in large stainless steel vats.



It would be almost unheard of to not try the oil before buying it, although the smell in the mill alone makes you think you are really tasting it in the air.



These are the old clay vats that they used to store the olive oil in.  Now they are just antiques.





These are the straw mats that they pour the mulch onto and then pack them on top of each other and place them in the press.



We decided to buy a couple bottles and they literally pulled out the empty bottles, filled them from the vat, then capped and labelled them for us.



And trust me, there is

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