Kosher Food and Drink

December in Israel is the month to sample and buy new fresh olive oils. As a winemaker and former chef, I’ve always loved good extra virgin olive oil (EVOO). But I’ve only really gotten into it during the last few years, dedicating myself to both reading and tasting EVOOs from various quality producers here in Israel and paying particular attention to the characteristics of specific EVOO cultivars. Cultivars are the different varieties of olives, of which there are hundreds in the world, though only about 150 are cultivated for eating and olive oil.

In Israel, olive orchards occupy the largest area of any single fruit commodity, and there are five main cultivars grown.

I’m learning that olive oil is a bit like wine, in that you might find one producer’s Cabernet to be excellent but his Chardonnay not to your taste. Anyway I’ve got a long way to go before I can make definitive statements beyond, “I’m inclined to love this cultivar EVOO from this producer here and that cultivar from that producer over there.”

What I can speak about is which producer offers a good educational experience, and that’s what I received yesterday at Meshek Paz in Kfar Shmuel from Shimon Paz himself. Shimon is a long time veteran of olive cultivation and olive oil production in Kfar Shmuel, which sits very much in the heart of Israel’s center between Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.

I tasted Meshek Paz’s Picholine EVOO, but first a little about the Picholine cultivar.

The Picholine cultivar, fleshy and firm, with a peppery flavor, is well-known as “the cocktail olive,” and widely-cultivated today for eating and for olive oil. While it was originally grown in France, today it can be found easily in Italy, America, and Israel, as well as in other countries around the world.

Picholine olives are known for their high antioxidant levels via polyphenols, which are a chemical which can “take out” free radicals which damage good cells in your body, and helping to control inflammation.

Olive oil labels can sometimes be a good source of information as to whether your EVOO is from a reputable producer and whether the oil contains high levels of polyphenols. The growing region, harvest time, and processing method can all play determining factors in the polyphenol level.

I would add that just as grapes and wines have vintage variations, olive oils may share the same characteristic, even from specific highly-regarded vineyards.

Tasting Notes for Meshek Paz’s Picholine EVOO (Maximum score of 4 stars)

Fruity green olive aroma: 4 stars

Peppery/Spicy aftertaste: 3 stars

Bitterness: 1 star

Viscosity: 2 stars (Of average viscosity for quality EVOO)

Overall quality: 4 stars

The characteristic smell of fresh green olives jumps right out of the tasting cup. On the palate, the oil is moderately unctuous with surprisingly and pleasantly low bitterness in relation to its potent aroma. The aftertaste is aggressively peppery and spicy.

Overall this is an excellent EVOO for all-around use in cooking (where a potent green olive character is desired, e.g., in ratatouille or as a rub or baste for grilling steaks, fish or roasting chicken) or for dressing all sorts of salads from leafy green to chopped Israeli. I think it’ll make great flavorful mayonnaise, pesto, or aioli/skordalia.

100 Point Rating: 92+/100. This is my first EVOO rating on the 100 point scale and I’m a tough grader of any food or wine.

A Visit to Meshek Paz in Kfar Shmuel

I first read about Meshek Paz while cruising Facebook, where because of my interest in EVOO, the algorithm exposes me to various EVOO producers in Israel. The Facebook feeds from Paz caught my eye in particular for three reasons: 1. Their Google rating is high. 2. They produce only varietally-specific EVOO, from five olive cultivars: Barnea, Picholine, Suri, Coratina, and Askal. This is an unusual practice, as most EVOO producers make a “house blend” as their flagship product. 3. Their location in the Emek Ayalon, not far from Modiin where I once lived, and Kfar Bin Nun, where I once worked. Yekev Bin Nun (Bin Nun Winery) makes their own lovely EVOO from their own olive trees.

Anyway I scooted down there on my way to Tel Aviv for a dinner I had planned: orange soup and mushroom risotto. I called in advance as their Facebook page noted visits by appointment only. I asked if I could taste some of their oils while visiting and specifically mentioned that I prefer EVOO with strong fruity aromas and plenty of the characteristic spicy pepper taste classic to certain olive varieties.

When I arrived to the farm, I suppose I expected to see a boutique operation because I had never seen a “Meshek Paz” labeled bottle of EVOO in a store. The initial area Shimon Paz brought me to was a simple room with a few tables with various sized bottles of oil and a single wooden pallet with five-liter tins of various varieties of oil: clearly not an image of a bustling, marketing-slick operation. The Paz family are rather real farmers. They are, in a sense, the types of people I’ve come to know over decades of working professionally in food and wine. Paz works with olives gathered into 1/2 ton macrobins, not lorries with gondolas of fruit such as you would see in bigger olive oil manufacturers.

Shimon was friendly but in that reserved way of most farmers. He suggested I try three oils in the order of lightest to strongest, starting with oil from the Barnea cultivar, then tasting the Picholine that’s associated with some of the finest EVOO of Provence, France, and finishing with the Coratina cultivar from central Italy, which I’d only learned more about in the past year or two.

Coratina EVOO, from the Kibbutz Masik Magal, has been my current go-to “strong” EVOO. It’s at the top of the list of olive cultivars that produce oils high in polyphenolic content with the resulting aroma and flavor profile I tend to prefer: fruity, peppery, hot, and bitter. Tasting the Masik Magal Coratina EVOO on a teaspoon is on the edge of an unpleasant experience. It’s so strong. It’s an oil for folks who want their EVOO to scream olives!

The tasting itself started with Barnea EVOO, and it was bland as I expected, since Barnea is among the most gently-flavored olives suited well to folks who want to use EVOO “without the olive flavor.” I have never come across a pure Barnea oil I fancied.

Next Shimon poured me the Picholine EVOO and it was an instant wow! I am aromatically driven in my taste and the Picholine smelled strongly of fresh green olives as my nose approached the small plastic tasting cup. In the mouth, the oil expressed typical EVOO viscosity, but the biggest surprise was how intense the spicy/peppery aftertaste was, while at the same time not tasting particularly bitter, and in fact, was below average in bitterness.

Finally, I tasted the Coratina oil with the expectation that it would be even more potent than the Picholine, since Coratina olives are a home run hitter among all cultivars. But the Coratina just did not show well after the beautiful and expressive Picholine EVOO. It was a concentrated, potent tasting, but simply did not have the beautiful green fruit of the Picholine. When I expressed my opinion to Shimon, he suggested that it is because he harvests the Picholine variety at a greener stage of fruit maturity, and the Coratina olives at a more ripe stage.

After purchasing a 5L tin of the Picholine EVOO, I asked him if he could show me his equipment and tell me about the processing. Upon opening the shed housing the oil production equipment, it became clear that his equipment is modern, scaled for a small farm’s boutique level of production, and that cleanliness and the presentation of clean, pure fruit, unencumbered with leaves or dirt (what one of my former workers used to call “gibriss” so far as winemaking is concerned), was what Shimon wanted to introduce into his oil extracting equipment.

I’d have had several more questions for Shimon Paz (if his English or my Hebrew were better) about his farming practices or about what his favorite EVOO are, both by cultivar or from other producers. He tersely answered my comment that the mild sunny weather was lovely for mid-December with the response that, “good weather for the farm in December is rain. In retrospect, this made me wonder if his orchards are unirrigated, which is fairly common for olives, but far from ideal so far as quantity is concerned.

I plan to visit several more EVOO producers in Israel this year and to report again whenever I find one of great character and style. In other words, I will hope to write up whatever EVOO I purchase for myself in a 5 liter tin with a full description and rating. I’ve traveled extensively in France, Italy and Greece and tasted several great EVOO in these countries, but Israel is producing equally fine oils here – for real. Paz’s Picholine is so outstanding, I could drink the stuff. Actually, I do! At least 2 tablespoons daily straight up. Shalom!

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