COLD PRESSING

Air is blown through the olives to remove twigs and leaves. The olives are then carefully washed in cold running water.

The olives are crushed using the slow rotation of a three-wheel stone millstone. This allows more regular crushing without raising the temperature of the paste.

A layer of olive paste approximately 1 cm thick is spread on each filter disc (“fiscolo”). The filter discs are then stacked on a table that has a central steel shaft, called a percolator, with openings for drainage. A perforated steel disc of the same diameter is inserted between each set of five filter discs to distribute the pressure uniformly. Thus a tower is formed, consisting of 20 sections (“cinquine”), each containing five filter discs, including one without paste which rests on the steel disc. These can finally be subjected to pressure so that the oil and vegetation water can be extracted, separating them from the solid part, the olive residue.

The oil and vegetation water obtained from the extraction under pressure are put through a further process: the separator.
This separates the vegetation water from the extra virgin olive oil.