PURA GROVE has won the GOLD AWARD at the prestigious World Olive Oil Competition. The New York International Olive Oil Competition (NYIOOC) named our premium extra virgin olive oil as one of the World's Best Olive Oils for 2024! Let’s go behind the scenes at our PURA GROVE farm to show you the factors that enable us to make you a flavorful, healthful, award-winning olive oil.
To begin, we are grateful for the wonderful climate and terrain of San Diego County, California. Only 15 minutes from neighboring Riverside County’s famous olive town, Temecula, PURA GROVE is in the hills of beautiful de Luz, California. The growing conditions are spectacular here and we are grateful that PURA GROVE’s olive crop benefits from them.
Our olive oils, which are certified organic, are grown onsite at our farm without any pesticides or chemicals. They are grown in a cared-for but natural environment.
Once the olives reach the right level of ripeness, we hand harvest them. Since the more contact the olives have with oxygen, the worse it is, we make the transition from olive to olive oil extremely quickly. We have the advantage of having our processing facility onsite at the farm, as opposed to many other olive oil brands. Also, larger brands that process their olives at a higher volume may have their olives sitting longer waiting to be put through the machines. Therefore, we find that smaller batches like ours turn out better!
We then clean the olives to remove any debris, leaves, or soil dirt. We crush the cleaned olives and break them into a paste. We do this without heating, since heat can impact the oil’s quality.
Have you heard of malaxation? This is an important phase in extracting the oil from olives. The olive paste is in tanks with rotating arms and stainless steel blades. These tanks churn and knead the paste so the oil droplets coalesce into larger drops, which can then be separated by centrfugation. Malaxation is key to the quality of the olive oil and we take a lot of care with our process.
After the malaxation is complete, a centrifuge separates the olive oil from the paste, and the separated mixture undergoes further separation. This separates the heavier water from the lighter oil and removes any extant impurities.
Finally, we bottle and store the olive oil. We store our oil in stainless steel tanks to preserve freshness and flavor. We cork, package, and seal the bottles by hand onsite. As the bottles are filled, they’re immediately sealed so as to avoid contact with oxygen. Our main goal throughout the process is to minimize contact with oxygen and avoid oxidation, so as to retain the oil’s flavor, freshness, and healthfulness.
So there you have it! These are the components that make up an award winning, made-in-the-USA olive oil. We appreciate your interest and we’re glad that you care about the quality of the oil you consume. Many thanks from all of us at PURA GROVE.