School students make award winning olive oil
From pruning to harvesting of the 175 Tuscan style olive trees, the students did all the grunt work to create the boutique olive oil.
An extra virgin olive oil made by students from trees at a Wairarapa college has taken out silver at this year’s New Zealand Olive Oil awards.
The judges said the oil, competing in the boutique medium blends category, had aromas of tomato and hints of vanilla in its flavour.
The 372 students studying agriculture at Wairarapa College all help tend to the olive grove and bring in the harvest.
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Extra virgin olive oil is the highest-quality of unrefined oil, made by cold-pressing the olives.
Students at Wairarapa College were involved in the entire process from pruning to harvesting of the 175 olive trees on the school’s horticulture block.
The college was “surprised and overwhelmed” to win silver, Dan Grace head agriculture teacher at Wairarapa College, said.
The grove was planted in 2018, he told RNZ’s Checkpoint.
“It took a while to establish, we’ve got them in a clay, alluvial soil, quite high in the clay content and the flavour has evolved from that.”
Soil and climate have a big impact on the flavour of olive oil, he said.
“Every year, every grower will tell you it changes depending on the climate, the rainfall the temperatures how you mulch them, the flavours are quite subtle, but obviously the judges know what they are looking for.”
The college grows Frantoio and Leccino, both Tuscan varieties of olive, he said.
And with 372 students studying agriculture at the school, there are plenty of hands on deck to work the block, he said.
“The students start off at pruning, that’s really important, just getting the shape of the tree, the olives grow on one year growth as soon as you’ve got that harvesting kicks in late autumn.”
The students hand pick the olives which are then pressed at local outfit Leafy Ridge (which picked up a presser of the year award).
It takes a lot of fruit to make oil of this quality, Grace said.
“To make a litre of olive oil you need roughly 6kgs of fruit, each mature tree can produce between 3 and 5 litres of oil.”
The oil is a sell-out, he said.
“We envisioned we were going to sell it at the Masterton Farmers’ Market, as soon as my staff at school found out, it’s quite a big college about 100 staff, so they’ve pretty much snapped it all up.”
