Will the Real Olive Oil Please Stand Up?

I grew up eating a lot of food cooked in butter, toast covered in butter – it was the oil of my childhood in the South! But in the past few years, especially living in Madrid, I became an olive oil person. I like it for cooking, I like it on toast, I like it for everything.

So as I was reading the book Real Food, Fake Food, I was surprised to find that many of the olive oils are actually a mix of fresh olive oil (the yummy stuff) and a refined, low-flavor, super-stable version of olive oil. Sure, the book calls that fake, but if you read between the intense accusations, it still shakes out that the labeling in this industry is deceptive. This doesn’t mean that every bottle is mislabeled, but Extra Virgin Olive Oils from California, it turns out, actually have a more consistently high quality than some brands from Italy, according to tests!

It made me wonder if I had good “taste” in olive oil; so I bought a bottle of California Olive Ranch, and grabbed my most recent bottle of EEVO, and tasted them. I liked them both – but the California one was really flavorful! It makes me think I could happily use whatever olive oil for cooking but might want to keep the delicious California kind with me for toast and other kinds of direct use.

Do you have a favorite brand of EEVO? I’m only now opening my eyes to the idea that they can taste different!