You can only get Daniele’s cold-pressed, Tonda Iblea olive oil from us. Coming straight from his family farm in eastern Sicily to our hub in Brooklyn, the reason Senia is our first choice is that what you taste off the tree is what you get in the bottle. There is a clean correlation between the two, with no loss of authenticity from fruit to oil.
OUR RELATIONSHIP
At a Sicilian table in 2012, we encountered the best olive oil we’d ever tasted. We left the restaurant with a small tin, on which was written just a phone number - no name, no address - determined to track down its producer. Days later we were in Daniele’s olive groves, surrounded by Tonda Iblea trees. A second generation grower, Daniele took over the land from his father-in-law, moving from the city to run the small-scale business full time. Seven years later, nearly all of his oil goes straight into the hands of our chefs across London, Paris & New York.
THE LAND & ITS FRUIT
The farm lies at the epicentre of Sicily’s olive oil region; Chiaramonte Gulfi in the Iblei mountains, whose mineral-rich soil and microclimate produces some of the world’s finest Tonda Iblea olives. A typically low-yielding variety - each kilo of olives only gives you 110-120ml of oil - Tonda trees are avoided by intensive oil producers. Daniele persists for its unique flavor. His olive grove is set across fifty acres of land and home to over 2000 trees, some over 100 years old. His cultivation and production is entirely organic, protected by the Iblei Mountains Gulfi D.O.P.
FLAVOR FROM TREE TO BOTTLE
In order to achieve the best oil, Danielle starts the vendemmia at the beginning of October, when the olives are still young and green. The harvest takes up to thirty days of non-stop, intense work, each olive being picked and graded by hand. Within 12 hours of being picked, the olives become oil, through the natural process of cold pressing. Different parcels of his land produce olives with incredibly subtle variations in flavor - Daniele keeps each batch separate and blends the oil himself for a perfect balance of 100% Tonda Iblea oil.
