Olive AcreHow it's made
From an olive tree in Tunisia —
to your kitchen.
Every bottle of Olive Acre olive oil begins with an olive tree in Tunisia, some of them more than 200 years old. The olives are hand-harvested and pressed there. Once the oil arrives stateside with our supplier, it's tested, then flavored, then bottled. None of it is the fast way to do it. Here's exactly how it happens.
The groves
Our olive oil is grown in Tunisia, where olive trees have been cultivated for thousands of years. Many of the trees are more than 200 years old, and they're dry-farmed — no irrigation, only rainfall, caught by a cleared 50-foot ring of earth around each trunk.
Every olive is picked by hand. Harvest crews work with rakes, nets, and ladders, spending about four hours on a single tree. No machinery drives through the rows. It takes longer and costs more, but it's the only way to harvest a tree this old without damaging it.
The press
Extra virgin is a grade, not a marketing term. It means the oil was extracted using pressure alone — no heat, no chemicals — and tested under 0.8% acidity, the strictest cutoff among the four recognized olive oil grades.
The base oil behind our flavored extra-virgin olive oils was chosen for a smooth, buttery character rather than the sharp, grassy, peppery notes prized in some single-varietal oils. That's intentional. A milder base lets an infused flavor — blood orange, basil — come through clearly instead of competing with a stronger olive taste.
The flavoring
Flavoring happens last, right before bottling, and without heat, which matters because heat is what dulls a fresh flavor. Liquid flavorings are stirred directly into the oil, using the olive oil itself as the carrier. A few flavors use a dry spice blended in instead. Every flavoring is all-natural and plant-based.
The balsamic
Our balsamic is produced in Modena, Italy, to a specification of 80% grape must and 20% red wine vinegar. That's a higher concentration of grape must than most balsamic sold even in specialty stores, which is why it comes out thicker and sweeter, with no added sugar, thickeners, or coloring. What you taste is concentrated grape must and nothing else.
A note on age, because you may have seen bottles elsewhere labeled "18 Year" or similar. By Italian law, only DOP-certified Traditional Balsamic Vinegar of Modena — the kind that sells for $200 and up per 100 ml — is permitted to state an age on the label. Every other balsamic, including ours, legally cannot claim an age, no matter how long it was actually aged. Ours averages an estimated three to four years in barrel.
Dark vs. white
Both start as the same grape must.
Dark
Reduced at a temperature where the natural sugars caramelize, which is where the color comes from, then blended with red wine vinegar. Barrel-aged. Deeper and more complex.
White
Reduced in a vacuum chamber at a lower temperature, so it never caramelizes. It stays a light golden color, is blended with white wine vinegar instead of red, and is not barrel-aged. Lighter, a touch sweeter, less bitter.
Purity
Adulterated olive oil — oil cut with cheaper filler oils — is a documented problem in this industry, especially when a shipment passes through several importers before it reaches a shelf. Our supplier imports the oil directly from Tunisia, which limits how many hands it passes through before it arrives. The oil is independently tested three to four times a year, for both quality and purity.
Why we do it this way
None of this is the fast way to make olive oil and balsamic. It's the way people did it before fast was the point. It's the only way we choose to source it.
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