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GLOBAL CUISINE
 
OCTOBER 2012
EVOO with Fresh Herbs
IN THIS ISSUE
LIMITED RESERVE
Be among the first notified about the availability of our Limited Reserve extra virgin olive oil. Limited Reserve is our freshest oil, and is available only during the fall harvest.
 
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WHAT'S HAPPENING AT THE RANCH
YouTube 
Visit our YouTube page and and see what keeps our ranchers and millers busy.

Click here to see YouTube
FACES AT THE RANCH
Mike Perez, milling manager

Meet Mike

Mike Perez is the milling manager at our Artois mill in northern California. Mike and the rest of our milling team will be working round-the-clock during our harvest.
FAN PHOTO OF THE MONTH
Pork Tenderloin with Plum Chutney by Ricky Williams

Send Us Your Photos!

Congratulations to Ricky Williams, the latest winner of our Fan Photo of the Month contest. Ricky shared this photo of a dish he made and was just about to grill: pork tenderloin with plum chutney. Ricky, as a result, has  won some olive oil. You can win this month's contest by sending us a photo showing how you use our oil. Put "Fan Photo" in the subject line and send it to the email address below, or post it on our Facebook page

[email protected]
NEW COOKBOOK


Order Your Copy Today

The team behind the best-selling The Food52 Cookbook and the James Beard Award-winning website Food52.com are back. Noted food writers Amanda Hesser and Merrill Stubbs are the editors of The Food52 Cookbook, Volume 2. It features seventy-five recipes from talented home cooks around the world. 

 Click here to order
THE GROWING GLOBAL APPETITE FOR GOOD OLIVE OIL
Olive Harvester at Artois
This month marks the start of our most important time of year: the olive harvest.

Our field crews are gearing up, test driving our harvesters up and down the rows of olives, as well as practicing turns and other maneuvers. The quality and quantity of our olive crop look good.  We also anticipate dry weather for harvest - ideal when gathering the olives and trucking them to our northern California mill for crushing into extra virgin olive oil.

The growing size of our harvest makes us marvel at how much Americans' appetite for good olive oil has grown since we were founded nearly 15 years ago. In just the past decade, U.S. consumption of olive oil has jumped about 40 percent. Moreover, we aren't the only people on the planet who've acquired a new-found taste for good olive oil.

It's fair to say olive oil has earned a place at the global table. From China and Japan to Russia and Brazil, olive oil imports are recording double-digit growth. India, too, is rapidly increasing its appetite for olive oil.

"India has become a significant market for olive oil in recent years. There is an increased awareness in India about the numerous health benefits of olive oil," The Olive Oil Times reported last year. "It is no longer perceived as a rich man's fancy food, but a truly healthy food."

Italians, Spaniards and Greeks have been baking cakes, saut�ing vegetables, braising meats, and deep-frying foods with extra virgin olive oil for generations.

Now chefs and home cooks around the globe are increasingly following their lead. The U.S. Department of Agriculture's Foreign Agricultural Service noted in a 2010 report that a decade ago Italy, Spain and Greece accounted for 90% of global olive oil consumption.

"Today, those leading Mediterranean countries consume about 60% of total olive oil, with consumption increasing the most in the United States, Japan, South America, and Eastern Europe."

In recognition of the growing global appetite for olive oil, we've assembled recipes below that reflect olive oil's use in global cuisine. The dishes showcase cooking from Cuba to Turkey, from London to Morocco.

Enjoy the dishes, knowing that you're breaking bread and enjoying good olive oil with people from all over the world.
Favorite Recipes from Around the Globe
Roasted Parsnips and Sweet Potatoes with Vinaigrette
Mom's Summer Tomato Salad Yotam Ottolenghi's eclectic cuisine reflects his rich heritage. He was born in Israel to Italian and German parents. He studied literature and philosophy before becoming a celebrated London chef who operates five eateries. "Treat this recipe as a blueprint for an infinite number of roast vegetable dishes," he writes in Plenty (Chronicle Books, 2011), where this recipe appears. Our Everyday Fresh oil would be good for roasting the veggies.   

 Click here to see the recipe
Rif Mountain Omelet with Wild Mushrooms
Cedar Planked New York Steak with Rosemary and Honey Cookbook author Jeff Koehler says he came across this dish in Morocco's Rif Mountains. A chef there whipped up this "divine" omelet using wild mushrooms that Koehler and his family had gathered in the local pine forest.  The herb-flavored omelets are cooked in extra virgin olive oil - such as our Everyday Fresh - and topped with at least two varieties of wild mushrooms. The recipe appears in Koehler's  book Morocco (Chronicle Books, 2012). Top it with a drizzle of our fruity Arbequina.

 Click here to see the recipe
Roasted Potatoes with Homemade Za'atar, Aleppo Pepper
Arugula Salad with Watermelon and Feta This dish features a homemade version of za'atar, a Middle Eastern spice blend, paired with roasted potatoes. It comes from a food blog showcasing global cuisine, One Tribe Gourmet. The recipe itself is included in the new book The Food52 Cookbook, Volume 2 (William Morrow Cookbooks, 2012), by Amanda Hesser and Merrill Stubbs. The spices bring "a little taste of the exotic to weekday potatoes," Hesser and Stubbs note. Give the dish a finishing drizzle of our robust Miller's Blend. 

Click here to see the recipe
Turluturlu
Tequila Salmon This spice-infused Turkish dish, which is cooked in the oven, would be perfect for a cool fall night. It includes chickpeas and lots of vegetables: eggplant, potatoes, winter squash, red bell pepper, zucchini, and pur�ed tomatoes. Cumin, coriander, and red pepper flakes add spice. The recipe appears in the book  Turkey (Chronicle Books, 2012), by Leanne Kitchen. Try our Everyday Fresh oil for preparing this dish. We'd give it a finishing drizzle of our robust Arbosana or Miller's Blend.

 Click here to see the recipe
Swordfish Kebabs with Celeriac, Orange and Walnut Salad
Grilled Rib Eye with Crispy Potato and Smoked Bacon Vinaigrette Turkey is blessed with lots of fresh seafood. Turks prepare it simply and serve it with an accompaniment that takes little effort to make. This dish takes that approach. Cubes of swordfish are marinated in fresh orange juice, dill, and extra virgin olive oil, like our Everyday Fresh. The swordfish is grilled and paired with a celeriac, orange, and walnut salad. The recipe is from Turkey (Chronicle Books, 2012), by Leanne Kitchen.   

 Click here to see the recipe
Black Bean Soup (Frijoles Negroes)
Grilled Tuna with Red Wine, Caper, and Olive Sauce "You will find a recipe for black bean soup in every Cuban cookbook. It's mandatory. I'm not kidding," Ana Quincoces half jokes in her Cuban cookbook Sabor (Running Press, 2012). What is certain, she adds, is that most Cubans consider black beans to be "food of the gods." Try our Everyday Fresh for preparing this hearty soup.

Click here to see the recipe
The Creative and Culinary Brains Behind Food52
Amanda Hesser and Merill Stubbs
Amanda Hesser and Merrill Stubbs
Amanda Hesser and Merrill Stubbs
Amanda Hesser and Merrill Stubbs are the creative forces behind the James Beard Award-winning website Food52.com, which showcases recipes from talented home cooks around the globe. It led to Hesser and Stubbs' best-selling book, The Food52 Cookbook. The book was created in 52 weeks and is the first crowd-sourced cookbook featuring recipes from home cooks. The Food52 Cookbook, Volume 2, is due out in December.

Hesser was an award-winning food writer at The New York Times before catching the entrepreneurial bug and launching Food52.com with Stubbs. Stubbs previously worked in the food industry for more than a decade and has written for numerous publications, including The Times. Food52.com's launch, in 2009, came after Hesser and Stubbs asked: Why not let people on the Internet team up and create a cookbook?  

How do you like to use extra virgin olive oil in your cooking?

Amanda: We use olive oil for everything. And while we love lots of oils, it's fair to say that olive oil is our primary cooking medium. I lived in Italy and Merrill studied in Italy, so we both drank the Italian Kool-Aid, aka olive oil! One of my favorite ways to use olive oil is for poaching fish and shellfish. The oil surrounds and protects the fish; and as the fish cooks, its juices mix with the oil and make a delicious sauce.

Merrill: I just recently started cooking for my 8-month-old, and I add extra virgin olive oil to almost everything I make for her - carrots, broccoli, zucchini, sweet potatoes, squash, ground turkey, and roast chicken. She loves it, and I love that I'm giving her early exposure to an ingredients she'll hopefully enjoy her whole life.

What's in your home fridge?

A: Where to begin! In my fridge right now are probably 100 foods and ingredients. Everything from vanilla beans to mascarpone to anchovy paste to Sriracha sauce to pistachio oil!

M: We just moved, so it's a lot less jammed than usual. One whole shelf is dedicated to food for the baby, plus our own leftovers. There are eggs, yogurt, bacon and a whole chicken that has yet to be roasted, and my cheese drawer is overflowing, which it always is. My condiments are sparse at the moment: mustard, mayo, peanut butter, and a few jars of jam.

What do you like to cook at home?

A: I really like when my food supply is waning and the fridge is filled with odds and ends. Makes it more of a challenge to come up with something interesting!

M: Simple things: roast chicken, steak, salad, pasta. I like using as many seasonal ingredients from my local greenmarket as possible.

What do you like to eat when you're too tired to cook?

A: Toast with salted butter and jam. Or I like to have cured meats, olives, bread, and sparkling wine.

M: Toast with ricotta and sea salt, or cheese and crackers.

Do you follow recipes, or wing it?

A: Maybe this comes from all the recipe testing we've done, but I'm a pretty good recipe follower. I like to trust the recipe writer and see what he/she had in mind and learn something new. And because we do so much of our own  recipe creation and development, I find it comforting to just get in the kitchen and let someone else (the recipe author) tell me what to do.

M: I usually wing it, unless whatever I'm making involves baking. My mother is all about improvising in the kitchen, and I take after her.

Do you clean up as you cook, or do you wait until after you're done?

A: The dishwasher and counter space has made me so lazy in this department. I used to be so good about cleaning as I go, but I've slacked off a bit. One thing I'm a stickler about is keeping my work space and countertop clean as I cook. No mysterious spills and sticky spots!

M: I make my best effort, but sometimes the dishes pile up in the sink. My husband and I have a "you cook, I'll clean" agreement, so he's usually stuck with the lion's share!

What's your favorite global cuisine?

A: I love south Indian and Sri Lankan food, which is based on coconut oil and coconut milk, rather than the ghee and yogurt you find in northern India, and incorporates more fish and herbs. The best way I can describe the cuisine is that it's invigorating.

M: I love the clean flavors of Vietnamese food. Rice noodles are one of my favorite comfort foods, and the Vietnamese use a lot of them, along with simply grilled meats and fish. I also love how they incorporate fresh herbs and vegetables into so many of their dishes - I never feel weighed down after a Vietnamese meal.

What's your earliest food memory?

A: Eating our poodle's good food. And I liked it.

M: We had a babysitter who was from Thailand, and I remember the first full Thai meal she made for us with great clarity: tiny fried spring rolls filled with ground pork and bean thread noodles, chicken and coconut milk soup, and Thai curry with all of the accoutrements.