HISTORY OF THE SAN AMADOR OIL COOPERATIVE
The many hundreds of farmers of the San Amador Cooperative cultivate the olive groves of Martos, a town in the province of Jaén, Southern Spain. For decades now this picturesque community has had the distinction of containing the largest area of olive trees of any municipality in the world. The Coop has bottled and shipped its classic Extra Virgin Olive Oil to consumers worldwide. Under its official trademarks, Tuccioliva and Peña de Martos, this rich, bright-green oil has captivated imaginations and palates wherever it is sold.
The San Amador Coop was formed in 1960 to help small and medium-sized, family-owned olive farms in the area. In the beginning, farmers continued to use the traditional method of harvesting and pressing olives using wicker baskets and the local olive press.
In 1994, the Coop undertook an important modernization of its facilities and technology and today its olives are harvested and pressed using modern, ecologically sustainable practices. The Coop now boasts more than 700 individual farmers working on close to 7,500 acres ( 3,000+ Hectares) of land, which produce an average of more than 29 million pounds (13.5 million kilos) of olives and 6.6 million pound (3 million kilos) of oil.
In 2007, the Coop introduced the Tuccioliva brand name. Tuccioliva Extra Virgin Olive Oil has been awarded prizes by various panels of expert tasters and in competitions across the globe.
THE SAN AMADOR COOP: FACILITIES
1ª STAGE: SELECTION
The quality of our olive begins with the olive itself, which is picked at just the right level of ripeness. The harvest is undertaken by a variety of methods, both traditional and contemporary.
2ª STAGE: CLEANING, WASHING AND WEIGHING
The fruit is cleaned by the use of fans to blow away any stems, leaves and dust that might have fallen in with it when it was harvested. Thus cleaned, the olives are weighed, measured and analyzed in various ways to ascertain their state of maturity. The olives are then washed in pure, drinkable water to eliminate mud and stones.
3ª STAGE: MAKING THE OIL
Olives must be pressed as soon as possible, because the quality of the fruit begins to deteriorate rapidly after harvesting. The olives are pressed, and then mixed to even out the oil. Solids and liquids in the oil are separated and various oils are mixed.
4ª STAGE: STORAGE
It is fundamental to the process of making oil that you preserve the delicate and essential characteristics of the fresh olive. This is done by controlling temperature and light, keeping the oil as still as possible and making sure it isn’t exposed the air or metals.
5ª STAGE: BOTTLING
As in storage, it is important when bottling the oil to keep it as healthy as possible. That means maintaining the right levels of temperature and light and keeping the oil away from the air and metal exposure.
CERTIFICATE OF QUALITY
At the San Amador Cooperative, we do everything we can to preserve the quality of our oil, so that it comes to your table preserving all of the beautiful properties and characteristics it had on the day it was pressed.
We have a distinctive CERTIFICATE OF QUALITY on our oil, given to us by the Junta de Andalucía, the government of our region, which recognizes products of the highest level, created under specific and stringent quality controls.
