The great names of the Italian olive come from Tuscany or Puglia. Ours comes from neither. It is called Dolce di Rossano and grows almost only where we are at home — in the hills around Rossano, on the Ionian coast of Calabria.
“Dolce”, the sweet one, it is called for its mild, rounded character. It is a variety you will scarcely find outside Calabria.
Two characters from one olive
The beauty of the Dolce di Rossano: from one and the same olive, two very different oils can be pressed — it comes down only to the moment of harvest.
Picked early, still green, it gives our dense, peppery Intenso. A little later, riper, it becomes the balanced, versatile Nobile. The same hill, the same variety, two signatures.
Why so rare?
Calabria was for decades the quiet olive-oil region of Italy — much volume, little name, a large part of it going anonymously into the blend. Varieties like the Dolce di Rossano stayed under the radar as a result.
We think this undeserved. What grows here has a voice of its own. We only give it the bottle to go with it.