Olive oil in Brisighella
A story that has its roots in the mists of time
Italy is famous around the world for its great inventors, poets and artist but in the last years the locution “made in Italy” is becoming more and more synonym of high quality in particular in the fashion and in the food industries. Cheese, sliced meats (the so called “affettato”), wines, pasta, pizza, mozzarella, ice creams are becoming Italian ambassadors in the world: between these products stands out Brisighella’s olive oil.
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The Olive oil production in this part of the Appennini mountains is not extemporaneous: the first evidence of the elaboration of this product in Brisighella is aged around the II century B.C. and is still possible to see a rudimental millstone inside the “Pieve in Ottavo”, an ancient church situated few km out of Brisighella, where farmers used to gather to make the olive oil. The first written documentation related to this production in Brisighella has been written during around the 1594, when the Bishop of Bertinoro, S.E. Andrea Giovanni Callegari, talking about the river Lamone valley in a letter, was saying that “air, water, wines, olive oil and fruits are so good and savored here that they don’t have to envy anyone in any other region”.
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As always for these matters, there isn’t a real math formula to obtain a product of such quality, but the good result is the fruit of the right mix of different factors (in particular the climate, the soil and the kind of olive) which has made Brisighella the olive oil’s capital city in the world.
Having a closer look, in fact Brisighella’s climate represents a unique situation at its latitude, being closer to the Mediterranean temperatures, which are typical of the Appennini Mountains of 300 Km more southern. This is possible thanks to the hills orientation which prevent the blowing of the Bora wind (capable to ice the olive oil trees) and facilitate the warm hugs of the Corina wind. Moreover, Brisighella is located in the “Vena del gesso Romagnola”, a defined part of the Appennini Mountains where the lands are made of chalking clay; this clay is capable to collect the warm from the atmosphere and to release it slowly, increasing the temperature during the whole year.
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Summing up the effect of the Corina and of the clay, the result is really extraordinary: Brisighella is the municipality in the Emilia Romagna region where has been recorded the higher temperature ever*, very particular primate for a municipality with semi mountain features.
Finally, “Toscane, Nostrane, Ghiacciole and Orfane” mainly represent the variety of olive trees in this municipality. Indeed are the Nostrane olive which has the best output in this part of the Appennino Mountains and for this reason they are the most common. The other kinds of olive are used to obtain 3 different types of extra virgin olive oil.
During 1996, the olive oil of Brisighella (the ones obtained with Nostrane olive) has been rewarded with PDO status (Protected Designation of Origin), first olive oil to obtain this result in the whole Europe!
Today in the “Olive oil land” are working around 300 farmers with around 70000 olive oil trees in production.
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* The temperature has been recorded on the 4th of August 2017 when 42,5 C° has been touched. Sources: Arpae website.