60 millions of olive trees. Nearly one tree for every Italian citizen. These are the record numbers of Puglia territory, it’s two thousand years that the olive tree is part of the territory, it is not only the protagonist of the cultivation, but also of the popular, artistic and literally culture. Twisted, gnarled, trunks corroded in bizarre shapes by the wind, wonderful and monumental in their shape, they can be 15 meters high, they deal an ancient story interlinked with the work of the ones who for years have produced and bottled this yellow gold that flows through the heel of Italy. Nowadays this precious product of the firms of Puglia is known in the whole world: it may happen to find it, in elegant bottles, on the tables of seven stars-hotels in Dubai, in the gourmet shops in Montreal or in the refined department stores in Tokyo. Each oil has its own identity. An example is the oil produced by the frantolio di Pietro D’Amico, in Cisternino, in the heart of the Itria Valley. A successful firm for three generation ( it opened in 1917) produces an extra virgin oil squeezed coldly by grinds made of stone, obtained by a careful selection of sound olives picked up by hand (directly from the tree) from the second half of October to december. Olives are squeezed after a few hours after the collecting, to keep the colour, the scent the aroma and all the properties unchanged. From these olives we obtain the “Trisole”, good and genuine marked by the symbol of the “fiscolo”, a disk of straw woven by hand, still used in Puglia as a filter during the squeezing of the olives. The traditional oil mills during the XX century were built in a circular tank where the olives were put and squeezed by big wheels made of stone put in the centre of the tank. The “oil paste” coming from the rotatory movement of the olives was distributed on the fiscoli and led to the press. Anyway a kind of tribute to the country history that continue inspiring “I frantoiani di frantolio”. The ones who want to know the historic traditions of the territory that lead this noble fruit of the nature from the tree to the dishes, many guided tours ere organized in the “trappeti” (the name of the oil mills in dialect) along the whole oil production, from the squeezing to the bottling, learning the rudiments of the main healthy smell and taste characteristics. After the visit of the productive departments it is possible a taste of the extra virgin oil “Trisole” ( “Agricoltura Biologica”, “Lacrima”, “Denocciolato”, “Sovrano” and “Aromatizzati”) with bread, frise, taralli, all typical goods of the Itria Valley. And since you should also please the eye, the tasting is set in the ancient trulli of the XVII century. Here the tastes of the gastronomy melt with the charm of the past.

WHERE AND HOW
IL FRANTOLIO di Pietro D’Amico
Contrada Tesoro 25 – Cisternino (BR)
Ph. +39.080.4444671
www.ilfrantolio.it