Kalamata is a city in Peloponnese, Greece which has given its name to the superb quality Kalamata Olives or Kalamon Olives. The city has its own Olive oil school and is the capital of Messinia county where the olive trees groves dominate over any other tree cultivation. Whole picture of Kalamata finishes with the organisation of its own olive oil competition and olive festival: Kalamata Olive oil competition

This year results are:
Category
Kalamata PDO extra virgin olive oil
Gold medal:
Agrexpo Faris PDO Kalamata extra virgin olive oil
Silver medal:
Agropoly PDO Kalamata extra virgin olive oil

Gold medal: Kyklopas Ages Organic extra virgin olive oil
Silver medal: Mani Organic extra virgin olive oil
Bronze medal: Kondea Organic extra virgin olive oil

Gold medal: EnKardia Ultra Premium extra virgin olive oil
Bronze medal Agropoly Organic High Phenolic extra virgin olive oil

Within the frame of the Kalamata olive oil competion and festival, praise/credit have been given to the following companies and their products  

1st Praise: Karapata private company - Product : Lioklado extra virgin olive oil

2nd Praise: Maria Dimitrakopoulou - Product : EnKardia Traditional extra virgin olive oil 

3rd Praise: Eustathios Georgakilas - Product: Georgakilas extra virgin olive oil

What is Organic extra virgin Olive oil?
To explain what Organic extra virgin olive oil is, we have to start from the name term which has 2 parts.

- The first part is the adjective '' Organic '', which is used when the olive tree grower applies organic farming standards on the cultivation of olive tree as these have been defined by European Union regulation EC 834/2007.

When ''Organic'' is placed on a product label and before the name then the grower must be certified showing the organic farming standards are followed. This is testified by the audits executed by the relevant regulatory bodies responsible for providing such accreditation.
Such labelling requirement is followed by other logos or emblems such as the green starred leaf for EU

- The second part is the extra virgin olive oil. Within this definition, there are 2 sections
First one is the Virgin Olive oil and according to the Olive oil – Institute of Olive Council, virgin olive oils are the oils obtained from the fruit of the olive tree (Olea europaea L. ) solely by mechanical or other physical means under conditions, particularly thermal conditions, that do not lead to alterations in the oil, and which have not undergone any treatment other than washing, decantation, centrifugation and filtration.
Second one is Extra an adjective which is the most important element of a virgin olive oil.

Extra Virgin Olive oil has superior taste quality and does not have taste (sensory) faults. Its chemical laboratory analysis should show results below certain limits: one of them is acidity and more specifically of no more 0.8 % on free fatty acids.
It appears to have a plethora of health benefits especially the organic ones as they do not have residues of pesticides used to fight off an insect which damages the olive fruit.
The lower than 0.8% acidity, the better quality of the extra virgin olive oil is. An extra virgin olive oil with acidity 0.5% is better than the one with acidity of 0.7%. This implies better harvesting method i.e. careful selection of olives and better process condition in the olive mill.

A bit of our lack of knowledge and a bit of usage of not accurate wording from chefs side, we have ended up watching on the web and on TV, episodes on cooking and chefs calling the extra virgin olive oil just oil!
Of course, calling the extra virgin olive oil just Oil is incorrect and inaccurate, olive oil is not accurate either though. ”Oil” should be wiped off from our culinary vocabulary. In certain countries, we have seen people calling it “regular” but they mean is the refined olive oil which is a a very low quality (=extremely low quality), product.

Extra virgin olive oil is not oil and it is not even olive oil.  If all of us love the olive juice, we should start naming this natural product properly. Simirarly, we would not call a silver piece as golden piece because both of them are metals, would we?
There is an exception for the usage of ”olive oil” though: ”olive oil” is the name of the juice from olives generally and by itself it consists of a category of products. One of the reason this exception exists in several languages is to differentiate ”olive oil” from the other vegetables oils (juices from vegetables), generally cheap and without health benefits at all, such as sunflower or rapeseed oil.
Let’s see together why extra virgin olive oil can not be named as olive oil.
There are several types of juice from olive:

1. Extra virgin olive oil:  It has superior taste quality and does not have taste faults. Its lab analysis should show results below certain limits: one of them is acidity and more specifically of no more 0.8 % on free fatty acids. It appears to have a plethora of health benefits especially the organic ones. The lower than 0.8% acidity, the better quality of the extra virgin olive oil is. An extra virgin olive oil with acidity 0.5% is better than the one with acidity of 0.7%. This implies better harvesting method i.e. careful selection of olives and better process condition in the olive mill.
2. Virgin olive oil : its quality appear to be lower than the extra virgin olive oil while acidity can be up to 2% on free fatty acids. Taste wise appears to have defects on aroma / scent and flavour. It is suitable for sale/consumption.
3. Olive oil: it is a low quality product as it is refined product from
   

a. bad quality virgin olive oil,
b. previously used virgin olive oil mainly in cooking and frying, and
c. other oxidised virgin olive oil products.
In our opinion, consumers should not consume this product at all. It appears to have no health benefits and no taste or aromas at all.

1. Pomace oil: Extremely unpleasant smell and taste. This must not be consumed by humans. It is dangerous if consumed by people.

It is obvious that as we move from extra virgin olive oil to pomace oil, the taste quality lowers massively to the degree where pomace oil can cause serious harm to humans if consumed.
In certain countries, there is a usage of ”pure olive oil” and we can say categorically that there is no such thing as purity in olive oil as olive oil is a very low quality product which is derived from the refining process of used ”olive oil” products (through cooking, baking, and other oxidised olive oil products). 
Our advice here is to always read the label of the product! It is our obligation as consumers to do so! By law, in all countries, all olive oil products must have label with all the above information clearly stated.
Source: https://organicekiosk.com/oliveoilcategories/

Honey and Extra Olive oil have a few "good" things in common:

• single ingredient products, easy to consume as they are, no further cooking is required
  
• unique and complex flavour profiles, and
  
• a lot of health benefits.
  

 
Extra Virgin Olive oil flavours are so complex to the point where one might say their complexity resembles the ones from wine.
To understand the depth of complexity of such flavours, one can read the flavour description as it comes out from an international olive oil competition panel. Panelists experts on identifying the flavours descibe the flavour profile of an extra virgin olive oil. We quote one example from a competition in New York for Pamako organic extra virgin olive oil
''It has a fresh and fruity aroma, with strong spicy elements, and a soft, bitter taste''

This can be testified through the plethora of olive oil competitions in the world happening in various cities to name a few Athens, New York, Madrid and Tokyo. 

Both Honey and Extra Olive oil have been used in food frauds many times in the past. Companies such as Lidl, Filippo Berio and Bertolli had been fined for misinformation about the origin or the tasting quality of the extra virgin olive oil.
EU and UK authorities still allow honey and olive oil to have label which mentions in a very vague way the country of origin of the product. In many cases, one can see a label on a bottle or a jar reading: ''This is made of EU and non EU blends''.
In most of the cases, it is impossible to find the exact country of origin of these honeys due to a broken food traceability system. And that can be proved from the fact that European Food Safety Authority publishes data from most of the food fraud cases across the world where honey and olive oil products appear on the list more or less on every other month.

Why the supermarkets still sell products of honey with the label to read non EU blends of honey at only £3.20 per Kilo when the cost of producing honey for a beekeeper is at least £5.00
What is our action then you might wonder?

Do not buy any of these products: blends of various products, and to make sure this does not ahppen check the label.
When you see blends of EU and non EU blends, then immediately it is understood that this products is jarred or bottled using mixtures of various olive oil. Instead buy them from local delicatessen stores across the country where both olive oil and honey products come from one grower or beekeeper. Especially with honey, we recommend any purchase of honey products to be done from a beekeeper who packs their honey into jars by themselves. And remember all products must have a label on with all the legal information on: address, weight/volume, name of the product, best before date, country of origin (which in our case it should be one) and nutritional information (Honey is excepted)

 Are you a foodie or a fine foods sourcing expert? Then we might have something in common with you.
But if you would like to become one, then maybe it is time to start your research and tasting sessions as tabula rasa, with lots of energy. Remember to ask questions
We do not believe that new products are found in food markets but in a food kitchen from some innovative and persistent people.

When we do the research for the fine foods, we search for something out of the normal:
Taste comes first and packaging follows . 
We do not look for normal ingredients only but something extraordinary. We go to people's place where they produce these fine ingredients, where possible.  
We do not search for just another Extra virgin olive oil but:

• one from a single estate and multiawarded or
• An organic olive oil from Manaki variety, and not from the usual varieties such as Koreoneiki.

We supply to market with the Organic Wild Mint, with entirely different flavour to spearmint and peppermint, known for its help towards muscular pains.  
Same principle applies to the selection of our herbal teas, unique herbal ingredients are part of the blend (not nasty flavouring boosts):

• Would you like to have a tea with Rosehil, Agrimony, Geranium or Greek Sage, and Jasmine flowers?
• What about some fruit sauce with goji berry, tomato and pepper?  
• Or a black olive paste with a great taste award? 

As regards packaging and its usage, we believe we have got it right, every single product appears to have something unique. 
However if the packaging does not follow the superb taste of the product, then the customer will put some things into the right place in other words the food product will have a repetitive sale.
And the other way around too, packaging is not enough to support repetitive sales of a product.

If you want to find more about the finest and luxury foods, we distribute to delicatessens and high end groceries, complete the contact form and
                                                                        We will call you back! 

There is a very large number of producers around the world claiming their product is premium, of superior taste and packaging. And the extra virgin olive oil is not an exception.

As product the extra virgin olive oil has a superior taste, and from countries such as Greece could be characterised as a superb one. Acidity of no more than 0.8% is not anymore the only criterion for the characterisation of an extra virgin olive oil as premium.
Therefore, one might wonder what elements or technical features are making an extra virgin olive oil a finest product then? It is the features coming from the product flavour profile.

There are 3 major characteristics:
1. Fruity
2. Pungent
3. Bitter

The flavour profile is the main structure and the robust foundation for having a superior or premium extra virgin olive oil. While the chemical analysis remains as one the pillars, the tasting of the product by an accredited panel will put the final signature. Excellent and premium packaging completes the picture of the finest product following always the tasting and the analysis.
Whoever is your supplier, ask them to do a taste panel with you explaining some features to understand the extra virgin olive oil (evoo) flavour profile. All these three characteristics should be balanced well, and remember slight bitterness is not a defect on the contrary it indicates high content of antioxidants which is a benefit.
There are several competitions of olive oil products around the world, and the awards can not be given so easily to extra virgin olive oils that they do not meet the strict criteria. Such competitions can be used an indication or supporting hand to select the finest of all.
In these competitions, world experts/taste panellists ''tear apart'' the profile of an extra virgin olive oil and identify which one deserves a gold award.

If you would like to familiarise yourself with extra virgin olive flavours, it is wise to start a tasting session by yourself simply by smelling and tasting the several products and write down the intensiveness of each product characteristic.

We all know the benefits of a Mediterranean diet and where its foundation relies on: the extra virgin olive oil.
At FOS Squared, we do make sure that olive oil is not just oil but an extra virgin one and has won taste awards on:  gold ones. That means is approved by palates of extravirgin olive oil taste experts in the world.
Moreover, we make sure that at least one of the selected olive oils is a PDO one which means it is a protected designation of origin. This time the PDO product has its origin in Sitia, Crete, in Greece. Of course, a superior quality extra virgin olive oil is a complete one when its packaging is  exceptional too. In our case, both selected extra virgin olive oils have won awards on packaging design too.  
Our selected olive oils are eclectic, premium and fine ones, only for those who look for something unique within the delicatessen and high end grocery market of London and UK.