Precious Gift of the Cretan Earth
EFKRATO is a limited production early harvest extra virgin olive oil that comes from our small family olive groves in northern Crete. It is the optimized version of the olive oil we grew up with and an award-winning gourmet productthatis produced exclusively from the ancient Cretan variety Tsounati.
Τhe cultivation of olives in Crete began 4000 BC while the consumption of olives even earlier. Ancient local varieties such as Tsounati are in their ideal and natural environment. No wonder the olive tree and olive oil are important elements of the Cretan identity, as well as an essential element of the Cretan diet and culture.
Every drop of EFKRATO encloses this tradition and takes you in a culinary journey to meet it. EFKRATO offers a unique combination of gastronomic pleasure and nutritional value. It harmoniously combines the bitterness and pungency of early harvest olive oils with aromas of green fruits, artichokes, green peppers, freshly cut grass, etc while It is also very rich in antioxidants (polyphenols).
We have a loving and respectful relationship with the olive grove that generously gives us back not only its fruit, but also snails, wild grasses (fennel, native capers, wild asparagus etc). This is a key component of EFKRATO’s identity. As a result, the cultivation methods we use are stricter than those of organic farming and practically impossible to apply in large scale production of olive oil.
It harmoniously combines the bitterness and pungency of early harvest olive oils with aromas of green fruits, artichokes, green peppers, freshly cut grass, etc while It is also very rich in antioxidants (polyphenols).
The main way of fertilization is our “cooperation” with horses and sheep that offer their organic manure in exchange for the wild grasses of our olive grove. The olives are selected by hand, one by one, and only those in excellent condition are used in the production of EFKRATO. Cold extraction takes place every day, a few hours after harvest. Only the batches with the best organoleptic characteristics are bottled. EFKRATO is then filtered and bottled in a protective atmosphere using the noble gas argon, thus maintaining the organoleptic characteristics and nutrients for much longer.
Harvesting takes place before the fruits ripen, in order to produce what the ancient Greeks called “ωμοτριβές” (early harvest olive oil), which from ancient times was considered the most nutritious olive oil.
Modern scientific studies confirm this belief: Polyphenols, the antioxidants contained in large quantities in early harvest olive oils such as EFKRATO, have anti-inflammatory, antioxidant, cardioprotective and neuroprotective properties.
EFKRATO contains many times more polyphenols than the limit allowing for a health claim to be made (according to Regulation 432/2012 of the European Union). Never before what is good for your health has been so delicious!
