Products From Olive Tree

Olive tree products provide a number of documented presentations of the production and quality of the two most important olive tree products: virgin olive oil and table olives. It is a source that familiarizes readers with recent approaches and innovations that can be introduced in the virgin olive oil extraction and stabilization technology and the preparation of table olives with emphasis on the presence of bioactive constituents. It also describes advances in the methods of checking authenticity and in the evaluation of attributes that may influence consumers' perceptions and preferences. Other topics discussed are squalene, a trove of metabolic actions, pigments, geographical indication, biotechnology in table olive preparation, and recovery of hydroxytyrosol from olive-milling wastes.

The olive tree (Olea europaea L.) is a very important plant in terms of oil-producing crops in the Mediterranean basin. As reported by Zohary and Hopf (1994), olives probably originated in the Eastern region of the Mediterranean area. All of the ancient civilizations of the Mediterranean area used the olive tree and its olive oil, which was also integrated into the religious practices of all the "known religions" of the region with implications of peace, fertility, strength and purification. Nowadays, the olive trees have spread to many countries in the world and adapted to the varied microclimates that characterize the different areas. The cultivation of the olive tree has expanded in Asia, America and Oceania due to the promotion of olive oil as a product with both nutritive and beneficial effects on health.Currently, the world olive fruit production is around 19 million of tons, of which 90% is consumed as olive oil and 10% as table olives.The beginning of this book is devoted to the historical roots of olive oil production, in order to produce a picture of the ancient empirical olive cultivation and Italian institutions that have allowed the scientific and technological knowledge of olive cultivation to prosper from the eighteenth century to the mid-20th century.Olive tree biodiversity is estimated to have more than 1,200 cultivars, which is a very wide germplasm. In one of the chapters of this book, the botanical and historical origin of the olive tree and the morphological and genetic methodologies applied to identify the olive cultivars are examined. Moreover, the importance of preserving the large olive tree germplasm to avoid the loss of cultivated biodiversity is mentioned. The importance of the germplasm collections, their management and enhancement are reported in a chapter in terms of the strategies for the ex situ conservation of plant genetic resource. Development in the world of olive groves requests not only the choice of suitable germplasm for the different environments, but also the production of olive plants in the nurseries. A chapter describes the most important propagation techniques such as grafting and cutting, and in particular the micropropagation that may represent a thriving business for nurseries. The last chapter explores an important aspect of the olive oil production chain, which produces a large amount of by-products like humid pomace and wastewater. These by-products have represented for several years an environmental problem due to the presence of high polyphenolic content and minerals. In recent years, a new approach is taking into account strategies and technologies for the valorization of these by-products, which would be transformed from waste materials to resources.

The market is flooded with products posing as elixirs, supplements, functional foods, and olive oil alternatives containing phenols obtained from multiple olive sources. This technically-oriented book will be of value to nutritionists and researchers in the biosciences. It unravels the body of science pertaining to olive minor constituents in relation to new chemical knowledge, technological innovations, and novel methods of recovery, parallel to toxicology, pharmacology, efficacy, doses, claims, and regulation. Topics include: the biological importance of bioactive compounds present in olive products; developments and innovations to preserve the level of bioactives in table olives and olive oil; and importance of variety, maturity, processing of olives, storage, debittering of olives and table olives as a valuable source of bioactive compounds. Presents detailed information concerning the claimed benefits of olive oil and discusses the permitted health claim to EFSA on oils with natural phenolics Recovery of bioactive constituents from olive waste is comprehensively described Explores the relationship betwen phenolic levels and sensory evaluation Features chapters on the clinical and cellular mechanisms and health effects of olive, important for functional foods research

Sitti's Olive Trees is the story of the olive harvesting season in Palestine. Sitti shares the beautiful tales of her ancestors planting and caring for their precious olive trees with Reema, her granddaughter in the U.S., and the unique culture and hard work that goes into olive picking season. This heart-warming tale is a celebration of culture, family, and storytelling.

This Mediterranean travel memoir offers “an engaging mix of history, food travelogue, and botany lesson . . . There is much to enjoy here” (Library Journal). Inspired by her Syrian forebears’ intimate relationship with the olive, Julie Angus embarks on a voyage around the Mediterranean to unlock the secrets of the fruit that meant so much to them. Accompanied by her husband and their ten-month-old son, Angus collects samples from ancient trees to determine where the first olive tree originated; feasts on inky black tapenades and codfish drizzled with olive oil, among many other delights; witnesses the harvesting of olives in Greece; and visits perhaps the oldest olive tree in the world, on Crete. The result is a fascinating history and biography of this most influential and irresistible fruit. “It is a pleasure to try to keep up with this book; like its author, it covers an enormous amount of territory.” —Christopher Bakken, Wall Street Journal