The Almassera Vella Estate is now for sale and listed with Lopez Henderson, C/San Bartololomé 33, Local 1, 03560 El Campello, Alicante, SPAIN Tel +34 965 63 55 50 and see their excellent presentation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AxV6pCtzD_M15

We’ve enjoyed a superb life-style here at the Almassera Vella and made countless friends via our courses and retreats, but we need to downsize –Sale-d_Estar-SergeyLibrary, Almassera Vella

Another great year for olives out of our Valero grove, possibly a result of the unusual Spring weather which brought exceptional, but actually welcome, rain. Our 75 trees produced 1075 kilos of olives – a blend of Manzanilla and Blanqueta varieties. In harvesting we were helped by guests from England David, Tim, Jackie and Tess.

Aftre gathering from the trees,the olives some green, some turning and others black, the ideal time to harvest, we delivered straight to the ‘Almassera de Relleu’ and  165 litres of extra virgin olive oil arrived that evening.  Jordi at the  Olive press commented on the high quality of the oil – now available 35 euros for 5 litres. (Christopher@oldolivepress.com) or 655 592 851 What’s App. Pleasant lunch on the terrace  next day – warm Indian summer days….

 

  

We gathered  little later than usual this year – about half the trees were producing following the odd weather – but we harvested sufficient for 72 litres of extra virgin – a 80/20 mix of Manzanilla and Blanqueta olives. The oil smooth, tasty and easily enough for us and our friends this coming year.

We were ably helped in the field by visitors from England, Jane Sergeant, Joan Scot, Jonathan David Simons, Mary Costello, Tim Edwards, Jackie Story – and from New York, Rabab Fayad and Michael Kaftner.  We enjoyed tasting some other local oils. In making the judgement, ignore the colour or clarity of the oil (both irrelevant) but savour the taste and gentle sensation at the back of the throat you experience from a good extra virgin oil.  One oil we sampled was from the  ‘Señorios de Relleu’  (https://www.senoriosderelleu.com/) whose groves are spread around Masía de Teuladi on the opposite side of the ravine from us. They have been winning some international awards for the quality of their oil recently so we are in good company. So a reasonable  harvest – but we hope for 100 litres plus next year. We gained 200 litres plus in past years.

 

The first two weeks in February are a magic time in the valley — the almond blossom is out. A hundred years ago there would twice as many trees at least, the almonds going to the nearby Jijona Turrón factories, but there are still thousands of trees left – lining the bancales like white ghosts. Jijona buys its almonds from California now, but there’s still a market through the local co-operative. Now the groves are full of photographers, we gather almonds in August.