And I've Fallen in Love With Granada...

The Art of Olive Oil

Over the last month, I have quickly learned how big of a deal olive oil is to the people of Priego de Cordoba.  They truly love it here and will defend it until the day they die.  I even received a video on olive oil when I visited the tourism office for a map of the town.  And this past week, I taught the Spanish version of the food pyramid to my students and it advises that you need to eat Olive Oil every day.  To be fair, it is super good.  And I do find myself adding it my meals on a daily basis.  So maybe this is the secret to why all of the Spanish women are so beautiful?? 

This past week, I spent a lovely evening with my friend Sara who works in the Olive Oil industry.  She gave me a lesson on the ins and outs of Olive Oil that I found rather interesting and wanted to share on my blog.

To begin with, you have three types of Olive Oil:

• Extra Virgin Olive Oil
• Virgin Olive Oil
• Olive Oil

Extra Virgin Olive Oil is the best of the best.  This oil is made from the olives that are picked from the trees.  The olives are then sent to the factory and are naturally changed into oil.  This olive oil has no negative affects; only positive ones.  It helps your skin, it is good for digestion, it helps with wrinkles, etc.  If you were to taste test the olive oil, you will be able to taste sweet on the tip of your tongue, bitter as it travels towards the back of your tongue, and spicy as it hits your throat.  It also smells like a mix of fresh tomatoes, apples, and other fruits and vegetables.  I had my first olive oil taste testing session in Sara's kitchen, and I can vouch for all of the above.  (I even started choking when the spicy part kicked in!) 

Virgin Olive Oil is made from the olives that are picked up from the ground.  They are a little bit more ripe than the ones from the tree (which is why they fell off in the first place), but they are still good.  This olive oil is very good for you as well.  It has all of the same attributes as Extra Olive Oil except the taste and smell is less flavorful. 

Plain jane Olive Oil is terrible for you.  Back in the day, (when there was no electricity) they used a specific olive oil to light the street lamps.  This oil comes from a different olive than the ones I mentioned above.  After electricity was invented, they had all of this leftover oil and needed to get rid of it.  Therefore, they decided to chemically alter it to turn it into an edible substance.  Today, this olive oil is completely "fake."  This oil is actually black in color unlike its sister oils mentioned above.  Since this is a very unattractive feature with food, they add chemicals to turn it white.  This oil also lacks the tastes and smells that are normally associated with good olive oil.  To fix all of these issues, they add a few drops of Extra Virgin Olive Oil to add some color and flavor.  While this may be the cheapest route for olive oil, it is by no means the healthiest. 

When buying Olive Oil (especially in the U.S.), one needs to make sure to read the label of the bottle.  Like most food in the U.S., the fine print labels are the only true way to find out what is in the food.  (Thank you American manufacturers for your wonderful plays on words.)  A bottle could say "Extra Virgin Olive Oil," but not actually be that type.  The back of the label should explain about the oil itself (what it tastes like/smells like/where it is from/etc).  One also needs to avoid the plastic bottles of oil.  Olive oil has a shelf life of about six months.  However, when it is stored in a plastic container, its shelf life is much shorter due to light penetrating through the bottle.  (When olive oil goes bad... yuck.)  It is best to buy the oil in a glass bottle, and even better to buy it in a dark, glass bottle.  This way, the light cannot filter through the dark color or the glass.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is my run down on olive oil.  (Sara if you are reading this, and I got any of the information wrong, please inform me!)  I now dare all of my American readers to find their nearest bottle of olive oil and read the label.  And next time you buy a brand new bottle, taste test it and smell it!  Bon Apetit!

Spain vs. America

Over the last week, I have successfully:

•           Died a bunch of my clothes pink.  At least now, all of my clothes match and coordinate nicely.  I also no longer see the makeup on what used to be my white face cloth.  And to be fair, it is breast cancer month.

•           Learned the skeleton, muscles, and joints of our bodies better than ever before thanks to      teaching it repeatedly to each grade level for the last two weeks.

•           Lost power at our house

•           Ate another lunch feast with our landlords

•           Discovered the deliciousness of a vegetable kebab!

         

•           Ate pomegranate the Spanish way (way better than the American way!)

•           Went through an entire package of tissues.

Speaking of tissues, I also compiled a presentation for my 6^th graders highlighting the differences between America and Spain.  I feel compelled to share some of these differences with my readers.

1. Tissues.  I love tissue boxes.  And never appreciated them fully until I came to Spain.  I’m that friend who asks in advance if you have tissues at your house and if you don’t I will notoriously bring my own box.  (Thank you allergies.)  Here in Spain, tissues come like this…

                                                            American Version of Tissues

 

Spanish version of tissues

 

For my continuously sneezing nose, this is not a good thing.  Do the Spanish not sneeze?? (Spanish readers, how do you function on these little packets??)  There are only about 10 tissues in each packet.  And yes they are equivalent to PUFFS brand which my nose appreciates, but they go so fast!

2. The School Day: Spanish school goes from 9:00-2:00.  There is also a break/recess around 11:30-12:00, making this only a 4 ½ hour school day. In case you were unaware, the American school day is from 9:00-3:15.  It should also be mentioned that students usually arrive at school around 8:30 and leave school around 3:30.  This does not include the morning care programs (where students arrive prior to 8:30am) and the aftercare programs where students remain at the school until sometimes 6:00pm or later. In Spain, students do not arrive much earlier than 9:00am (that I am aware of?), and they leave at 2:00 because it is time for lunch with their families at home.  This brings me to my next point.  No one eats lunch at school.  There is no cafeteria.  Everyone leaves at 2:00pm to go home and eat.  And because the school day continues to be so vastly different, there are no school busses, or school nurses (the teachers take on this role), failing is okay/normal, and these specials do not exist: Computers, Library, Art, and Health.  The students can also write in perfect cursive at the age of six (it’s totally legible and everything!), draw pictures with complete details (ex. They include ears/noses, the legs of a human aren’t green, they add  jewelry/clothing logos-- not normal for American students until they hit 2^nd/3^rd grade), and color inside the lines perfectly!

A sideways picture of some of the drawings I've received from the little ones

 

 3. 8:30 pm is considered the afternoon.  “Hola, I will see you at 8:30 in the afternoon tomorrow!” The morning and afternoon are dictated by meals.  Because lunch is between 2:00-5:00 (siesta), the afternoon doesn’t start until 2:00.  Therefore, it is still considered morning here at 1:00pm.  For example, throughout my entire school day, I address the students with “Good Morning Boys and Girls” because it is before lunch.  Once dinner occurs (9:00-11:00), then you are allowed to reference the day as “night time.”

4. Lunch.  Lunch here is equivalent to eating a Thanksgiving meal every single day.  For example the lunch with our landlords:
     Pre starter drink/snack: Beer, fried zucchini, and tortilla

     1^st plate: wine, and the most amazing salad I have ever eaten (pomegranate, avocado, cheese, lettuce, almonds, corn, carrots, melon, mango, bananas, kiwi, etc)

     2^nd plate: soup with garbanzo beans, bread, wine
 
    3^rd plate: an assortment of meat: pot roast style beef, turkey, and chicken with bread.
 
    Dessert #1: fruit—grapes, pomegranate, this cool new fruit I don’t remember the name of, nectarines, etc.
    
    Dessert #2: coffee and pastries

     Digestive: Gin and Tonic

5. Again, I sadly cannot take my coffee to go anywhere.  I have to sit and drink it for at least an hour.  Nor have I found any food readily available to take “to go.”  Guess I’m going out for Pizza every Friday during Lent.

6. Food Shopping. Ugh.  Not only is everything closed on Sundays including the food store (the best day to go food shopping), I have to go to 4 different stores to get what I need.  You buy your meat at the carniceria.  You buy fish at the pescaderia.  You buy fruit at the frutaria.  You buy daily essentials at the farmacia.  Etc, etc.  Yes, the food store has an itty bitty selection of these things, but it is very expensive and not worth it.  Therefore I buy my basics at the food store (supermarcado) and then venture to the other stores after siesta for the rest of my needs.  The selection in the stores is also vastly smaller (with the exception of the yogurt section).  Instead of having an entire aisle dedicated to cereal, I only have 8 boxes to choose from.  If I want mustard, the decision is easy because there are only two options.  Milk is also not to be found in the refrigerator section.  Get ready for this one… you buy it in a box next to the bread.  And then you store it in your cabinets until you’re ready to use it, which then, if you desire, you can put it in the fridge.  This milk thing took a while to get used to since my brain has been trained since day one to keep it constantly refrigerated. 

Spanish boxes of milk in the non refrigerated section

 

7. The garbage men wear bike helmets when riding the backs of the trucks.

8. If you want to totally confuse a Spaniard, you can say these two phrases:
         
          Bird with a beard.
          Bear with a beer.

The words in each sentence sound exactly the same to them.

9. I miss goldfish.  Another food Spain is lacking along with pumpkin, brown sugar, bagels, ranch, buffalo sauce, chives, KRAFT Macaroni and cheese, ginger ale, and sour cream.  I am sure there are more, but these are what are making up the holes in my heart at the moment. Don’t worry, I’ve been consuming lots of chocolate to ease the pain.

 

Jaen in Photos