About a month or so ago I was listening to NPR and they were talking about olive oil tasting. They were discussing it much the same way people talk about wine tasting. They were discussing it as a sensory experience, the aroma, the complex flavors and, now this shocked me, how you don't use bread to taste it, but rather slurp the oil straight out of a small glass--shots anyone?! Listening to this show, I was thinking, olive oil tasting sounds horrible, who would ever want to shoot or slurp olive oil? Definitely not me, give me some bread please and I'll just dip it. I had a sneaking suspicion that for me slurping oil would most likely lead to retroperistalsis--no thanks!
Well, the other day I had the opportunity to go olive oil tasting. There is a new olive oil shop here in Reno called Big Horn Olive Oil Company. It's on Mayberry and McCarren, in the Mayberry Landing shopping center. They've only been open a couple of months and were kind enough to donate some items to our Wingding's raffle and silent auction. They also invited us to come over to the store and do a tasting. Immediately my thoughts drifted back to the NPR program, I became a bit nervous, but figured what the heck, I'll give it a try.
Let me just tell you, olive oil tasting was amazing! It was soooooo good and slurping olive oil is not even remotely vomit inducing--as I once feared. We started with extra virgin olive oil that we warmed in the glass with the palm of our hand, we inhaled the aroma then slurped away. After we tasted the straight extra virgin olive oil we tried combinations of infused olive oils with balsamic vinegars. We tried Wild mushroom and sage infused olive oil mixed with traditional balsamic vinegar which was my favorite. We also tried blood orange infused olive oil mixed with dark chocolate balsamic vinegar which was surprisingly delicious--I could definitely see this on a sweet spinach salad or maybe even on ice cream, soooo yummy! If you're in Reno I highly recommend going into this shop and giving olive oil tasting a try. It was fun and delicious and a nice sober alternative to wine, whiskey and tequila tasting!
Oh, and don't you just love their logo?! I do!!!
Cheers!
2 comments:
Renee: Agree about Big Horn Olive Oil Co. Excellent variety of oils and vinegars. I was interested in your visit at Leonard Creek Ranch. I'm always looking for new places to take my horses and ride. Accommodations for me and my horses are always a plus too. I'd like to know more about your experience there. HOw did you get in contact with those folks?
Hi, Sorry I haven't responded before now. I have not been keeping up on this blog. My boyfriend's family owns Leonard Creek Ranch.
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