Grands crus d'huile d'olive
Haute gastronomie Méditerranéenne
Nice 1868

Our Mill

We have the last mill still operating in Nice.  This is an ancient mill which employs only techniques dating from its creation (1868).

It uses a method very special that we will describe below:

GENOVA MILL

1. Weighing: The olives are made healthy and mature as quickly as possible to the mill to prevent degradation of the fruit. These are sorted, weighed and then poured into vats stone.

2. The grinding and mixing: 

A stone-hard, more or less large, also rotates in a vat of stone.

The wheels are offset from the axis of rotation. In fact, skidding on the bottom of the tanks, these are not just crush the olives, it knead the dough to burst the vesicles that are the fat cells of the flesh. This is a very mild olives where the risks of overheating are nonexistent.

Once we got a thin crust and creamy, it must separate liquids, oil and water, plant fibers of the pulp and kernel.

3. System Genoese

Our mill uses a special technique to harvest the oil. This so-called Genoese, but disappeared, is to fill the tank with water so that oil can be separated and come to the surface of the water (lower water density: 0.916). Similarly, the pulp and skin that still contain a good proportion of oil will separate the crushed kernels that remain at the bottom of the tank.

The pulp and oil can then be retrieved using a kind of pan hole drilled and fitted with a long handle. The miller allow maximum water flow through the holes before pouring the oil and pulp in a tank. Free oil will be recovered immediately by another pan without holes this time, it exposes the surface of the tray.

4. Press: 

He must now recover the oil still contained in the dough. To do this, we have not invented anything better than the press. In the old mills "on the cake" is filled with this paste kinds of baskets, flat and round like a Basque beret, the "mats". They are stacked in a press auger. It waters the mats of hot water to facilitate the extraction of oil. It is this stage that the oil carries the name: the first cold pressing.

It is a mill which, despite its age, has a performance quite acceptable and often comparable to modern mills. Its only drawbacks are handling a larger and longer grinding time.

5. Nuclei of olives:

Once crushed, the olive stone forms a coarse powder. We call when the powder of "pomace".The husk will be collected and placed in vats. We'll let it dry for one year. Once dry, this one will be used as fuel and will heat all the mill through a special boiler.

6. The olive pulp:

Once pressed, the olive pulp will be collected and used as natural fertilizer for the trees.