Olives, and especially olive oil, play a huge part in Italian cuisine. That's on the savory side. I have to admit that except for making cakes with olive oil, olives and pastries were a combination I had never thought of before. That was until my friends from Salento introduced me to Massimo and Andrea who have invented a sweet product using the ubiquitous Pugliese olives. The product is Olivotto, made with the black cellina olives that grow in the Salento region.
Like most great culinary inventions or recipes, Olivotto came about by accident. Massimo's young son had stained his hands from the olive's juice. His son mistook the purple stain as one from amarena (dark sour cherries, usually preserved in a sugar syrup). That's when a light went on in Massimo. Surrounded in Salento by almost endless groves of olive trees (Puglia produces over 40% of Italy's olive oil), yet no one had ever thought of using this fruit for pastry making. Massimo and his friend Andrea, who was then the chef for the restaurant at the swanky Patria Palace Hotel in Lecce, put there heads together to create Olivotto.
Andrea Serravezza and Massimo Gaetani - The creators of Olivotto
Olivotto comes in three variations. The crema dolce, meaning sweet cream, can be used as a base flavor in pastry making. Similarly to how one uses other fruits, nuts and chocolate, one would use it to flavor creams (pastry, Bavarian, Anglese, Chantilly, etc), doughs, cakes, sauces, candies and gelato, just to name a few. The dressing could be a finishing touch to dress desserts, used like a marmelade in a crostata or cookie, in chocolate making, and even paired with cheese. Finally there is the Perle Noire (black pearl). The black pearls are whole, pitted olives in a sweet syrup. They could dress the top of any Olivotto dessert beautifully, or stud the inside of breads, brioche and cakes.
Make no mistake, all three variations are sweet, not overly, but they are sweet and produced with natural ingredients. The dressing is the sweetest of the three. The dark purple color is also natural and brings an interesting color to all pastries Olivotto touches. In fact, the Cellina olive is the only olive that is black naturally; the others turn black due to chemical oxidation. Each of the desserts we tried had light olive notes throughout. You taste the savory side of the olive at the finish; something that balances things nicely.
We met Massimo and Andrea at Bar Castello in the Grecia Salentina (a part of Salento where a Greek dialect is still spoken and street and store signs are in both Greek and Italian). Angelo, the chef and owner of Bar Castello was the first person in Salento to offer Olivotto products and use the products in his pastries. In the bar's kitchen the talented pastry cooks, Vladimiro & Carmin, wowed us by making one delicious dessert after another with Olivotto.
Angelo Anchora of Bar Castello
They made the region's famous pasticciotto pastry with pastry cream flavored with Olivotto - giving it a bright purple color. Instead of chocolate covered cherries, we tasted chocolate covered olives; the dressing and a black pearl were covered in chocolate. There was purple pandolivotto - panettone made with the crema dolce and studded with the black pearl olives. I don't normally like panettone. I find it too dry, but the Olivotto cream gave the cake a moister texture that changed my mind about the Italian Christmas bread. They flavored marzipan and cream chantilly with Olivotto. And of course, there was gelato flavored with Olivotto.
Pastries and chocolates with Olivotto
Pasticciotti filled with Olivotto flavored pastry cream
Olivotto gelato
Fruit Crostata - one of the fruit toppings is the Olivotto Perle Noire
Crostata filled with Olivotto dressing and topped with the Perle Noire
Marzipan biscotti (known as quaresimali) filled with Olivotto dressing and Perle Noire
Pastry cooks at Bar Castello - Vladimiro and Carmin - working with Olivotto, pastries & chocolate
In Salento, Olivotto is already a popular name, and you can find it in many pastry shops, food shops, and at Lecce's Farmers' Market. Chef Heinz Beck is using Olivotto at the three-Michelin starred Restaurant La Pergola in Rome. You can find Olivotto in London, at Harrod's, and at some stores in France. Rumor has it that Pierre Herme in Paris might be baking up something with Olivotto - maybe a macaron/Olivotto combination. Massimo and Andrea are still looking for distribution in the U.S., where I think the Pandolivotto would be a huge hit, especially around Christmas. One thing is certain, Olivotto makes my must-buy list for foodie souvenirs from Salento.
Join me in Puglia in 2013! For this food lover's culinary tour, we'll be cooking with our beautiful Italian mamme and professional chefs. We'll also be eating and exploring our way through the region. There are four tour dates available from which to choose! For tour details, check out this page: Culinary Tours in Puglia 2013!
***Early booking discount: Book and pay by check by January 31, 2013 and receive a $200 discount off the tour price.****
Pandiolivotto - Olivotto flavored panettone (photo courtesy Olivotto)
Olivotto
Email: info@olivottocreme.it
Phone: +39 0836 572304
Bar Castello
4 V. Ferrovia
73222 Corigliano d’Otranto
Phone: +39 0836 471098
Related Posts:
The Pastries of Lecce with Pastry Chef Luca Capilungo
The Art of Making Pasta by Hand: A Pugliese Pasta Lesson with Nonna Vata
Cheese in Puglia - Making and Eating Fresh Cheese in Salento
Traditional Salentine Dishes at Locanda Rivoli in Lecce
Lecce: The Baroque Beauty of Puglia
Pugliese Pasta Dish: Sagne Ncannulate con Sugo Schiattariciati
Classic Salentino Cuisine Reinvented at Sette di Sette in Lecce
Tour of Masseria L'Astore and its Frantoio Ipogeo in Salento
Lunch Salento Style at Cantine Menhir
Artisinal Cheese at Masseria CinqueSanti in Puglia
Shopping and Eating Local in Italy - Farmers' Market in Lecce
Sagne Ncannulate Schiattariciati - Pugliese Pasta with Schiattariciati Tomato Sauce
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I didn't know how yummy olives were until my 1st backpacking trip to the south of france, italy and spain! i tasted my first olives in aix-en-provence...and life changed after that!
by the way, i have a new blog, http://tartineandapronstrings.com . hope you can visit me there it’s going to be mainly a food blog with side servings of travel and design! i’m also giving away 2 cookbooks right now.
Posted by: Jen Laceda | March 03, 2012 at 08:23 AM
how funny- i created a sweet black olive jam years ago when I did a presentation in USA for IACP-- should have"produced" it!!!
Posted by: Judy Witts Francini | March 03, 2012 at 09:19 AM
Wow! Thanks, Kathy for some much needed enlightenment! This sounds positively fascinating. I wish I were there to try everything you shot. IT all looks fab. I can't wait until Olivotto hits our shores.
Posted by: AdriBarr | March 04, 2012 at 02:05 PM
Very innovative ideas! Here in Istanbul, the chef at Ciya makes candied (in sugar syrup) black olives, tomatoes, black walnuts and quince and serves it as part of a dessert plate. It's very good!
Posted by: MyTurkishJoys | March 05, 2012 at 06:59 AM
How very clever!! I love when people find a new twist for familiar ingredients. And what a boon to local olive growers as well. :-) I'm very interested in trying this. :-)
Posted by: Krista | March 06, 2012 at 09:16 PM