Unfortunately, I have not been able to follow up the blog entry on the olive harvest with another entry on the olive oil extraction process. When I have been able to go to the mill the weather has meant that no olive oil was being produced. Hopefully, I will be able to make a visit sometime next week.
Anyway, yesterday I was with a group of Australians who are on a cruise which docked in Cadiz. We went first to the beautiful white town of Arcos de la Frontera where a local guide did an excellent tour with us. We then went on to Jerez to visit a boutique winery that I go to very often. The visit also included lunch. Below is a photograph with the group sampling an amontillado drawn straight from the cask.
Like many sherry wineries, the one we visited has a glass-ended sherry butt to show the growth of yeast on the surface of fino sherry. The rainfall that we have had, has raised the humidity in the wineries. This together with the drop in temperature favours the growth of the yeast which is now quite a bit thicker than it was a few weeks ago. You can see the yeast layer in the photo below.
As the weather was nice we had some finger food served to us in the courtyard of the winery. This were accompanied by a chilled glass of the one of the winery’s finos.
We then sat down inside for lunch. We started with squid served with artichokes and wild mushrooms which was superb and went very well with an amontillado. We then had a dish of Iberian pork cheeks matched with a very fine Palo Cortado. Dessert was a chocolate dish with mint and ice-cream that paired brilliantly with a magnificent sweet Pedro Ximenez. Coffee at the end of the meal was accompanied by a fantastic Solera Gran Reserva brandy.
On leaving the winery to head back to Cadiz the group leader commented that this had been one of the best food and wine experiences he had had in a long time.