Seven Days to Release of CSOO

Today's Fun Fact from Chemical Story of Olive Oil (CSOO) 

Tree Shakers Harvesting in New Zealand

Did you know that olive oil is really a fruit juice?

In "Harvesting" Chapter 4 of CSOO,* you will celebrate with the farmers and producers as they finally bring in their harvest.  Timing is critical and much can happen during the weeks, hours, and days up to harvest to ruin a year's worth of work.  From hand-picked to machine harvested, methods of harvest are as varied as the cultivars themselves and as old as the pyramids.  Our chemical story in this chapter features the glorious liquid gold oil itself.  You will learn how the plant can cleverly make the oil from a cyclic process in which the carbons, like the animals on Noah's ark,  are added two at a time until the long chain carbon fatty acids are produced.

*You can pre-order The Chemical Story of Olive Oil now from The Royal Society of Chemistry. 

Colossus Harvester in Australia

Hand picking in South Africa