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Chicago Tribune
8 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Chicago Tribune
Grilling up ‘octo' with Monteverde's Bailey Sullivan
Within minutes of watching her cook, Bailey Sullivan's kitchen jargon sticks in the brain. A skewer of octopus, plated with sauces, vegetables and garnishes, simply becomes 'octo.' Soon, it's sweet in your head. As in, 'can we do octo rollout?' or 'we need a second octo.' At least, that's what happened to me and likely to the audience of Bravo's 'Top Chef' Season 22. About a month after her top-three finish on the show, Sullivan, free of cameras and in her comfort zone, was back to working as executive chef at Monteverde Restaurant & Pastificio. For the past few months, diners at the West Loop restaurant have received their bill with a glowing portrait of Sullivan, celebrating her appearance on the show. Sullivan's personal style is memorable — ever-colorful hair, large glasses and rotating patterned bandanas. It seems to tell you everything about her on first look: quirky and easily creative. But that belies a scholarly understanding of Italian cooking history, techniques and terminology, and a serious competitor. 'Competition is about building a sense of community,' said Sullivan. In her view, instead of aiming for domination, it's key to challenge yourself and others in the hopes of reaching higher peaks as a team. On the first day of July, Sullivan bantered with the staff on her way to the kitchen. A bartender called her promotion to executive chef the 'best thing that ever happened' at the restaurant. Line cooks responded to her lessons or demos with a 'sheesh' or 'hell yeah, brother.' She told stories about dishwashers who worked up to the kitchen, the women who have loyally manned the pasta station for years and the diverse personalities that make up the restaurant. 'Monteverde is Bailey. And Bailey is Monteverde,' said Sarah Grueneberg, head chef and co-owner. 'Just as much as I am Monteverde.' The octo spiedino was new to most that day, but it was served when the restaurant first opened in 2015, inspired by a trip to Spain. On 'Top Chef,' Sullivan and Houston chef Tristen Epps won Episode 6's elimination challenge with a dish that echoed the Monteverde classic: grilled octo with Kalamata caramel glaze and charred green olive honey relish. '(Initially,) when I left Monteverde to go to 'Top Chef' I felt very confident and comfortable,' said Sullivan, who had run some practice quickfires with Grueneberg, a 'Top Chef' alumnus. But Sullivan's time on the series started rocky, with an elimination in the second episode for a maple tart. It was her debut on national TV and her first time on camera. She hadn't even done local TV — and here she was vying for attention with 15 other contestants. 'It was hard going from something very community-based versus being just someone in the crowd,' she said. Her journey of rediscovering her confidence in front of the cameras became a major part of her arc. Rather than cooking her authentic self, she tried to anticipate others' expectations. But she dug in and returned to the competition by winning 'Last Chance Kitchen.' Many of her competitors weren't surprised; frequently, fellow 'Top Chef' contestants and Chicago chefs Zubair Mohajir and Cèsar Murillo refer to her as a beast in the kitchen. She made it to the finale in Milan, Italy, where she cooked a four-course progressive meal. Though Sullivan didn't win the show, judge Gail Simmons told me at the James Beard Awards in June that it was one of the best finale meals she's ever had. Of course, Sullivan served octo at the finale. This time, it was pulpo e mozz, a combination that guest judge Richard Blais called 'dumb and brilliant.' Sullivan has no hard feelings about being a runner-up and is proud of her fellow contestants; frequently, she would be the first to hug them and tell them she loved them after a win or a loss. 'With the show, as proud as I was of all of her cooking, I was just as proud of the way she carried herself and the way she treated other people,' said her father, Mike Sullivan. Bailey Sullivan fell in love with the industry growing up in Goldyburgers, the longtime Forest Park neighborhood staple her father has run since he bought it in 1981. She remembers fondly listening to stories of the Irish immigrants who worked at the restaurant and the patio with ivy. 'I would run around and have such a great time,' she said. 'So I had this positive image of what restaurants were in my brain.' Sullivan's father recalls his daughter and wife watching 'Top Chef' during the early years, engrossed in the competition and craft. He didn't encourage her to join the industry; but from a young age, she had the bug — she joined him on supply runs to Fulton Market, made wing sauce for Super Bowl parties and signed up for cooking classes. His daughter speaks with admiration of his work ethic. She said he still opens and closes down the restaurant every day. While Goldyburgers may have inculcated that love for restaurants in Sullivan, her father laughs when comparing Goldyburgers to Monteverde. 'This place is completely different than Monteverde,' said Mike Sullivan, beaming. 'She's in a whole different realm.' He means it literally; Italian food was not a cuisine of personal culinary significance for the Sullivan family. Her entry was actually through noodles — some of her early line cook jobs included working at restaurants like Yusho and Parachute. That led her to a fateful meeting with Grueneberg when they worked together in a ramen battle. 'She was a bright shining light of excitement,' Grueneberg said. 'All of the things that I love about cooking, about being a young chef … That passion that you have naturally. That you can't force. It's a natural passion for the craft. ' Naturally, the first stop of her journey at Monteverde was the pasta station. Over time, she became a student of Italian regional and atypical cooking, learning deeply from staff, cookbooks and, of course, Grueneberg. At Monteverde's pasta station, her original home, she went through the complexities: extruding, the challenges of sourcing dried pasta and all the variety of shapes. From below the station, she pulled out portioned containers of fresh shapes like gramigna, gnocchetti and fusilloni. From above, she brought out a seriously rustic, well-loved wooden pasta-cutting tool, a 'chitarra.' It looks like a harp that could kill. 'As a mentor, when you watch someone who you've put a lot of time and nurturing into, to see them blossom and see them utilize the skills they have to make it their own, it's a really amazing part of the process,' said Grueneberg, talking about watching Sullivan win a 'Top Chef' elimination challenge with an octo skewer. 'It's just one of those things that she made it her own.' In many ways, Sullivan has been directly following the path of her mentor. Grueneberg rose up the ranks at a notable and influential Italian Chicago restaurant, the now-closed, Michelin-starred, Spiaggia. Her next step a few years after competing on 'Top Chef' was opening her own restaurant, Monteverde. Given the obvious parallels, I wondered if a restaurant was next in the works for Sullivan. While it's not set in stone, both speak of 'Bailey's restaurant' like it's an inevitability, something on their agenda. 'I think what I've realized over the last couple of years is that whatever my restaurant will be, I want it to truly evoke a feeling of who I am,' Sullivan said. 'I just want it to have that same aesthetic, that it feels lightweight and a little eccentric, but ethereal and fun.' How will Sullivan present that feeling of 'Bailey-ness'? She's confident the food will come. But the rest? Well, just like in 'Top Chef,' she'll figure it out. For now, the octo awaits. In the narrow, clean kitchen, the plancha radiated a dry heat. A row of sieves awaited pasta in aggressively boiling water. Woks sat over flaming burners. That is to say, it was really hot. But as nearly a dozen staff watched her demo the octo, the vibe was warm emotionally too. Sullivan, clad in patterned tights, clogs and a trademark vibrant bandana, gave history and technique lessons as she went through the steps. First, Sullivan explains how the octo came to be on the menu after chef Grueneberg saw a simple preparation in a Spanish coastal town; the octo must be boiled in salt water 'from whence it came.' 'It makes the most delicious, tender octopus,' Sullivan said. She shared some more superstitious traditional techniques that they don't use, like using actual ocean water or adding wine tops. Then, she demonstrated how to brush the octo with an herby marinade right before it's charred on a surprisingly small grill. 'It's important you're giving it the love it needs,' she said while letting the flame kiss the skewer on all four sides. Afterward, it's garnished with fresh summer pepper peperonata, dusted with smoky pimenton, sprinkled with toasty garlic chips, lemon juice and adorned with a few dollops of aioli. She narrated her thought process, 'maybe three or four,' as she squeezes the sauce onto the plate. Sheesh. Octo! Next, it's what she calls 'Vanna White time.' She snaked her way through the restaurant, holding up the plated demo octo, servers taking orders glancing over to give her a brief nod. It's a sign that it's time to sample. A few moments later Sullivan parked by the stairwell with the octo. The team quickly shuffled past to take a bite in a well-practiced flow. There were murmurs of approval and questions. Octo can be tough, but the spiadino had a perfectly pliable chew, surrounded by whorls of smoke and spice. Was it the love or was it the discipline of studied cooking? In Sullivan's hands, it's indistinguishable. I began to ask a question, and in it, I registered that I had been saying 'octo' without realizing it, even though it had been rattling around my head since watching 'Top Chef.' 'You've got me saying octo,' I said. Sous chef Michael Murray turned to me and said, 'You're one of us now.'
Boston Globe
08-07-2025
- General
- Boston Globe
Recipe: Give the classic side dish Green Beans Almondine an uplift with olives and lemon
4. Add the green beans to the skillet. Cook, stirring often, for 2 to 3 minutes, or until warm. Remove from the heat. Stir in the olives, lemon rind, and a pinch each of salt and pepper. 3. In a large skillet over medium heat, heat the oil. Add the almonds and cook, stirring constantly, for 2 to 3 minutes, or until the almonds are aromatic and beginning to brown. Add the garlic, and cook, stirring, for 1 minute, or until aromatic. 2. Drain the green beans and transfer to the ice water to chill. When they are cold, drain them again and spread on a clean kitchen towel or paper towels. Pat dry. 1. Have on hand a large bowl of ice water. Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Add the green beans. Let the water bubble steadily for 4 minutes, or until they are tender but still bright green. This is a bright variation of the classic French side dish, Green Beans Almondine, in which the beans are sauteed in butter and garnished with toasted almonds. Instead of butter, this simple variation uses olive oil, along with Kalamata olives and lemon rind. Season cautiously because the brined olives add quite a bit of salt to the dish. Serve with grilled fish or chicken. Be prepared for this glorious, flavor-packed side to outshine whatever else is on the plate. Serves 4 This is a bright variation of the classic French side dish, Green Beans Almondine, in which the beans are sauteed in butter and garnished with toasted almonds. Instead of butter, this simple variation uses olive oil, along with Kalamata olives and lemon rind. Season cautiously because the brined olives add quite a bit of salt to the dish. Serve with grilled fish or chicken. Be prepared for this glorious, flavor-packed side to outshine whatever else is on the plate. Salt and pepper, to taste 1 pound green beans, trimmed 3 tablespoons olive oil ¼ cup slivered almonds 2 cloves garlic, finely chopped ½ cup pitted Kalamata olives, halved Grated rind of 2 lemons 1. Have on hand a large bowl of ice water. Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Add the green beans. Let the water bubble steadily for 4 minutes, or until they are tender but still bright green. 2. Drain the green beans and transfer to the ice water to chill. When they are cold, drain them again and spread on a clean kitchen towel or paper towels. Pat dry. 3. In a large skillet over medium heat, heat the oil. Add the almonds and cook, stirring constantly, for 2 to 3 minutes, or until the almonds are aromatic and beginning to brown. Add the garlic, and cook, stirring, for 1 minute, or until aromatic.
Business Insider
04-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Business Insider
I tried making Ina Garten's easy pasta salad. It's so good that I'll be bringing it to every cookout this summer.
I tried Ina Garten 's easy, summery tomato feta pasta salad recipe. The dish came together quickly, and I found it more flavorful than other pasta salads I've tried. I loved the briny taste, and my leftovers held up for several days. As a chef, I've always loved Ina Garten's classic, riffable recipes — they're easy to recreate at home, and they're usually a hit with guests. I've also been looking for a simple side dish to bring to summer cookouts and picnics, so when I found Garten's tomato feta pasta salad, I had to give it a try. Here's what happened when I tested the dish out for myself. Spoiler alert: I'll be adding it to my recipe rotation. The ingredients amp up umami more than other pasta salads I've tried. The recipe calls for short-cut pasta, black olives, feta cheese, and two kinds of tomatoes: fresh and sun-dried. It's key to use sun-dried tomatoes packed in oil, as they're more tender and flavorful than the dry variety. As for the pasta shape, Garten recommends fusilli, which has a corkscrew-like shape that soaks up extra dressing. After trying out the recipe, though, I'm confident any short-cut shape will work. The olives (Garten recommends Kalamata), tomato, and feta all bring major umami to this summertime dish. The salty, briny mix-ins give the salad a distinctly Mediterranean taste that felt a little unusual, but I preferred it to the typical mayonnaise-dressed pasta salad. The noodles and mix-ins are tossed in a dressing made with more sun-dried tomatoes, red wine vinegar, olive oil, capers, and garlic. The preparation is quick and easy. As is the case with every good pasta-salad recipe (in my opinion, anyway), it's not overly complicated or time-intensive to prep the ingredients. While I boiled a big pot of salted water for the pasta, I chopped the fresh tomatoes, sliced the olives, and diced the feta and sun-dried tomatoes. Garten calls for diced whole tomatoes, but I used cherry tomatoes and simply sliced them in half for the same effect. The dressing calls for a food processor, but it's possible to make it without one. The best way to make this pasta- salad dressing is with a small food processor. You could also try an immersion blender or pitcher-style blender, but expect to spend some time scraping down the sides. By whizzing more sun-dried tomatoes, red wine vinegar, olive oil, garlic, and capers in a food processor, I was able to break down the capers and tomatoes to maximize their flavor output. I ended up with a fairly smooth, reddish dressing that was thin enough to coat every nook and cranny of the pasta. If you don't have any blade-loaded countertop appliances, give everything a fine chop and a good stir. The dressing won't be as smooth and creamy as Garten intended, but your pasta will still benefit from the flavor-packed ingredients. I dressed the pasta while it was still hot from the stove. My pasta finished cooking in the time it took to prepare the dressing. Although Garten recommends letting the noodles cool first, my pasta-salad-making experience has taught me that tossing hot noodles in an oily, salty dressing maximizes flavor. Warm pasta readily absorbs flavors better than after it cools. I tossed the cooked pasta, salty mix-ins, and dressing together in a large bowl. I then let the pasta cool to room temperature before finishing the dish with Garten's recommended chopped fresh parsley and a generous amount of freshly grated Parmesan. Here, I made sure to add the cheese after the salad cooled so it wouldn't all melt into a gooey mess. Instead, the Parmesan coated the noodles to hint at the creamy, rich dressing many of us associate with pasta salad. This version, however, is big on savory flavors and pops of briny, chewy sun-dried tomatoes along with juicy, sweet fresh ones. I loved that the dish felt lighter than a mayo-drenched salad but just as satisfying. The oil-based dressing holds up well, too. I doubled the recipe, and my household of two enjoyed pasta for several days. I'm glad I found this recipe right before cookout season — I'll be bringing this easy, crowd-pleasing dish to every summer occasion this year.
Bloomberg
30-06-2025
- Business
- Bloomberg
The Olive Oil Crisis
Businessweek + Green An olive grove in Greece's Mesogeia region. Olives were a low-stress crop for millennia, but climate change has made the harvest much less predictable—and growing regions more desperate. By Lauren Markham Photographs by Myrto Papadopoulos June 30, 2025 at 4:00 AM EDT Share this article Last December, at the height of Greece's olive harvest season, two men drove a stolen white truck to the Glyfada mill in a small town not far from Kalamata. After idling the truck for a while, the men stepped out of the cab, loaded 33 sacks of olives into the back of the truck, then drove to a field. They transferred their haul, worth about €1,500 (a bit more than $1,700), into different bags—presumably attempting to conceal its provenance—then dropped off the truck back at the municipal office where they'd pinched it. Unfortunately for them, they'd parked their ill-gotten getaway vehicle directly in front of the mill's security camera, which made them easy to track. Also, they brought their bags to a second mill nearby and asked the owner to press the stolen olives into oil. Suspicious, he called the authorities, and that was that. The whole thing had an air of slapstick about it. Who thinks they can get away with such buffoonery in a small town, where news travels fast? Stealing olives, of all things? But the theft was on trend. Rising temperatures in the Mediterranean had rendered olive oil scarcer than it had been in recent memory, leaving some of the growing region's residents desperate enough that such a crime started to make sense. Olives have been a hardy staple for thousands of years throughout the Mediterranean because the trees thrive in dry climates. But these days olive growers in Spain, Italy and Greece—the world's top three producers—are struggling to keep their groves from getting too dry. Greece is a leading indicator: The smallest and poorest of the three countries, it's focused on catering to buyers of high-quality extra-virgin oil and exports more than $1 billion worth of oil a year. Of the three, it's also suffered the most climate damage, about $400 per capita in 2023, according to Eurostat, the European Union's research office. Greek farmers who eke out a living with minimal technological assistance must now reckon with the growing risk of wildfires, which burned more than 11,000 acres of olive orchards last year. 'The climate impacts were so intense that it almost destroyed all our production,' says Michael Antonopoulos, who heads the Agricultural Olive Oil Cooperative of Kalamata. 'We don't have the weapons to fight this problem.' Thieves have also hit olive oil distributors in Spain and Italy, and smaller operations in Houston and Montreal, for that matter. But news of thefts has abounded in Greece, with stories appearing in Facebook posts and local and international outlets. Some of these heists were large in scale, such as the 37 tons of olive oil stolen in drums from a mill in Halkidiki, to the north. (That oil was worth more than $300,000 to the local growers cooperative.) Others, however, smacked less of Ocean's Eleven and more of subsistence. The Great Olive Squeeze Global price of olive oil, in US dollars per metric ton Smoke Point Change in olive oil production since 2000 On the island of Crete, a group of thieves crept into a man's house and took more than 400 pounds of his personal olive supply. On the outskirts of Athens, farmers awoke to find their olive trees cut down overnight. Sometimes the thieves took the entire tree, leaving only the stump; other times they absconded with only the olive-laden branches. Bags of fresh-cut olives disappeared from the fields before farmers had a chance to haul them to the mill. In the Messenia peninsula, not far from Kalamata, locals reported that thieves broke into cemeteries to steal the stores of olive oil set aside to light lamps and even bottles left as offerings for the dead. For generations, the average Greek olive farmer has known somebody who knows somebody who's been ripped off, but this felt different, like a new normal. Fluctuating temperatures rendered Greece's 2023-24 harvest so paltry that some farmers decided it wasn't even worth picking the olives from the trees. Olive oil lovers may have noticed a price spike around then; the global cost per pound roughly doubled. Inflation, food insecurity and supply-chain breakdowns have also helped keep prices elevated. Food and agricultural products now account for one-third of all hijackings, according to an analysis by the BSI Group. 'Last year was probably the worst period I've seen in 20 years,' says Prokopios Magiatis, a professor at the University of Athens and a scientist who studies olive production. This year, things have rebounded significantly, with a yield of 250,000 tons, more than double last year's dismal number. (This time around, Greece even slightly outproduced Italy.) Yet the future of the country's olive industry still feels shakier than it has in most farmers' lifetimes. Greek olive harvests did more than their share to help foster human civilization. In a tour of several key olive-producing parts of Greece this winter, I sought to examine the question of what happens when that building block starts to wobble. As one farmer in Laconia put it to me, when it comes to planning, 'May is no longer May anymore.' Homer may have been the first to call olive oil 'liquid gold,' but whoever coined the nickname, it stuck. Ancient Greeks used the oil to anoint their body, produce their perfumes, light their lamps and cook their food, and often left bottles of it as offerings to the gods. They also propagated their trees for export, making the oil a prized commodity across civilizations. And speaking to the tenacity of the crop, some of the silvery branches from Homer's day are still around. Olive trees can live many thousands of years, growing from pliant wisps into stately, gnarled monuments with canopies wide enough to live under. Today, olive oil constitutes 25% of all Greek agriculture and 7% of the country's gross domestic product. Modern Greeks largely rely on olive oil for cooking, more so than anyone else: Each Greek uses around 5 gallons of olive oil a year for everyday cooking, about 10 times as much as the average American. The antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties of extra-virgin olive oil (the good stuff, which is mechanically cold-pressed without chemical help) are prized by folk healers and Big Pharma alike. 'According to ancient Greeks, it was illegal to cut the olive tree,' a grower and yoga teacher named Kalliope Ziogou tells me during a walk through a hillside orchard on the island of Evia, where a massive wildfire burned a few years ago. 'Even if it was damaged, there was always the possibility of regrowth.' Ziogou points out all the charred trees, as well as all the shoots of new growth from trees that, right after the fire, had seemed dead. 'For two years, they were completely black,' she says. Now, silver-green growth shoots upward from the blackened trunks. 'That's why I respect them. They are powerful and have great stamina and tolerance.' Still, she adds, it will take a decade, maybe two, before those trees produce olives again. Olive trees have historically thrived in this arid region because they require little to no irrigation. Yet, according to the European Environment Agency, temperatures there have risen roughly 1.2C (about 2.2F) from preindustrial levels. Summer temperatures are beginning to stress the stoic trees more than they can take, forcing many farmers to rely on irrigation for the first time. This has made cultivation costlier and more labor-intensive. Ziogou and Father Christos, a local olive-growing priest, say the 2021 fire burned about 80% of the olive groves on the island, one of Greece's largest. This devastation exposed the hillsides, creating more inland wind and noise. During the 2023-24 season, a fire in the Evros region bordering Turkey claimed more than 130,000 olive trees. 'From the first moment of the fire, I knew that we will all be burnt down to the ground,' Ziogou says. 'It will come to our farm. It will come to every village. And it did.' The day after the fire, almost all her trees were black. What gets far less attention than the extreme summer heat, though, are the swelling winter temperatures. 'The main problem is the high temperature during winter,' Magiatis says. Cold temperatures in January and February send a signal for the tree to enter its dormant period, which it needs to preserve its energy resources to prepare for spring. 'If the tree does not feel it is winter,' he says, 'this cycle does not work properly.' We're not talking all that cold; he estimates that Greece's trees need only at least two weeks in a row of temperatures below 50F. But that's getting tougher. During the walk in January with Ziogou, Evia is unseasonably hot, enough for me to feel comfortable in a T-shirt. Another factor that affects olive production is rainfall. It's not that there isn't enough of it, says Antonopoulos of the Kalamata cooperative, but that it comes at the wrong time. Too little rain in the winter means the trees will have less moisture stored up for the summer, but a rain in the hot months of May or June can be devastating to a harvest, causing the flowers to turn prematurely and encouraging pests like the vexing olive fruit fly (known in Greece as the Dakos fly), whose larvae feed on the fruiting trees. Rain during harvest season, as the farmers experienced this year, can be worse still. Roughly one-third of the annual rainfall in Kalamata took place in December, during peak harvest, drowning a great many olives and costing farmers 20% to 30% of their yield. The olives were smaller too, which made less oil. At a wholesale price of about $20 a gallon, the area's farmers would barely turn a profit. On harvest day in Nemea, home to an ancient Temple of Zeus and nestled in the foothills of the Arcadian mountains, a team of workers use a handheld machine to shake olives loose from their branches onto green nets below. After each tree has been cleaned of fruit, the workers gather the nets in their arms like bedsheets and dump the olives into large red bins. From there, it's onto screens where the workers pluck out stray leaves, then funnel the crop into hip-high plastic bags much like the ones heisted in the stolen municipal truck the month before. Once his team is done harvesting, a farmer named Konstantinos Papaioannou heads straight to the mill to press the oil. Like everyone I've spoken with in Greece, Papaioannou is emphatic about the perils of climate change. It's here to stay, he says, and he intends to adapt, both by planting the most resilient varieties of trees he can find and by updating his methods to safeguard them. 'I spray every year now,' he says, which requires time and equipment—more funds. Some farmers have focused on short-term security measures (cameras, fences, nightly armed vigils, even microchipping branches for tracking), but those thinking long term are wrestling first and foremost with the climate. Papaioannou sprays his trees more often than he used to with a nontoxic pesticide and irrigates them farther from the trunk to encourage the roots to seek out moisture. When he transitioned this particular field from grapes to olives a few years ago, he opted to plant the trees closer together—30 to an acre where he once planted 10 or 12—so as to maintain more ground moisture from the canopy cover. This makes sense the way he explains it, though farmers in Evia have taken the opposite tack, planting trees farther apart to make it harder for fire to spread. Historically, farmers relied on their family to harvest olives, but that's becoming a tradition of the past. Now, Greece is reckoning with a massive labor shortage, which, according to a representative from the Greek Association of Table Olives, 'has disastrous consequences' for the olive sector and the country as a whole. In the 2022-23 crop year, 20% to 30% of green table olive varieties remained on the trees unharvested, resulting in a €27 million loss across Greece, according to the table olives association. So severe is this shortage—and so powerful the olive lobby—that last year, Greece's right-wing government, which has campaigned on closing the borders and has been widely accused of carrying out abuses against immigrants, fast-tracked a visa for undocumented workers to staff the olive groves. But the farmers I've spoken with say they either distrust the program (because of the government, xenophobia or both) or have found the bureaucracy too difficult to navigate. Rising costs of living might also be a factor. Last year, when prices of olive oil were soaring, foreign and domestic workers throughout Greece began demanding more pay. Now they can expect to make about €60 a day, up from about €40. The threat of US President Donald Trump 's tariffs has added further headwinds. Most recently delayed until late July, the levies in their strictest form could devastate Europe's export markets. Generally speaking, Greeks don't love that so much of their olive oil is bought by Italian companies and repackaged as oil 'from Italy,' but they need the global marketplace. Some of their business comes from connoisseurs (also known as snobs): Like wine or chocolate or coffee, the taste range from one bottle of olive oil to another, or even one year to another, can vary from peppery to smooth, bitter to acidic, fruity to nutty. But producers also rely on orders from the conglomerates that are willing to mix and match. Some farmers recoil when I tell them about a label I spotted on a bottle at Whole Foods: 'International Olive Oil from Greece, Turkey, Tunisia and Italy!' Still, selling to the conglomerates is better than not selling at all. In spite of recent crackdown efforts, olive oil remains widely counterfeited, diluted with cheaper oil or mislabeled as virgin or extra-virgin when it's not. Pride in their craft helps keep many small farmers going. So does a sense of stewardship. 'If we make it through these difficult times,' Papaioannou says, 'it's because of the satisfaction I get from seeing these trees I planted when they were so small bear fruit.' Harvest day is a happy day, he adds. 'I'll be even happier when I see all the bottles.' However valuable to the economy, olives aren't merely a commodity in Greece, but a point of national pride and the source of a reverence verging on the spiritual. They've grown well and easily here for just about all of recorded history, making it difficult to imagine what might come after. One possibility is that olive cultivation moves uphill to cooler temperatures, but that would require radically remaking the entire landscape and likely casting aside many growers in the flatlands. When I visit in January, a usually bustling mill in the Athens exurb of Paiania has been closed for weeks. It's been a hot season for this particularly arid valley. One grower says that this year, like last, his 1,000 trees yielded only about 20% of the roughly 3 tons of oil he usually presses. Thefts have also become common in the fields interspersed among the buildings and businesses of Athens' outer sprawl. Although Kalamata has felt the effects of climate change far less dramatically, it has struggled too. Even so, on the day I visit, the mill at the Agricultural Olive Oil Cooperative of Kalamata is surrounded by green crates teeming with olives. Inside, hulking vats shudder and whir as they wash and sort the crop, suck the olives up into great vats that masticate and then press the pulp, eventually siphoning green threads of oil into basins in a steady pour. The room is filled with an earthy aroma both sour and sweet, a combination of wet soil, turned flowers and yeast. There's a precarious art not only to the growing but also the pressing of oil in the age of climate change. Using warmer temperatures at the mill leads to more oil, but it's of reduced quality, because more of the prized polyphenols—those antioxidants fit for the gods—are burned away. Antonopoulos, of the Kalamata cooperative, says he's far less concerned with thefts than he is with olive producers dropping out of the industry as a result of rising costs. 'Many people are abandoning olives,' he says, and the fields are just 'becoming forest.' This is much the same lament as that of Father Christos in Evia, who notes that elders in the area who made their life growing olives gave up after the 2021 fires. What will happen to the acres they abandoned? 'Nothing,' he says. Young people can see the struggle that awaits them in the fields, and the fires (and the floods that followed) dissuaded them too. Olive groves no longer stewarded by humans quickly become unproductive. 'It would take too long to harvest those trees,' Father Christos says with a degree of sadness. Every year, because of the pressures from a changing climate, land once plump with olives becomes merely a feral hoard of trees, not worth even a thief's time. This story was produced in collaboration with the Food & Environment Reporting Network, a nonprofit investigative news organization, with support from the Pulitzer Center. 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Telegraph
19-06-2025
- General
- Telegraph
Ryanair jet from London damages wing after landing in Greece
The incident comes after an Air India flight crashed shortly after take-off last week, killing 271 people, including 241 aboard the aircraft. Although both the Air India Boeing 787 Dreamliner and the Ryanair Boeing 737 Max in Thursday's incident were made by the same company, there is no suggestion of an inherent flaw in Boeing's products. A Ryanair spokesman said: 'This flight from London Stansted to Kalamata (18 June) was taxiing to stand when the wing tip came in contact with a fence at Kalamata Airport. 'The aircraft subsequently continued to stand, and passengers disembarked normally. 'The aircraft then underwent the required inspections and maintenance prior to its return to service.' Data from Flightradar24 suggests that the airliner, registered EI-HMZ, had yet to return to the sky at the time of writing. It was due to fly from Kalamata to Milan at 2.30pm GMT on Thursday but that flight has been delayed by four hours. The Greece-Italy leg was the plane's first scheduled flight after Wednesday's incident. It had arrived in Kalamata from Rimini, Italy.
