Our Story
The story of our Cailletier Single Cultivar Extra Virgin cold crafted olive oil begins more than a century ago.
In 1903, my great-grandfather, Hassan Kassem Iskandar, planted 250 olive trees on a 20-acre estate, and began to carefully nurture them under the golden sun and gentle rain of the fertile highlands near Mount Lebanon. To my great-grandfather, this was more than just a means of producing olive oil for our family – it was the continuation of a respected historic legacy that stretches back into the mists of antiquity.
You see, in the Békaa Valley of Lebanon, olives carry enormous symbolic and national significance. Olive trees have been proven to have existed before written languages were invented, and there is archaeological evidence of olive oil extraction on the Levant coast which dates back to a period between 7100BC and 6300BC. Early inhabitants not only used olives as offerings to the gods, but revered the olive tree itself as a symbol of peace, fertility, and immortality.
In ancient times, brides would wear an olive branch wreath to symbolize purity and integrity, and ‘extending the olive branch’ of course still exists today as a metaphor indicating a desire for peace and harmony.
The olive tree is sometimes referred to as ‘the tree of life’, and little wonder, because although most olive trees have an average lifespan of 300 – 600 years, there are those who have exceeded a thousand years of age and are still fertile. In fact, there are olive trees in Lebanon that are older than 6000 years and which still bear fruit!
Modern Times, Ancient Ways
Today, our estate in the Békaa Valley is home to 400 olive trees, and they are tended to every bit as carefully as my great-grandfather did 117 years ago. The Cailletier varietal is the only one we allow on our estate, and it is an extraordinary olive for a number of reasons.
My grandfather, Abdelkareem Iskandar, produced olive oil on our estate, and after he passed on, my father, Ahmad Iskandar, took over and continued planting more olive trees, ensuring the preservation of traditional olive cultivation and pressing, and replicating the farming methods that have been used by our ancestors for thousands of years.
To this end, he introduced small-scale livestock – cows, sheep, ducks, and chickens – as well as planting additional orchards of peaches, apricots, figs, cherries, mulberries, oranges, and lemons. Doing this ensured greater biodiversity, richer soil, natural pest control, and a naturally sustained ecosystem that protects our prized olive trees and ensures their health. And right now, our estate stands as an example of how to combine ancestral knowledge with modern thinking, and of how to work organically with nature in ways that are amazingly successful.
A Bigger World
Seven years ago, I came to Canada, and one of the first things I looked for was a naturally produced artisanal olive oil that would at least match the oil that my family has produced for generations. After searching high and low without success, I eventually decided to bring some of our family’s olive oil over from our estate in Lebanon. Of course, our oil has never been produced for any kind of commercial purpose, but has really only always served to supply the needs of our family. (We also donate around 3000 litres of our olive oil per year to charity, because we understand that the greatest happiness comes from giving to others, especially those in need.)
And then, after I had imported some of our oil, something extraordinary happened.
We naturally shared our olive oil with our Canadian friends and acquaintances, and they were immediately impressed with the enormous difference in taste and quality compared with anything they had tasted before. For the very first time, they understood exactly why our ‘liquid gold’ (as connoisseurs refer to it) is so special.
The culmination of centuries of tradition, of organic growth, hand-harvesting and cold-pressing, the care and attentiveness – the love – with which our olive oil is produced, from the finest Cailletier olives – is the reason for the fruity, buttery taste and texture that so astounded our friends.
So, for the past five years or so, I’ve been bringing in about 40 litres per year for my family, and as others began to ask if they could purchase some too, we’ve decided that we’re happy to share what we have with those who’d like to taste this extraordinary olive oil.
We’d love for you to experience it for yourself, and you’re welcome to place an order – but please bear in mind that our seasonal stocks are limited by the size of our yearly harvest. Timely ordering is essential, and we’ll do our best to accommodate you.
We welcome you to a tradition that spans centuries, a taste that has its roots in the expression of the divine, and - most of all – we welcome you to our family.