The Gay Farmer

General information

THE GAY FARMERS STORY

The idea for The Gay Farmer came in the beginning of 2008 after doing my first olive harvest on my mother’s small holding in Moratalla, north west Murcia in Spain.

The harvest takes us around a week to ten days of hard work netting the ground around the olive tree, up the tree precariously holding on to a large branch and also up a ladder carefully getting the olives off the branches without bruising the precious fruit. Then around 4 pm we place the crates in the back of the car and take them to the local co-op for processing into oil. We do this daily until our 50 or so trees are all done. I love this time of year working outside, more often than not in t-shirts enjoying the warm January Spanish sunshine collecting nature’s harvest.

The oil from our harvest tasted wonderful and the idea came to import to the UK and sell to local delis, wholefood and grocery stores. The word spread amongst my friends and, being a gay man, they teased me with, “so what are you now dear, the gay farmer?” The Gay Farmer was born!

Our homegrown harvest produces around 100 litres of oil per year and so the search was on to find a local partner with similarly exacting standards to ensure we could bring exceptional olive oil of the highest quality from this region of Spain at a competitive price.

After tasting olive oil from many of the local producers, I found that Ace Agra in nearby Calasparra offered the best Organic Extra Virgin Olive Oil. I sent a sample to leading expert whom confirmed this was truly an exceptional olive oil. Which is understandable considering the amount of care Francisco, Pedro and their team spend from cultivation, harvesting, processing and storage.

Why do we sell oil in a can many may ask! Well firstly to protect this wonderful oil from light, one of the three things that damage olive oil along with air and heat. Secondly it’s much lighter than glass therefore more logistically environmentally friendly.

So that is the story so far, all that is left to say is “Enjoy”, The Gay Farmer, Spanish Organic Extra Virgin Olive Oil, [olive oil] just as it should be.