Qualities of the extra virgin olive oil

The extra virgin is the olive oil with the best nutritional and organoleptic (smell, colour, taste) quality in the market. Its consumption means more than the 25 % out of all the oil sorts. It has a beneficial effect on the cardiovascular system, favours the bone growth, the calcium absorption and makes digestion easier. In addition, it prevents the skin ageing, cancer and diabetes.

The extra virgin olive oil is pure olive oil, real olive juice with a maximum acidity not higher than 0, 8º. In the making process it doesn’t have any contact with chemical products or organic solvents. It is the only vegetable oil that can be consumed raw, neither refined nor rectified, keeping the vitamin content, the essential fatty acids and other natural products of dietetic importance.

In former times, the extra virgin olive oil was considered a medicine because of its natural properties and its pharmacological scope. It was even used as an ointment to clean and heal warrior’s wounds and burns.

We can point some medical properties out among others:
• It protects against heart diseases, especially heart attack.
• It is a natural remedy for ulcers.
• In paediatrics, it is the appropriate fat for child’s diet.
• It favours bone growth and calcium absorption.
• It prevents diabetes.
• It is excellent to keep a healthy and young skin.
• It is rich in A, D, E, F and K vitamins.
• It increases organism defences.

The extra virgin olive oil has become one of the medicine’s best allies against cardiovascular diseases, especially against atherosclerosis (a chronic inflammatory affecting arterial blood vessels, in part due to the accumulation of fat and cholesterol, and it blocks blood and oxygen circulation).

Thanks to the antioxidants and to the E Vitamin, it slows down ageing in elderly. At the same time, it stimulates bone growth and favours calcium absorption.