My interest in olive oil started when my husband John and I started planning an olive grove, Oasis Olives, in Peru in 2007. We did not know anything about olives or olive oil. We decided we needed to grow olives in Australia first to educate ourselves. We bought an olive grove in the Goulburn Strathbogie region in Victoria, Australia, built a mill with good machinery and started processing olives in the 2010 season.
We were very fortunate to have Alberto Serralha from SAOV in Portugal come out and teach us for a number of weeks. It was an extremely steep learning curve for me and I am still learning. I was very lucky to be able to go to Savantes tasting course in New York. Simon Field encouraged me to really taste and describe the oils and opened my eyes to many excellent olive oils from all over the world. There is so much to learn!