Day 38 - The Olive Oil Journey

Athens, Greece | December 2nd, 2022

Of course I decide to go out at midnight and park myself at Cuba Libre for 3 hours, featuring mushroom risotto, beer, live music, and a couple shots bought by randos.

In the morning I wake up, do some work and roughly outline the start of the day. For some background, I had no idea what Acropolis was before arriving in Athens but learned to make it a point to visit. So I planned to eat breakfast, visit in the morning, and walk around to olive oil shops in the afternoon.

By 10:30 I make my way to breakfast but not without a couple stops on the way. First I stumbled upon a meat market - I had my "welcome to Greece" moment when 20 raw animal heads (not sure which animal) were in a bucket for sale. Don't worry, that picture will not be posted.

Right outside the market I stop at several small shops selling Olive Oil, so I arrive at the Snob Café 30 minutes later than planned. I still have no idea what I ordered - just went with the waiter's recommendation and enjoyed it - some sort of egg, feta cheese, and tomato sauce combination with toast and olive oil. And the black tea they served was perfect. Goat milk, fresh honey, and tea in a teabag with that newer type of netting. 10/10 would recommend.

On my walk towards Acropolis, I pass by a fruit stand selling large pomegranates for 1 euro (would never fly in the US) and I’m at ease - when I left Tel Aviv I was slightly nervous I had my last pomegranate of the trip. Wrong.

To be completely honest, Acropolis was nice, but I appreciated none of it. Yeah I read the signs and some history on the place. Sorry to the Greeks reading this but I'm just one of those people that is ready to get out of there the second I walk in, unless I have full understanding, custom tour guide, etc etc. I sound like a complete snob but it's true. 35 minutes elapse and the supposed-to-be 3 hour visit came to an end. At least I posted some nice pics.

The next 2 hours were literally going from shop to shop in the flea market and getting as many samples and information about olive oil I could get. Some may call this overcomplicating, I call it field work. I'm here to find great olive oil, period. No oils were purchased but I guilt bought a variety of 3-5 euro items after the store clerk gave a 15 minute explanation on the oils.

One surprise was the amount of honey sold in these shops. Maybe it was one of those things that zipped over my head in the previous countries but there was such great variety. More on this Day 39.

After oil (I was so done) I stopped for some Greek yogurt - goat yogurt was fuego. I proceeded to walk to some fancy hotels and the shopping area in my super casual clothing. They either thought I was dirt poor off the street or some silicon valley super minimalist tech billionaire. Neither are true. The guy in the Rolex store even said my Apple Watch is a mere gadget. I disagree it's the best - though actually a couple years ago I was so against it but was convinced by my cousins it would suit me well. They were so right.

I get back to the hotel, sleep, write the blog, organize 40 new brands of oil on a spreadsheet, snag a cappuccino from the Nespresso in the allegedly closed café, shower, and get dressed.

I start walking to the Gatsby hotel [which I visited earlier] that apparently had a DJ (was not the DJ I had in mind), but in the back of my head I knew I'd probably end up somewhere else anyway.

First stop: Gyro and Souvlaki across the meat market. Dirt cheap - like I could have had dinner for 3.5 Euro but opted for a Greek salad, sampler meats platter, and bottle of water for 16 euro. Splurge. I was in and out in 20 minutes.

As I walk towards the bars I find myself walking into a wine shop that clearly did olive oil tastings as well. That was a fun 40 minutes.

I was slightly uncomfortable at the next bar and ended up mustering the cojones to walk up to up to some people outside and started a conversation that carried for the next 3 hours until bedtime.

1 Olive Oil Takeaway

Based on my day yesterday, Greek brands have the nicest bottling on average compared to California, Spain, Italy, and Israel. I will try and figure out why this is the case by the end of the trip. There were so many pretty bottles.

This doesn’t include the Greek brands you see on Instagram (@ Americans) as those are [highly likely] privately labelled Greek oil only sold in America.

-Jack

Thank you for reading and welcome to the blog! I'm traveling through Europe on a quest to find great Olive Oil.