Olive oil cantata

Olive oil is the very soul of cooking. It gives to its preparations that spirit, that talent which exalts the taste, underlines the flavour as an accent highlights a word, informs of a personality. Olive oil is also an oil with a heart. A heart that is sympathetic to our physical miseries, an oil that soothes, relieves, softens, the oil of consolation. And the oil of good health. To this oil of gladness and mercy — as to the olive tree, symbol of peace and eternal rebirth, and to the olive, “ruddy and almond-like” — this book pays fervent and tender tribute. At once an enquiry and a celebration, this cantata of olive oil sings, in fact, through the sunny voices of many olive growers and millers from the countries of Provence, the Alps and the Côte d’Azur, the ineffable benefits of these marvels of nature.