Hernando County olive orchard providing visitors with a taste of Tuscany

Olive Grove providing true taste of Tuscany

Jason Wright reports

BROOKSVILLE,Fla. - Tucked away in Hernando County, visitors can find a true taste of Tuscany.

"The Olive Grove is an olive orchard of over 200 closer to 300 trees," said Deidre Davis, the owner, "My husband and I took a trip to Italy 12 years ago. We fell in love with Tuscany and the olive orchards, so we decided we wanted to have that in Florida."

And the story of The Olive Grove began.

"So we bought this land and planted all of these trees," admitted Davis, "We have eight different varieties of olive trees."

Those trees cover acres of land off Rester Drive in Brooksville, but growing olive trees means you get olives.

READ: 7th and Grove providing southern comfort food in the center of Ybor City

What happens to those olives takes some deliberate planning.

Of their plan, Davis said, "We mill, and we mill other people's olives as well."

Milling is the process of taking the olives, or the fruit of the olive trees and extracting the oil from it.

The process does require some intentionality, shared Davis, "(The olives) need to come off the tree and go to the mill within 24 to 48 hours. You pick the entire tree and then it goes to the mill."

The milling equipment cleans the fruit, grinds it to a paste and mixes that paste to allow the oil to begin expressing from the mix.

READ: New restaurant in Tampa's Midtown showcases cuisine from Southeast Asia

A centrifuge then separates the oil from the vegetable matter and water.

The entire process happens on-site at The Olive Grove and the benefits of all of that are served up for visitors.

"When you come here, you get to sample several different kinds of olive oils, you get to sample different olive products, sample the olive leaf tea," shared Davis, "We take you on a tour of the grove. We do workshops on infusing olive oil, curing olives and making clay olive lamps."

To learn more about The Olive Grove and the events they have going on this fall, click here.

Or check out their Facebook page by clicking here.