When most Americans were dispatching the last of their Halloween candy and planning Thanksgiving menus, Alison Carroll (BSBA ’10) was focused on juice.
The co-founder of Wonder Valley, Carroll turns her attention each fall to pressing olives from the year’s harvest into oil that will please discerning palates, promote health and rejuvenate skin and hair. Every sustainably packaged bottle she sells bears the month and year when the fruits were picked.
“It’s a fruit juice,” Carroll says, explaining that the time of harvest is a more reliable freshness gauge than a “use by” date. “It doesn’t age well like wine, and you want to enjoy it while it has the vitality and incredible flavor and health benefits.”
The company Carroll founded in 2014 with her husband, Jay, has attracted a following by producing oil with buttery, herbaceous, fruitful, peppery and grassy notes. The robust flavors reflect a rotating blend of olive varietals, depending on which trees produce in a given year.
While many manufacturers ripen olives before pressing, Carroll says, Wonder Valley intentionally harvests under-ripe fruits. Fully ripened olives will yield more oil, she explains, but fruit that is still green contains a higher concentration of polyphenols.
“There’s a vibrant, kicking flavor,” Carroll says. “It’s more exciting to cook with.”
Because polyphenols have been associated with an array of health benefits from lowering blood pressure to aiding digestion and preventing Alzheimer’s disease, some Wonder Valley customers have taken to sipping oil by the tablespoon.
“It doesn’t age well like wine, and you want to enjoy it while it has the vitality and incredible flavor and health benefits.”
Glowing reviews in GQ and Forbes and a cameo appearance in “Real Housewives of New York” have helped Wonder Valley expand its product line to include health and beauty products featuring olive oil, as well as items for the home.
“It’s special to be in this place to have a more holistic conversation, to offer products that can support both internal health and external beauty,” Carroll says. “While the olive oil is still our hero product — and the backbone of the brand — a lot of our ability to scale and grow our family-owned business has come through the expansion of our skin and new hair care lines.”
Pursuing an unorthodox marketing strategy, Wonder Valley has sold in museum gift shops and clothing stores. Now with a production staff of six and a 10-person sales force, the company has branched out into hotels, spas and salons, where it finds new clientele.
The approach has enabled the company to hum along, even as drought and scorching temperatures have driven up production costs around the globe. But while customer demand remains high, sharp-elbowed competitors have emerged.
“I’ve felt more of the pinch from a surge of brands chasing the same model and showing up in nontraditional retail spaces,” Carroll says.
Recent growth in exotic new labels has coincided with doubts about labeling, increasing home cooks’ awareness of what Carroll calls “the snake oil conundrum.” But Carroll, who previously oversaw extra virgin olive oil certification for the California Olive Oil Council, offers some shopping tips:
- Scrutinize the label: It might say Tuscan olive oil, but if multiple countries are listed, it’s hard to have quality control.
- “Extra Virgin” means free of defects that can result from harvesting and pressing.
- Look for a harvest date: Honest producers will provide one.
- November to December is the most common time for harvesting. Buy from the source, if you can, in the new year.
- Watch for “fusty” oil that tastes like brined olives, reflecting improper storage during harvest or fruit not pressed quickly enough.
- Stored in dark glass or metal and away from heat, olive oil can last up to two years. Clear glass might allow flavors to ebb within a year. Avoid plastic bottles.
- Learn to detect EVOO yourself by tasting a spoonful of a top-tier bottle followed by one of the cheap stuff. EVOO has a clean finish and tastes of grass, pepper, citrus, nuts, apricot: natural flavors. Defective oil has a greasy or heavy mouth feel and carries hints of paraffin, old peanut butter, metal or spoiled salami.