You may have seen this term on some of your favorite healthy smoothies more recently. The black olives used in the food service industry are ‘made’ black by adding oxygen during the curing process, which helps to mellow the bitterness. About 90 percent of the world’s olive crop goes to make olive oil. The best time to make olive oil is right after they ripen, when they are green. Olive oils made from unripe, green olives have a light- to deep-green color. if you prefer a sharper-flavored oil, you would use more green olives than either fully ripe or partially ripe in the mix. The remainder is harvested for table olives which, though there are over 2,000 known olive cultivars, are known to … Typically, extra virgin olive oil is made at large mills by a method called cold-pressing. How Extra Virgin Olive Oil is Traditionally Made. The methods are different depending on which grower you ask, but olive oil itself is made before the olives turn black. Olive oil is pressed from a blend of unripe, partially ripe, and fully ripe olives. Basically, olives are pressed through a machine and oils are collected while the rest of the olive is discarded. For a sweeter-flavored oil, the mix is 1/4 green, 1/2 partially ripe, and 1/4 black. Oils made from ripe olives tend to be a golden- or light-yellow color. different curing processes combined with different varieties are how we get different types. Olive oil is usually made from completely different varieties.