Scripps College Olive Oil is Smooth, Fruity and a Winner

Scripps College, a part of the Claremont Colleges, is no stranger to earning honors. But its most recent honor, winning Best in Show for a recent Olive Oil creation, may have come as a bit of surprise.

The honor was announced recently and was earned during this year’s Los Angeles International Extra Virgin Olive Oil Competition awarded Scripps College Best of Show for its entry in the domestic, delicate category.

Nancy Neiman Auerbach, who teaches with the colleges Politics and International Relations Department, spoke to 89.3 KPCC public radio about the win. The professor described how the community picked the olives creating a real sense of a larger victory.

“We got the community out to pick olives for a four-hour period, and we did it to build community,” Auerbach said told Steve Julian, host of Morning Edition. “We had no idea that we would be producing a great olive oil."

The following is the announcement released by the college.

Judges awarded nine Best in Show out of 640 entries from 386 producers. The college celebrated three firsts for the College: first place in the competition, the first time Scripps had entered the contest and the first time Scripps had produced olive oil from its campus trees.

Scripps College harvested its olive trees last November as part of a campus-wide sustainability movement, sparked by a popular course, “The Politics and Culture of Food,” taught by Professor Nancy Neiman Auerbach. The trees themselves are a much-loved fixture on the leafy campus. Once slated for permanent removal because of campus construction, the trees were saved due to student protests in the 1960s; they were temporarily removed, boxed, and replanted in their original location.

The oil, from 1,500 pounds of fruit, was processed in Ojai and resulted in 700 8-oz bottles of oil, described by the olive press owner as “fruity, buttery, and smooth.” The oil was offered for sale to the Scripps community and, to date, sales have covered all production costs.