The Apokoronas region produces some of the finest olive oil in Greece. One family explains why it cannot be replicated anywhere else.
The Dourakis family has been pressing olive oil near Vamos for three generations. Their grove covers forty hectares on a hillside above the Drapanos peninsula, looking south towards the White Mountains and north towards the sea. The trees are between eighty and three hundred years old.
The variety
Cretan olive oil is dominated by a single variety: Koroneiki. The olives are small — smaller than your thumbnail — and their oil content is extraordinarily high. The combination of thin rocky soil, cool nights and the specific microclimate of the Apokoronas hills produces an oil with a green, grassy intensity and a distinctive peppery finish.
"If you squeeze an olive from this tree," Giorgos says, pressing one between his fingers until the oil appears on his skin, "and then squeeze one from Kalamata, you would not believe they are the same fruit."
The harvest
Harvest happens between November and January. The family waits until the olives are at peak oil content. They use nets spread under the trees and long rakes to bring the olives down. The pressing happens within hours of harvest — olives left overnight begin to oxidise and the oil quality drops immediately.
How to buy it
The Dourakis cooperative sells directly from the winery near Vamos. For olive oil, bring your own bottles if you want to fill from the tank: the price is roughly a third of branded Cretan oil in a Chania supermarket. The quality is not comparable — the tank oil is better.
Visit the Dourakis winery near Vamos for a tasting. Buy direct from the tank — bring your own bottles. The harvest months (November–January) are the best time to visit the grove.