Torno de Buera: Olive Mill Becomes Museum

Down a quiet, dusty street and past shoulder-high, UNESCO-protected stone walls in Buera, a village of 80 people in Aragon, in northeastern Spain, a low-slung building conceals a culinary treasure. Behind its wood-and-iron door sits an olive oil mill, built sometime in the seventeenth or eighteenth century—no one knows for sure—with most of its original equipment still intact.

Torno de Buera mill photo credit Alba Cruells

Torno de Buera, now a museum, is cool and slightly damp, a welcome change from the late-June heat outside. Mariano Lisa, the mayor of the larger municipality of Santa Maria de Dulcis, which includes Buera, flips on the lights and queues up a video about the history and tradition of olive oil production in the region. Behind him, traditional production equipment, including a seven-plus-foot hydraulic press and a lathe with a stone grinding wheel bigger than that of an industrial tractor tire, seem ready to roar to life, although they haven’t been used in decades. Even so, Buera is still producing oil, a centuries-old Mediterranean tradition of which Spain is one of the undisputed masters.

Olive Oil Route & the Culture of Olive Oil

Olive oil route

The mill is part of a local Olive Oil Route. Featuring nine stops that wind between vineyards, Medieval hermitages, and Spain’s ubiquitous holm oak forests, it gives an up-close look at centuries-old olive groves where regional varieties like albareta, injerto, blancal, neral, royeta de Asque, and gordal de Somontano thrive.

Lisa, dressed in denim shorts, a faded Nike T-shirt, and blue sneakers, speaks animatedly about Spain’s gastronomic gold in a bottle, his voice rising as he describes the trees and their twisted branches, each one comprised of its own root, that can grow up to 22 feet in diameter. “He is in love with the culture of the olive oil, and he owns himself a lot of olive trees to preserve local varieties,” says Alba Cruells, founder of tour company Spain Insights, who interprets for the mayor.

Traditions surrounding olive oil persist in Aragon. Many senior citizens, says Cruells, take a spoonful a day, before their morning coffee, to reap the benefit of the oil’s anti-inflammatory properties. For the Feast of the Incarnation in March, locals celebrate fertility with crespillos, a pastry made from a dough containing borage leaves, aniseed, and orange, and fried in olive oil. The celebration is thought to guarantee a good harvest the following fall.

At San Juan Church, just over a mile from Torno de Buera, a bottle or bowl of olive oil is always placed in front of a statue of the Virgin Mary. Churchgoers can dab it over achy joints or rub it onto their foreheads to eliminate headaches. Legend even has it that if you place a few drops onto a baby’s tongue, she’ll begin talking.

From Mill to Museum

Torno de Buera mill photo credit Robin Catalano

Until about 40 years ago, the mill operated much as it did in its earliest days. During harvest season, it was both the industrial and social center of town, a place where neighbors gathered to catch up, and share news and gossip. When production was complete, they would take home bottles for eating and cooking. The solids left over from the pressing of fruit and pit were used to start hearth fires.

The historic mill closed in the 1980s and was transformed into a museum. In the 1990s, locals banded together to create a modern olive oil cooperative. Lisa walks us through a tasting of three extra-virgin varieties. Verdeña has a bit of sweetness, with a tomatolike fragrance and a smooth mouthfeel. Alquezrana is warmer and spicier, with a hint of artichoke on the tongue. Silky, fruity arbequina is the highest-quality and most expensive of the three, at about $35 per bottle.

“The prices should come down as production recovers,” says Cruells, a nod to the higher-than-normal early-summer temperatures that stifled fruit development on the olive trees over the past two years.

Torno de Buera Oils

Olive oil bottles at Torno de Buera photo credit Robin Catalano

Torno de Buera oils, like many boutique Spanish oils that meet stringent purity and production criteria, display quality seals on the bottle. The producers are working with the Somontano, a neighboring Denomination of Origin wine region tucked into the foothills of the central Pyrenees, on a DO for the oils. Torno de Buera’s will probably never be sold outside of Spain, but world domination isn’t the point; for the producers in the cooperative, it’s about combining traditional knowledge with contemporary technology to create a superior product.

After the tour, we walk into town and sit down to dinner at Nyibeta Degustación, a hip, newer restaurant by young couple Mónica Alujas and Chef Raúl Hernández, who worked in Michelin-starred restaurants in Barcelona before moving to Buera. Among their updated interpretations of regional foods, from salad with just-picked arugula and tomatoes to fideuá with a whipped garlic gratin, and a perfectly grilled fillet of trout, local olive oil figures prominently. Each tapa is a reminder of the land’s generosity, and the simple magic of a well-crafted meal made possible by the golden elixir pressed from the region’s trees.