“I listened to the old Italian farmers — if you pick early, you get a better quality of oil.”
Andy Cilona, Owner
Cilona’s Sicilian Extra Virgin Olive Oil
Dear Visitor,
In 1956, my father left Cianciana to come to America, carrying every young Sicilian immigrant’s dream. More than finding a job, my father intended to see my grandfather who had left Italy three months before he was born. My father traveled to the US on the SS Andrea Doria and landed in New York. He was already thirty-four years old when he finally met my grandfather in a little town in West Virginia. On August 28, 1958, my mother, older brother, Sam, and I came over. My father secured a brickyard job in Waynesburg, Ohio, and we were finally together after two years of him being essentially alone in the country. We’ve been here ever since.
I always had a longing to go back to Sicily. When the opportunity came to buy a property on the island, I immediately jumped on it. I bought a small Villa in my family’s hometown, with little olives and fruit trees, but I was mostly drawn to the olives. In the first year of harvest, I had a group of Romanians come over to my house and we handpicked the olives and had them pressed. It yielded a humble portion, and I gave away the olive oil to my friends and business associates, and they just loved it! It’s so pure and to this day, we keep our olive oil the way our friends and family loved it. Nothing is added, just purely organic.
Sincerely,
Andy Cilona
We do not make our olive oil from a blend of different varieties and oils to mass produce. Cilona’s Sicilian Extra Virgin Olive Oil yields limited quantities, only from our olive groves in the Platani Valley of Southwestern Sicily. Local farmers cultivate and harvest our olives as their main source of livelihood.
The olives never leave our property until we send them 1km up the road to be pressed. When necessary, we source more olives from our neighbors who grow the same tree on the same ground.
Our olives go through a single press only which takes about four to six hours . After we bottle our olive oil, we ship directly to our shop in Waynesburg, Ohio in about fourteen days. The rich color, unique fruity and peppery bodies of flavor, and light fragrance you get from every bottle is purely fresh-pressed, 100% organic Sicilian extra virgin olive oil. Nothing more, nothing less.
We used to pick the olives after the first of November. But I listened to the old Italian farmers who told me that if we pick early, we get a better quality of oil. The old-timers were absolutely right! The oil is not watered down from all the moisture late in the season and although the yield is not as much, the taste is purely spectacular.
There’s nothing like it out there, but the only secret is sincere appreciation for authentic Sicilian olive oil. We’re not a big company. Cilona’s operation is shared among family, friends, and neighbors. From each harvest, we yield 19% to 22% of olive oil, which is about 150 bottles per season.
Olive oil’s typical shelf life is up to three years. Cilona’s Sicilian Extra Virgin Olive Oil lasts up to five due to our gentle picking and milling process, harvesting early, and only pressing once.
We hope to expand our operations so more homes can taste our pure, unrefined extra virgin olive oil.
