It’s time for me to eat some crow.
When Selo Oils, a Croatia-based olive oil company founded by my friends Kyle Trouble and Martin Erlić, launched last year, I was skeptical. The fact that they were hocking olive oil that cost in excess of $50 drew my suspicion. While Selo Oils advertised itself as offering pure olive oil produced by Martin’s family in Croatia, how could any olive oil be that costly? It didn’t seem like a legit product.
However, Martin recently sent me a bottle of Selo olive oil to try for myself, and I’m happy to say that I was totally wrong. Selo Oils puts out a fantastic product that is worth buying if you are at all concerned with the quality of the food you eat and the substances you put in your body. While expensive, Selo olive oil pays for itself in better-tasting, healthier food.
The Selo Oils Difference
Most people don’t think too deeply about the seasonings and ingredients they buy. I certainly didn’t; the olive oil I use for cooking is some generic brand I bought at Carrefour. The label is in Russian and I can barely read the ingredients list. The problem is that most mainstream olive oil is full of artificial preservatives and other garbage that harms both the flavor as well as your health. Like with life itself, if you cheap out on olive oil, you end up paying for it twice over.
The Selo Oils difference hits you the second you open the package up. In contrast to generic olive oils that are sold in cheap plastic jugs with cheap plastic caps, Selo olive oil comes in a nice, thick, whiskey-grade glass bottle. My friend Joe the Boomer uses his discarded Selo bottles to store holy water after thoroughly cleaning them. To cap things off (pun intended), the bottle comes with a cork to better seal in the taste.
Shortly after opening up my Selo olive oil, I poured some into a spoon and tasted it alongside my generic olive oil. The taste was clearly different: the Selo oil was thick, salty, and clean, with a peppery aftertaste. The generic olive oil tasted like motor oil in comparison and almost made me gag. While you can acculturate your body to consuming trash over time, once you have a taste of normality, your senses will immediately recognize that you’ve been eating poison.
Selo Oils’ product is so luxurious and tasty that you can use it as a dip for French fries, chips, and other finger foods, which I would never think of doing with other olive oils. When cooked, it lends a rich taste to whatever it is boiled with. I used Selo olive oil to make manti (an Armenian dish that resembles pierogies or pelmeni) over the weekend and the final product was noticeably tastier.
Buy Cheap, Pay Twice?
The main sticking point with Selo Oils for many people will be the price: Selo olive oil currently retails for $50 a bottle. I imagine at least some of this is due to logistical issues that Martin can probably overcome in the future. Having said that, think about it this way: isn’t your health more important than money? You can always earn more money, but if you damage your body by using olive oil laced with industrial runoff chemicals, you’re going to harm yourself for life.
In addition to this, how often do you buy olive oil right now? I cook at home much of the time (albeit less often now due to the summer heat), and even I am still using the same bottle of olive oil I bought not long after moving in (nearly a year ago). Selo olive oil comes in 750 ml bottles that will last you for months unless you’re a professional chef, so it’s not like you’ll need to buy a new bottle every week.
Ultimately, if you’re interested in healthy eating and cooking, Selo Oils is well worth the price. As a pure olive oil taken directly from the Mediterranean vineyards, Selo Oils promises to enhance your meals and your life.
Click here to buy Selo Oils.
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