Preparing for our Olive 101 Zoom session.

Thank you for your interest in our upcoming ZOOM Olive Oil 101 class.  You can attend whether you choose to taste or not, and you can attend more than once if you are so inclined.

Since ZOOM allows only 40 minutes for free accounts, the session is going to move quickly, so if we all have our tasting station organized we will jam a lot into the short session!

A few days prior to the event:

  • Ensure you have the ZOOM invitation details and your computer works with ZOOM
  • Each person tasting will require printouts of the tasting place mats and both pages of the taster scorecard. Print these out and have a pen or pencil you can use.
  • Make sure you have a bag of taster cups for each person tasting in your group. You can use anything, really, including separate cups or mugs, but the taster cups we provided are easier to manage.  Please note: the taster cups we supplied should go in your green waste (they compost)
  • If you prefer to spit out your oil instead of swallow, have a cup ready that you can spit into
  • Sparkling water (room temperature) or slices of a green apple help you to clear your palate between samples, so if you want to, have these handy.
  • You may cough, so have Kleenex or a napkin nearby
  • If you are interested, please check out the LEARN section on our website prior to or after the event.

On the day of the event, start preparing your tasting set up at around 9 a.m. so it is all ready to go at 9:30.

  • Make sure you have the ZOOM link and info and your computer is ready to go. Please note, I won’t start accepting anyone into the meeting until 9:27, but if you are ready and waiting, then I should have everyone online by 9:30 and we can start on time and we should have until 10:07 together before ZOOM cuts us off.
  • Set out your tasting mat (printout). The mat is going to get oily, so you can set it on a cookie sheet if you would like.
  • Put about 1-1.5 teaspoons of each oil in its own taster cup and place each oil on its correct position on the mat.
  • In the 6th cup, put about a teaspoon of balsamic. Use a spare cup upside down to cover it.
  • Have your two page score card and a pen or pencil ready.

The format will be:

  • 2 minute intro starting at 9:30 PST sharp.
  • 4 minutes to taste and discuss each oil (20 minutes total). Since we will run out of time at 40 minutes, during the first 22 minutes-ish (until we taste all 5 oils), I will mute all participants so it will be just me talking.  Open up the CHAT feature of ZOOM so you can add questions in there. I will try to include them if possible or we can discuss at the end.  If you prefer, write down any questions you have so we can discuss them at the end of the tasting session.
  • 15 minutes questions and answers.