About Us
Sample our Olive Oils and Balsamics
Sample our Extra Virgin Olive Oils and Balsamics at our Tasting Bar
In our tasting bar you can expect to sample the highest quality extra virgin olive oils harvested from the most current crops around the globe. We utilize the alternating harvest seasons in the Northern and Southern hemispheres to access the most recent olive crushes, allowing us to offer the freshest juice available - not just once but twice per year!
Product from Tunisia, Greece, Spain, Italy, Portugal, California, Chile, Peru, and Australia is available in our shop on a rotational basis.
Always Fresh
Never pre-bottled, and protected from heat, light, and moisture, each of our premium extra virgin olive oils come with detailed sensory, chemical, and nutritional information as well as a crush date.
Natural Ingredients
We offer both fused and infused oils that come in a variety of flavours using natural ingredients only.
You are also invited to savour intense white and dark balsamic vinegars from Modena, Italy. Taste our traditional condimento and explore other flavours such as raspberry, cranberry-pear, and coconut. Our unique whole fruit balsamic is out of this world!
Gluten Free
Our balsamic, unlike any other on the market, contains absolutely no caramel colouring and therefore no gluten!
Our product is free of Artificial Colour and Flavour. No Added Sugar. Gluten Free. All Natural.
Olive Oil and Balsamic Pairings
Let us guide you through suggested pairings or you can discover some of your own. Visit us instore or order online. With over 60 flavour varieties and hundreds of pairing possibilities, the choices are endless!
Try everything before you buy. All of your selections are poured and bottled fresh in our shop for you to take home and enjoy.
Customer Loyalty Program
CUSTOMER LOYALTY: Get $1 back for every $25 dollars you spend when you sign up for the Collingwood Olive Oil Loyalty Program. It’s fast and easy; just provide us with your name and postal code at checkout and begin saving immediately! Allow your credit to build up or redeem at anytime. The loyalty program is for in-store purchases only.
Recycling Program
Bring back any balsamic bottle and get a 5% discount on your next bottle. Ensure that our original label remains on bottle that you are returning.
Please put your oil bottles into your blue box. We follow best practices in all of our programs. Knowing that the worst enemy to fresh oil is old oil and/or moisture we do not refill or reuse oil bottles.
Health Benefits
Olive oil is richly complex
Composed of an array of fatty acids, macro and micro-nutrients, and over 30 phenolic compounds, olive oil's chemical balance is a part of it's exceptional reputation among chefs, healthcare specialists, and home users alike.
Olive oil is held with almost spiritual reverence by some of the longest-living cultures in the world. With new benefits and health correlations being discovered almost daily, science is now confirming the health effects that generations of olive oil users have experienced and celebrated for thousands of years.
The modern consumer is far more aware of the dark side of industrial food processes and the importance of understanding how food directly impacts our health. Evidence of the implications of diets laden with animal fats, or worse, highly processed and refined nut, seed, and plant oils is not only being recognized, but is alarmingly apparent in the current trends of disease and wide-spread health issues plaguing North America and similar cultures. There is a massive cultural shift steering us back in favour of the whole, the healthy, and the tried-and-true.
Unfortunately, olive oil has been slow to break into North American culture, and though no other oils have a history as extensive and beautiful as olive oil, many North Americans are still in the dark in regards to the health benefits of the oil, and more seriously, how to identify a high quality olive oil.
So, whats so great about olive oil? (Specifically, high quality extra virgin oils?)
The numerous health benefits attributed with regular consumption of high quality extra virgin olive oil is as follows:
Cancer
Olive oil contains a phytonutrient called oleocanthal, which reduces inflammation in the body similar to the effects of ibuprofen. Reduced inflammation reduces the risk of certain cancers, such as breast cancer. Olive oil is also rich in phenolic compounds, which reduce damage from oxidative stresses that can lead to cancer. Other compounds, such as squalene and lignans are being studied for their effects on cancer as well. Olive oil has also proven to effective in preventing skin cancer, both when take internally or applied externally after sun exposure.
Heart Disease
Olive oil has a dramatic effect on blood lipids. It has been shown to lower triglycerides and LDL-cholesterol (the bad kind), and in some studies, actually raised HDL-cholesterol (the good kind). This plays a role in preventing fatty plaques in the arteries (atherosclerosis) and reduces a persons risk factor for developing heart disease.
Oxidative Stress
The body is fueled by oxygen, primarily through oxidization-reduction, or redox, reactions. Oxygen is extremely reactive, and it is often forgotten just how volatile, and toxic, oxygen can be.
The very substance that is keeping us alive is also slowly killing us through the cumulative effects of oxidative stress. The human body is very careful to regulate oxygen concentrations. 95% of oxygen that enters our cells is used properly in the mitochondria, but as much as 3% to 5% is released as free radicals. Free-radicals produce chains of spontaneous chemical reactions, causing a domino effect that can lead to damage, most seriously of the DNA contained within a cell nucleus, but also of enzymes, cell membranes that regulate nutrient flow, and of lipids through lipid peroxidation (the base of over 200 diseases, including cancer, heart disease, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, etc). This damage can directly increases a persons risk of cancer, which occurs when cells copy an error in DNA leading to unrestrained cell division. Phenolic compounds and antioxidants such as vitamin E found in olive oil prevent these free-radical reactions and can reverse damage caused by free-radials, reducing the risk of cancer and general oxidative stress.
Blood Pressure
Regular consumption of olive oil has been shown to reduce both systolic and diastolic blood pressure. More research is being conducted, but the current effects are attributed to the phenolic compounds present in olive oil.
Diabetes
Consumption of olive oil, especially in conjunction with the Mediterranean diet (low in saturated fats, rich in carbohydrates and fiber from fruit and vegetables, legumes and whole grains) has excellent effects on LDL-cholesterol and blood sugar control, while improving insulin sensitivity. A study in the science journal Diabetes Care showed that the Mediterranean diet was 50% more effective in type II diabetes prevention than the low fat diet.
Obesity
Though olive oil is high in calories, as you will find with any fat, it has been shown to reduce obesity levels, likely due to it's nutritional value and the presence of other health boosting compounds and antioxidants not found in animal fats, nut and seed oils, and refined oils. Studies have also shown olive oil can promote a feeling of fullness and prompted less over-eating.
Osteoporosis
Diets with high olive oil consumption improve bone mineralization and calcification. Fats are a crucial part of our bodies ability to absorb certain nutrients in our food, and olive oil in particular is very beneficial for this, helping with calcium absorption, among other nutrients, and contributing to the prevention of osteoporosis and other nutrition related diseases.
Arthritis
Studies have shown that diets rich in olive oil reduce a person likelihood of developing arthritis, likely due to it's potent anti-inflammatory properties.
Alzheimer's
Numerous studies (some appearing in the journal Chemical Neuroscience) show that oleocanthal in extra virgin olive oil reduces the risk of Alzheimer's and other cognitive diseases associated with aging. The phenolic compounds and there strong oxidative damage reversing effects may also responsible and slow other areas of aging.
Stroke
In a 5 year study involving 7625 individuals over 65 in France, with no history of stroke, "intensive" olive oil users , those who used it for cooking, dressings, etc, had 41% lower risks of suffering a stroke compared to non-users. In the study there were 148 strokes, and that percentage remained consistent even in light of other risk factors including weight, diet, physical activity, etc.
Alzheimer's
Spanish researchers at the University of Navarra and Las Palmas de Gran Canaria have found that diets rich in olive oil can prevent mental illness. There appear to be similar mechanisms that trigger cardiovascular disease and depression related to diet. The increased nutrient absorption associated with olive oil consumption may contribute.
Contains Mono-unsaturated Fat
Typically, for prevention of chronic conditions like heart disease and diabetes, a low fat diet is prescribed. However, new research says more and more often that the TYPE of fat consumed is considerably more important than the ammount. Diets rich in monounsaturated fats, like the fats found in olive oil, actually protect us from these diseases, while presence of saturated, hydrogenated, animal or refined fats in the diet increases the risk. Monounsaturated fats are also much more stable than polyunsaturated fats, giving olive more stability, longer shelf life, and a higher resistance to oxidization that other fats are prone to.
Ideal for cooking
Unlike less stable unrefined nut and seed oils, high quality extra virgin olive oil (unrefined) doesn't oxidize nearly as quickly when you cook it. It also has a much higher smoke point. This is due to the stabilizing effect of the polyphenols (antioxidants), the typically low quantity of free fatty acids (this is only true when the oil is fresh, as it ages, it will build up free fatty acids that will reduce it's stability), and the fact that olive oil is comprised mostly of monounsaturated fats and with very little polyunsaturated fat.
This all makes olive oil one of the most stable and chemically ideal cooking oils, producing the least oxidization and free-radical build up during heating.
High quality olive oil also tastes incredible, accentuating the delicate bitterness of greens and flavour notes in vegetables, and perfectly complimenting the savoury nature of meats with it's astringent flavour.
The important thing to note, is that these benefits are ONLY found with HIGH QUALITY extra virgin oils. Not all oils are created equal, and it takes specific knowledge to be able to identify a high quality oil.