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Olive Pressing at S. Romolo
The stone rollers at S. Romolo's are huge. Today's solid granite grindstones can weigh 3-4000 pounds and often are, as at the co-op we visited, computer controlled. (The Olive Press, 2005) According to information on The Olive
"The next step is malaxation (mixing). The paste moves to the mixing compartment where it is gently churned with a large revolving stainless steel screw for 20-30 minutes. This causes the oil contained in the paste to bead up into large globules which increases the

yield of high quality oil in the extraction stage that follows. "(The Olive Press, 2005)

In the picture above you see the paste sliding from the grinding hopper into a horizontal trough with spiral mixing blades. Though you can't see the blades in the photo of S. Romolo's trough, you can in the photo to the right. (The Olive Oil Source, 2005)

This whole process is highly technical and controlled by the two operators at the co-op through a control panel. Both technicians are constantly busy at S. Romolo, checking readouts, status of controls and even scraping the mixing trough.
Source (2005) web site, some of the advantages of using stone rollers are that they "can be adapted to olive and pit size to optimize paste characteristics, the process doesn't cut the skin, releasing less chlorophyll, formation of larger size drops of oil, minimizing mixing times, paste isn’t heated, and produces fewer phenols so less bitter oil."
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