Olive Oil Expert, Food Historian and Consultant

Olive oil is the ever present guide in all of my wanderings.

Olive oil is the thread that ties together all of my searches, researches and inspirations. As an olive oil taster I seek out its sensory qualities. As an historian of olive oil culture I have published either with Lourdes March or on my own the results of my investigations in the form of books and articles. As a stylist I have produced considerable graphic material. As an artist, oil is the basis of all my performances, actions and reactions.

Alicia Rios

Alicia Rios qualified as an expert in Industrial Application of Sensory Evaluation in SIK, The Swedish Food Institute, Stratford-upon-Avon, U.K and the TRAGON Corporation, USA course led by Drs H. Stone and J. Sidel of the TRAGON Corp and B. Lundren, MSc of SIK. She also trained to be an Olive Oil Analytical Panel Head, at the Fats Institute of the Scientific Research Council (CSIC) Seville.

She has travelled abroad extensively for the International Olive Oil Council running presentations and demonstrations on the history and uses of olive oil. Together with Lourdes March she wrote The Book of Oil and Olives (Alianza, 1989). She has also written papers and articles on many other aspects of Spanish food culture such as cocido, tapas, gazpacho and pimentón and collaborated with Lourdes March on The Heritage of Spanish Cooking (Weldon Russell, 1992).

Alicia conducts workshops on olive oil tasting, cooking with olive oil and olive oil culture. She also works as a consultant and has been an advisor for the BBC and the Olive Oil Museum in Baena, Spain. In the Unión Española de Catadores (Spanish Union of Tasters), Madrid, she is in charge of activities related to olive oil. In 2007 she was named an honorary member of El Dornillo, the Gastronomic Society of the Sierra Sur in Jaén, and in 2008 she was appointed Trustee of the Oxford Symposium on Food and Cookery, an event she has been attending regularly for the past 25 years.