Palm Beach-based Olive Oil of the World has been attending the Marco Island Farmers’ Market for 18 years. According to owner Chef Rasheed Shihada, his mother was the inspiration for his business.
“She’s been collecting olive oil since the 1980s, curating it as a hobby,” he said. “She speaks Arabic, Italian, French, Spanish, and English and she took me all over the world collecting olive oil.”
Olive Oil of the World sells what Chef Rasheed calls farm-to-bottle olive oil. “We’re what’s called estate olive oil,” he said. “One family, one farm, one farmer per bottle. Each one is picked by hand, pressed the same day, and bottled at the estate.”
The company is something of an olive oil juggernaut, the only independently owned, non-franchised olive oil store in the country, Chef Rasheed said, and operateswith a new 2,000 square foot store in Palm Beach, a wine shop, and a cooking school.
Asked what his best-selling product is, he said, “Trampolini Black Olive. The olives were planted in the 13th century for this farm, and it tastes like olive oil and butter had a baby.”
With that irresistible description, I bought a bottle to eat with some French bread I made, and it’s incredible.
Brad Shaw retired in 2015 after 25 years in corporate communications. He and his wife Mary are full-time Marco residents and spend their time volunteering, boating, cooking, reading and hanging out with friends and family.
Dining and Cooking