Cuglieri, Oil Museum “dr. Giorgio Zampa”

It is located at the farm owned by the owner Dr. Giorgio Zampa, 15 km from the sea, built in 1937 on a previous animal-powered oil mill, which has always belonged to the family. Recently renovated, it is the only one left of the many that were once present in Cuglieri (eighteen still in the 70s of the twentieth century), a town in Montiferru traditionally linked to olive cultivation and oil production. The main theme is oil production tools. It is divided into two levels: a floor where the olives were collected (the floor is intended to house traditional peasant objects) and the ground floor where the equipment for pressing olives is still present (molazza with two granite mills, operated first by animal traction then electrically, powered by a wooden hopper that conveyed the olives from the floor), the pressing of the oily paste (two hydraulic tower presses consisting of a vertical hole and horizontal steel fissures and discs), the obtaining the oil must, the separation of the oil from the vegetation water, the collection of the oil (in the jars, some of Spanish origin, glazed internally and closed with a wooden stopper), the collection of settling water for the recovery of limited quantities of oil that emerged during rest (tanks). There is also a circular “furredda” with a cauldron for the hot water needed to clean machinery, fissures and other objects from oil (the fuel consisted of pomace or spent pasta). On the ground floor are still on display: an ancient basalt oil press (related to the primitive oil mill), the tools for processing olive groves, harvesting olives, transporting olives from the countryside (basto e sack); measures for the sale of oil at retail; a balance to weigh the oil, olive milling bills from the 1940s (which the owner of the oil mill handed over to the Ministry to obtain integration), sales and accounting invoices from the 1920s and 1930s, two “laccus” for the pressing of grapes and the wort collection, copper boilers for making soap (oil+water+caustic soda) and for cooking. Originally, the millstones were driven by the pulling force of the horse or mule. They are currently electrically operated.

Why it's important to visit it
It's important because it represents an art handed down over time by the ancestors of the owner Dr. Giorgio Zampa, merging experience in the company with passion. Extra virgin olive oil is obtained by simply cold pressing olives of the “Bosana” variety, which finds in Montiferru the ideal environment to bring out all the aromas and flavors of the Sardinian land.