Zester Daily (USA, July 22th 2010) Slow-Made Olive Oil  Talk about slow food. Sometimes it sneaks up on you and doesn't let go. That's what happened to Franco Lombardi, the retired civil engineer who'd worked building steel bridges in many of the world's hot spots -- "anywhere there was a war" -- and moved 28 times. He bought Pornanino, a rundown farm property in Chianti in the Tuscan hills, one of Italy's most sought-after and beautiful areas. There, employing the slow, patient method that Italians have used for centuries, they produce top-quality extra virgin olive oil from their own olive groves.

The Gazette (USA, February 28th 2007) Best olive oils are often hard to get, but Springs foodies soon have a chance. Last summer, the Colorado Springs cooking teacher took a culinary trip to Tuscany, met olive oil producer Lombardi, tasted the oil pressed from the olives grown on his land and began passionately spreading the word about his product.

The Ashai Shimbun (Tokyo, January 1st 2006)Qui Italia Book

Wisconsin Public Radio (USA, February 14th 2005) Franco Lombardi interviewed by Jean Feraca

Rockford Register Star (USA, February 14th 2005) In a valley believed to produce the best olive oil in the world about five miles south of Radda in Chianti, lives the Lombardi family on their farm Pornanino, where they host year round tourists in two beautiful restored stone barns. Franco Lombardi insists the finest extra virgin olive oils are those that have had the least contact with man or machine.

AZ TV (USA, February 14th 2005) Franco Lombardi on AZ TV in Phoenix

Washingtonpost.com (USA, January 26th 2005) Putting Olive Oils To the Taste Test  For our olive oil tasting, we selected nine bottles in different price ranges, deliberately avoiding house brands. Some are easily available, while others can be purchased at gourmet food stores, some farmers markets or on the Internet.

Post-Gazette.com (USA, May 7th 2000) I've been to my share of olive oil tastings, but none was more persuasive than a recent one at the Hyeholde Restaurant in Moon. The olive oil that Franco Lombardi and his family make on their farm in Tuscany may not be the only pure oil on the market, but it seems certain, from the care taken, that none could be more pure.

New Crops (Australia, July 12th 1999) [From the lead article in the Weekend Australian Review of May 22-23, 1999, written by Clare Pedrick; Telephone: 02 9288 2312; used with permission] Franco Lombardi represents a new breed of olive oil producer in Italy. He is anxious to protect the image of the product in the face of mounting doubts about the quality of some of it. He has an orchard of 4000 olive trees, all grown from saplings.

Reformatorisch Dagblad (The Netherlands, January 8th 1999) Wat er schuilgaat in Toscane - Door P.J. Vergunst De zon heeft het hoofd van Franco Lombardi meer dan gemiddeld gebruind. Aan een marmeren tafel,in de schaduw van het huis, vertelt de zestiger ondersteund door langzame gebaren over Toscane, zijn druiven en olijven zijn cypressen en kastelen, zijn stil- le stadjes en gezonde keuken.

The Sunday Times (England, September 20th 1998) In Tuscany for the olive harvest, JONATHAN FUTRELL finds himself led down a culinary trail, tracing the finest virgin oil in its progress from branch to table The only picking I like to do on holiday is sand, from between my toes, on a beach. In fact, whenever I come across handwritten signs, always on scrappy bits of cardboard, by the roadside, proclaiming "pick-your-own", I instinctively want to turn off and shake some sense into the scores of unpaid pickers bent double in the field. If God had intended us to spend our leisure time on our hands and knees, he would not have invented farmers.

Waitrose Food Illustrated (USA, September 8th 1998) Franco Lombardi is obsessed with purity. For him, the finest extra virgin olive oils are those that have had the least contact with man or machine. "We don't use tractors to harvest the olives because we might break some of the branches," says Franco. After talking with Franco, you get the impression that in his ideal world he would like to be able to turn olives into olive oil by magic, without them ever coming into contact with a human.