People We Meet: Emanuele Bariani ends namesake olive oil stall

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For 28 years, Emanuele Bariani has been the face of Bariani Olive Oil in San Francisco. Most Saturdays he can be found at Alemany Farmers Market, sitting behind an array of extra virgin olive oils, truffle oil, balsamic vinegar and olive oil soap. If you’ve called the number on the company’s website, you’ve probably talked to him or heard his voice on the outgoing message. 

At the end of this month, Bariani is retiring from the family business and shutting down the Alemany stand.

For years, Emanuele has been an unassuming figure in a black baseball cap, telling Alemany shoppers how his family produces cold-extracted, unfiltered, extra virgin olive oil from the Mission and Manzanilla olives they grow on 262 acres in Zamora, Calif. “Even now, when some people taste the really grassy flavors, they think it’s rancid,” he says. “This is estate-grown olive oil. We have to educate the public.” 

Like a vintner, each year Emanuele’s brother Sebastian adjusts the oil blend. “The Mission yields buttery and fruity with a hint of grassiness,” Emanuele says. “Manzanilla has a more pronounced grassy flavor, more polyphenols. My younger brother is very good at finding that center point of balance.” 

The golden 2024 extra virgin olive tastes like an olive minus the salt and bitterness but with a bit of pepper on the finish. The green 2024 early harvest extra virgin, reminiscent of the small, spicy, green shock from biting a fresh grass shoot, has a lingering heat and is so delicious that you might have to refrain from tearing open the little paper sample cup and rubbing it on your tongue.   

For those who aren’t sold on the taste, he’ll talk about the health benefits of consuming artisanal olive oil, dropping “oleocanthal” and “anti-inflammatory” like the physician he meant to become. 

Even after Emanuele leaves Alemany, customers can still find the products at area stores, including Rainbow Grocery, or order them online. At 50, he seems too young to retire, but in this, too, he is following in his father’s footsteps. 

When Angelo and Santa Bariani emigrated with their four sons from Lombardy, Italy to Sacramento in December 1989, they had a mission. 

“It was for us to study in American universities,” says Emanuele. “That was our main goal.” 

Goal achieved. Luigi, the oldest, graduated from Sacramento State with degrees in international business and marketing. Enrico, the second, got a landscape architecture degree from UC Davis. Emanuele earned a degree in psychology with an emphasis in biology from UC Davis.  Sebastian has a degree in architecture from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. 

But while his sons were busy studying, Angelo embarked on a hobby that would upend the grand academic scheme he had set in motion. At 52, Angelo was a young retiree with time on his hands. The house he’d bought in Sacramento had some old, neglected olive trees. He knew how to weld and had trained as an engineer so he rigged his own olive press and harvested enough fruit to bottle oil for the family, then enough to give away to friends, then so much that he brought it to a Sacramento farmers market. Darrell Corti of Corti Brothers tasted it there and told them it was good enough to sell. 

“A lot of it was self-taught until it came to the point of making it a business and going commercial,” Emanuele said. “So we got an education in Italy about olive cultivation and olive tasting and olive oil production.” Angelo traded his homemade press for a customized olive press he imported from Italy. 

In 1997 when Martha Stewart, who was impressed by how the Barianis applied Italian production practices to California olives, featured their business on her television show, orders surged.   

All of the Bariani sons joined their parents in the business, through every stage from harvesting by hand to getting bottles into customers’ kitchens.  

“We have control over the picking, crushing, pressing and bottling,” Emanuele says. “We deliver it ourselves. We don’t rely on outside contractors.” 

While it is not unusual for young people to take up careers that have nothing do with their college majors, there is something remarkable about a father who, having paid for those degrees, leads his children away from all that and into uncharted territory. 

“It was just a leap of faith,” Emanuele says. “We said, ‘why not?’ I was supposed to go to medical school.” He had just finished his undergrad degree and was working for a research group at UC Davis when he got involved part-time. “All of our life paths would have been very different. We have no regrets! We made the best choice.” 

While Luigi now lives in Germany, he comes home to help at harvest time. Enrico manages the orchards. Sebastian is in charge of shipping and production. And Emanuele, the CEO, handled retail and trade and food shows here and abroad. 

He says Sebastian will take over the parts of his work that will remain when he retires. 

“My brothers are not getting any younger,” he says. “To find labor has become a real challenge. They decided to step down a little and focus more on direct-to-consumer and smaller retail stores. The farm will become more manageable. I’m not needed anymore.”

When he says that, he doesn’t sound sad at all. The company doesn’t need him to develop new markets and they are not looking to expand production. Although he is leaving San Francisco, he knows he will come back to visit his friends at Alemany.  

“I have my community with other farmers. I’m always looking forward to seeing my pals.” 

He appreciates the Alemany shoppers, too. “They all come here for a purpose. To get freshness and nourishment. They get it at the table, but they get it spiritually, too.” He continued, “I have quite a few customers who stop and chat 20-30 minutes. I can feel they don’t have that.” 

While he is winding down his work, Emanuele is also selling the San Francisco house he’s lived in for 24 years. “It’s hard to live here. The cost of living has gone up a lot. I think I did my time here in San Francisco. I have no regrets. A lot of my really close friends have left already. I don’t have much to anchor me here anymore.”

He says the realtor has been pushing to get him and his Yorkies, Lord Dudley and Don Travieso, out of the way so the stagers can ready the property for showing. The next few weeks, he and his dogs will house sit for a friend. 

Away from Alemany, Emanuele spends a lot of time on his feet. “San Francisco is a very walkable city. I don’t think people do it enough. I walk at least five miles a day, sometimes 12-13 miles. Ocean Beach, the Presidio, the Marina. People say it’s a 7×7 city but they forget all the turns.” 

Last fall he spent 32 days trekking the 600-mile Camino de Santiago in Spain. “I felt at home in any of the small villages that I crossed,” he says.              

He looks forward to seeing more of the world. “I always wanted to do these much longer walks, but I had an obligation to the farm and my family and the business and my customers. This is helping me to realize the things on my bucket list.” 

Early next summer, he is planning a hike from Lausanne, Switzerland across the Alps and the Apennines to Rome. He figures it will take him and Dudley and Travieso about 54 days. He’s also looking at Japan’s Kumano Kodo Nakahechi route, a trail past 99 religious sites.    

By the time he finishes these trips, he’ll be just about the age, 52, his father was when he retired and launched the adventure that has shaped Emanuele’s life. He sounds happy when asked what’s next for him. 

“I think that’s something that I will discover when I start walking.”