LEONI ENZO AGRICULTURAL COMPANY

Itrane olives, pickled vegetables, and artisanal jams from Sonnino, at the foot of the Lepini Mountains.

Where the olive tree has been at home for centuries and every forgotten fruit still finds a jar

Sonnino, a town that smells of olives

Perched on the hills separating the Pontine Plain from the mountains, Sonnino is one of those villages in southern Lazio where the community's identity is evident in the landscape: terraced olive groves, dry-stone walls, and Mediterranean scrub rising toward the Lepini Mountains. This area has always been famous for its production of high-quality extra virgin olive oil, table olives, pickled vegetables, and artisanal jams—a family tradition, even before a commercial one, passed down through homes and cellars. This is where the Leoni Enzo Farm operates, gathering that knowledge and transforming the fruits of their land with the same traditional methods.

Itrana, the olive with a double soul

The heart of the production is the Itrana, the olive variety that symbolizes this corner of Lazio. It is a rare cultivar for its dual purpose: it produces an oil with great personality and, at the same time, is among the most prized table olives in Italy—the same variety that produces the famous Gaeta olive. The company offers it in nearly every possible form: black and white, brined, smoked, preserved in oil, split and seasoned, dried, and transformed into an Itrane olive paste for spreading. Each process reveals a different side of the same fruit, from the sweetness of the ripe black olives to the lively savory flavor of the early-harvested white olives.

Nature in the Field: the protected areas brand

A significant part of the production bears the brand Nature in the Field, the collective recognition that identifies agricultural products from protected natural areas in Lazio and produced in compliance with regulations that safeguard the landscape, biodiversity, and tradition. Under this brand, the company offers baby artichokes and eggplants in oil, citrus jams and preserves, strawberry grapes and sour cherries, as well as Itrane table olives in all their varieties and olive paste. This guarantee goes beyond the individual product: it speaks of an agriculture that coexists with the protected environment rather than consuming it.

A herbarium of forgotten jams

Then there's a collection that alone is worth the trip. Alongside the most well-known jams—apricots, black cherries, figs, quinces, blackberries, strawberries, prickly pears, pears and walnuts, and vanilla persimmons—the company also sources fruits most people have never tasted: hawthorn, dogwood, strawberry tree, carob, blackthorn, winter medlar, and rose hip. These are fruits found growing on hedgerows and field edges, once picked while walking, but now almost completely obliterated by modern agriculture. Transforming them into jam means preserving their flavor and memory: opening one of these jars is like leafing through a herbarium of the Lazio countryside.

Pickles, the pantry of the past

Artichokes and eggplants preserved in oil are born from the same logic as the peasant pantry: preserving the abundance of a season to enjoy all year round. Vegetables are selected at the perfect point of ripeness, hand-picked and drizzled with oil according to home recipes, without shortcuts. These are the kind of jars that were always on the shelf in every family in the southern Pontine area—ready for an impromptu appetizer, a sandwich, or a quick dinner with a festive feel.

The flavour of a territory, in a jar

Olives, pickles, and jams: three different ways to tell the story of the same place, with the same artisanal care and respect for nature's rhythms. Leoni Enzo Farm preserves a tradition that is a collective heritage in Sonnino, and does so without turning it into folklore—simply by continuing to do things well, as they have always been done. On Al Passo Food, you can discover all the products of Enzo LeoniSouthern Lazio, one jar at a time.

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