Time Out Lisboa

June — 2011

José Gourmet: hold on to this name

Olive oil, preserves and cool jams.
This is what José Gourmet is all about.

Adriano Ribeiro is a commercial airline pilot, and Adriano Ribeiro is the owner of the brand of gourmet products. And no, this brief presentation is not a cheap imitation of those ads from the nineties which showed the comparison between two detergents. Adriano Ribeiro is one and the same person. A pilot determined to have a stake in national products, for which he created a design line, something rare in this area, and he chose a curious name – José Gourmet. Even if no José plays a role in the story!

“The name was supposed to be ‘Tuga’, but I changed my mind “, he says. Even the strange explanation of the name chosen fits perfectly. The brand name is the fusion between a tribute to José Mourinho, an upgrade of “-, and the chance someone would buy a product because they have the same name. Thus was born, in 2008, the brand that specialised in the olive oil market, preserves and jams. Adriano wasn’t living in Portugal at the time and he thought “Portuguese products had little relevance”, says Pedro, his son who also runs the business. He contacted a friend who produced ‘Queijos de Azeitão’ and asked him to make a triangular cheese. “An innovative idea, which we sold in cardboard boxes soon became our brand image.” Adriano did the same with the different varieties of cheese from Serra, Serpa and also biological cheese. But the product’s short shelf life and the fact that they could not pursue the trend of triangle in boxes forced the company to look for alternatives.

They then entered the olive oil market, finding a good producer in Alentejo and, as they believe that “we can also eat with our eyes”, they travelled to Italy to look for a factory that produced stackable bottles that “fitted together into one another.”, Pedro explains. In the same way, aged white wine vinegar, rosemary olive oil, cherry liqueur and “aguardente” (brandy) from Lourinhã were produced.

It was only later, with the support of two men named ”Luís”: chef Luís Baena and a designer called Luís Mendonça), that they launched the line of cool preserves, which everyone is talking about now. Adriano Ribeiro goes as far as to say: “we made preserves trendy.” We wouldn’t go that far, but the truth is (and we have said it before), nowadays preserves are seen in a different light.

“This is a very nourishing food product, without added preservatives and with a pure pasteurization process”, they claim. José Gourmet’s tins are made in a factory in Matosinhos (La Gondola), with the exception of tuna, which comes from the Azores. “We strive to offer the best, even if the profit margins are still small. We pursue the fair trade policy.”

The product variety includes: sardines in extra virgin olive oil, octopus in olive oil and garlic, trout fillets in pickle sauce, tuna ventresca or sardine roes in olive oil. They are sold in several gourmet shops in town, with prices set by the shopkeepers. “But the average price is 2,50€. Each box includes two recipes (one for children and the other one for adults), created by Luís Baena, “He is an experimenter and is in the process of creating new preserves.”

Recently, some new jams were created: lemon, pumpkin with walnut, carrot-orange, and red pepper. We keep betting on design, cardboard packages with texts in different languages.” And those, if you look closely, are not literal translations. Even there, Adriano Ribeiro likes to innovate.