On the outskirts of the village of Bogomolje on the island of Hvar lies a noteworthy place surrounded by a beautiful, well-maintained Mediterranean garden with a pleasant ambiance. This place is Uljara Radojković – an oil mill where olives are processed into olive oil.
For a long time, we passed this place by, and to this day, I don't know why. But this year, the right time came for a visit with a tasting of excellent olive oils. And frankly, I must admit that I have never tasted a better olive oil. For years, we've been buying olive oil in the same village, just from someone else, and until today, it was the best olive oil under the sun for me. So now I have to admit that there's an even better one.
The tour and tasting last about an hour, and you'll learn interesting information about the entire olive processing process. What definitely surprised me was how clean the whole place is. Yet, they typically process about 900 tons of olives. Last year was a weaker year, so they processed 'only' 500 tons. Another interesting thing was that from the moment the olives start being processed, it only takes 1 hour before the olive oil begins to be bottled.
The tour then continues with a tasting of olive oils. They produce 3 types of oil here, plus several flavored ones – olive oil with lemon (great for fish), with orange (great for sweet dishes including ice cream), olive oil with tartufata (a paste of mushrooms and truffles), olive oil with seven types of herbal spices (rosemary, oregano, thyme...).
You'll get the explanation either in Croatian, English, or partly in Czech.
I'm adding a link to their website; it's better to arrange a tour in advance there: https://rajskivrtradojkovic.hr/index.html
And GPS for easier searching: 43.130138, 16.998759
There is a fee of 20€/person for the tour with tasting. If you can't resist and buy their olive oil, the fee is waived. The olive oil there is more expensive than we're used to, but we still bought some. I recommend bringing children too. Our children (5 and 7 years old) really liked all the different olive processing machines.
I don't gain anything from promoting the oil mill; I do it out of pure enthusiasm and I'm happy to share this great place with all of you, because in my opinion, it's worth seeing and the olive oil is at least worth tasting. But it will certainly please me and the staff if you mention that you came on Markéta's recommendation – we've known them for years, and maybe they'll even reveal some secrets, e.g., why good olive oil should be bitter 🙂
Have a beautiful summer! 🙂
