About us

Philosophy

Core to our philosophy is to always work with the utmost respect for the surrounding landscape and nature. We combine knowledge and tradition handed down over the centuries with the latest findings and methods to create an exceptional olive oil experience. In this spirit, we strive to sustainably produce one of the world's best organic olive oils.

katja & Rainer

We

That's us, Katja and Rainer, both successful entrepreneurs in Munich, and our children Anastasia, Leandra and Nikolas. As a Greek-German family, we have been spending as much time as possible in Greece, which is our second home, for many years.

A few years ago, we bought Villa Asterias with its more than 3 hectares of olive groves from a family of traditional olive growers. Friends told us that the Koroneiki olives on our property were the best oil olives in Greece, perhaps even in the world, and that we definitely had to produce oil. So we developed our Menelaos oil - a little unsure at first, but with increasing enthusiasm as we went along.

1200 Trees

Our Location

Our olive trees grow on a seaside plot opposite the picturesque Saronic island of Hydra, in the far east of the Peloponnese. Apart from the small coastal villages nearby, our groves are far away from major roads and towns that could negatively impact water and air quality. The countryside here is quiet and life follows the ancient rhythm of cultivation and harvest.

The Argolis region is one of the most productive olive-growing areas in Greece, with a high proportion of extra virgin olive oil, mostly obtained from single-variety Koroneiki olives or in a blend of Koroneiki and Manaki. For this reason, the region enjoys a wealth of experience in the production of olive oil of the highest quality, as well as an infrastructure that has grown over generations. Olive oils of this class, like good wines, have a strict certification of origin called P.D.O.: Protected Designation of Origin. Menelaos and Agamemnon oil carry the P.D.O. Kranidi, Argolis.

Earth's finest Olive Variety

The Koroneiki

The Koroneiki is robust, tolerates heat, but also frost down to -7° C. It is not suitable for the artificial irrigation methods of large industrial plantations, as the trees do not like standing in water. It also needs to be pruned hard every year, which we always do with the utmost care and patience. The Koroneiki is an olive that needs a lot of manual labour to fully develop its best characteristics. And because we treat our trees and olives as well as we do, we are rewarded with one of the finest olive oils in the world: our Menelaos oil with its exquisite fragrance and complex, peppery and slightly bitter, strong flavour with notes of freshly cut grass and herbs.