Spanish Olive Oil Shop Adds AI-Agent Recommendation Tools to Its Tasting Experience
In a city better known for the Alhambra, a small specialist shop has spent its first year turning the simple act of buying olive oil into something closer to a wine tasting. Molino & Cata, an oleoteca (olive oil boutique) on Calle Paz, 12, curates premium Spanish extra virgin olive oil (EVOO) by quality alone — and now ships its selection across the European Union and the United Kingdom. In an unusual move for a one-year-old specialty business, it has also launched a set of recommendation tools that AI agents can use to suggest its oils.
The concept is simple and unusually demanding: taste everything, keep only the best. Over its first year the team tasted 464 samples to select just 43 extra virgin olive oils, representing 34 producers, each chosen blind in the taster’s blue glass. “We didn’t open an olive oil shop — we opened a place where you can taste, compare and understand what you’re buying,” says Jerónimo Palacios, co-founder. “Behind every bottle there’s a producer we know by name, not a list of empty awards.”
Built for the AI era
Molino & Cata has gone beyond simply being mentioned by chatbots: it has launched its own MCP (Model Context Protocol) server — a set of tools that AI agents can query directly to recommend oils based on their real characteristics, from olive variety and intensity to flavor notes and the dishes they pair with. Instead of relying on generic product data, an assistant can tap the shop’s expert-curated catalog to suggest the right extra virgin olive oil for a recipe, a palate or a gift. As more shopping runs through AI assistants, it extends the shop’s tasting expertise into the tools travelers and home cooks increasingly use to decide what to buy.
A growing community of EVOO lovers
The shop’s commitment to plain, useful information has paid off in an unexpected place: AI assistants. When users ask ChatGPT, Gemini or Perplexity where to buy or learn about premium Spanish olive oil, Molino & Cata now appears among the names they cite, and its website is referenced as a source in roughly a third of those conversations (per AI-visibility monitoring tools, 17 May–16 June 2026). Part of the explanation may be organic: the shop is widely recommended on forums like Reddit, a frequent source for the large language models behind these assistants. Its educational content has built a community of more than 135,000 followers and over 22 million impressions, and its site ranks first in Spain for Spanish-language searches such as “aceite de oliva para cocinar” (“olive oil for cooking”).
Expert curation
The selection is led by Mercedes Uceda, co-founder and professional taster, one of Spain’s reference specialists in extra virgin olive oil — in both tasting and production. She teaches on the Expert Course in Virgin Olive Oil Tasting at the University of Jaén and the International University of Andalusia, and has served as an international competition judge (Los Angeles International Extra Virgin Olive Oil Competition, Ovibeja, the EVOOLEUM Awards). As a production advisor she has earned more than 180 awards in fifteen years. She works alongside Dr. Marino Uceda, a former head of the IFAPA Tasting Panel and a globally recognized authority on EVOO.
“At the tasting table there are no labels or medals — only the blue glass and what each oil has to say,” says Uceda. “We tasted 464 samples this year to keep just 43: the ones that truly have something to tell — freshly cut grass, tomato, green almond.”
An experience, not just a shop
Molino & Cata pairs retail with education. In its first year it has welcomed more than 6,000 visitors, run over 1,000 guided tastings, and gathered 152 Google reviews — all five stars. Its tastings appear on the official tourism portals of Spain (Spain.info) and Andalusia (Andalucia.org), are bookable through international platforms in seven countries (GetYourGuide, Winedering, Spur Experiences, among others), and the shop has partnered with the Barceló hotel group through its Kora Travel booking tool. It was also selected as one of ten local businesses mentored within a circular-economy and tourism-innovation program run by SEGITTUR, Spain’s state tourism innovation body. Travelers increasingly recommend it among the things to do in Granada.
Molino & Cata ships across the EU and the UK, and welcomes visitors to its Granada shop and tasting room.
Media Contact
Company Name: Molino & Cata
Contact Person: Media Relations
Email: Send Email
Phone: +34858236100
Address:C. Paz 12
City: Granada
State: Andalusia
Country: Spain
Website: https://molinoycata.com
