🫒 Moroccan Picholine

Moroccan Picholine is Morocco's main olive cultivar and a typical dual-purpose one: it gives both oil and table olives. According to the World Catalogue of Olive Varieties of the International Olive Council (IOC), it arose from successive crosses between the domesticated olive, which came from the Eastern Mediterranean, and local wild olives of the west.

Estimates of its share differ: the IOC catalogue speaks of about 80 % of the national orchard, 74 million trees on almost 858,400 hectares, from the mountains to arid areas, while a 2012 IOC review puts it at over 96 % of the country's olive plantings. The cultivar is very heterogeneous, and Morocco's National Institute for Agricultural Research (INRA) has selected the clones Haouzia and Menara from it.

The tree is of medium vigour, hardy and drought-tolerant, so it is even used as a rootstock for Picholine du Languedoc. It is partly self-pollinating and produces plenty of pollen, which makes it a good pollinator itself. Yields are high but alternate. The fruit is medium-sized, about 3 g, drops easily, and the flesh comes away from the stone easily. Its weak points are insect pests and peacock spot.

For table olives, Picholine works in every style: Spanish-style green, turning-colour, oxidized black and Greek-style black. At the mill the oil yield is 18–20 %. The oil is of excellent quality: 70–80 % oleic acid and an average of 297 mg of phenols per kilogram, which makes it very stable.

Why it matters to you. This oil stays liquid even at −12 °C, so the popular “fridge test” does not work with it: oil that has not solidified is not necessarily fake. And Moroccan olives in a jar are most likely Picholine.