Hi pistachio lovers,

Today we would like to bring to you part 2 of the pistachio reviews from the beautiful country of Oman.  The first pistachios we tried there were pretty amazing and you can read about them here. After a few days in Muscat, we rented a car to to really explore the Omani wilderness, camp in beautiful deserts and mountains, and bring you fantastic new reviews of pistachios wherever we go !

Before we get into the review here are some picture of the amazing region of Jabal El Akhdar where we tested and reviewed today’s pistachios.

Presentation and packaging

A plastic bag with a pretty nice design with the brand AL Rifai prominently displayed in both arabic and english. A heading that says “Natural Selections” and a round label that says Pistachio Kernels in english and green pistachios in arabic.

The back of the bag contains some more interesting information. Apparently made in the UAE and processed for Al Homaizi food industries in Kuwait, these pistachios are nitrogen flushed whatever that means.

We can also see a recycling logo and some customer service information for Al Rifai.

The pistachios themselves are unshelled with a mediumish size and have a nice green color.

Smell

A nice flowery smell emanates as we open this bag of unshelled pistachios.

Taste

The first surprise is that they are unsalted. Well nowhere on the bag does it say they are salted so it shouldn’t be a surprise. They are also not very crunchy and not very flavorful. These are not really snacking pistachios.. as we don’t think they are roasted. They would really good for cooking and making cakes and such..  We tried them with Omani halwa ( a really extremely delicious traditional sweet ) and the combination was magical !

Conclusions

Not a snacking pistachio but can go extremely well with sweets. We give these pistachios 2.7/5 as snacking pistachios and 4 for a baking or cooking sue.