From the Caretos de Podence to Costco: a Trás-os-Montes olive oil conquers the United States

The most iconic mask of Carnival in Trás-os-Montes — an Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity — lends its name and face to a single-origin extra virgin olive oil that has landed, in a limited edition, on the shelves of one of the world’s largest retail chains.

An olive oil from Trás-os-Montes is traveling far beyond our borders. Inspired by the Caretos de Podence and made with 100% Portuguese olives from the region, it is now being sold in the United States through Costco, the American retail giant, as a limited-edition find in its stores. From the northern interior of Portugal to American shopping carts, the journey is as improbable as it is telling of the moment olive oil from Trás-os-Montes is living through.

It’s no coincidence. The Caretos de Podence, with their tin masks and colorful fringed suits, are one of the strongest images of Trás-os-Montes identity and were recognized by UNESCO in 2019 as an Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. Linking that tradition to a single-origin olive oil tells, in one bottle, what is most distinctly the region’s own: the landscape of century-old olive groves, the ancestral knowledge of those who tend them, and a flavor that cannot be explained — only tasted.

For Azeite a Norte, the message is clear. “Seeing an olive oil born from our olive groves, named after the image of the Caretos de Podence, reach the shelves of one of the world’s largest chains is proof that Trás-os-Montes has, in its olive oil, a story the world wants to hear,” says Miguel Mendes Araújo, of Azeite a Norte Associação. “Our role is to give the territory and its producers a stage, so that every bottle that travels carries with it the landscape, the tradition and the hands that produced it.”

Trás-os-Montes e Alto Douro is Portugal’s second-largest olive-growing region and earned more than a hundred international awards in 2025. This is the territory that the Azeite a Norte project showcases, through more than twenty routes and dozens of olive-tourism experiences inviting visitors to discover the olive groves, the mills and the people behind each olive oil. Because a bottle that reaches New York is, above all, an invitation to visit its origin.

Discover olive-tourism routes and experiences here. Get to know this story too: «An olive oil from the devil».