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What is caviar? Most people would
have probably heard about caviar, but may have never
actually tasted any. It’s a delicacy of fish eggs, or
roe, from sturgeon primarily found in the icy waters of
the Caspian and Black seas, which separate Russia from
the Middle East. Ninety percent of the true caviar
produced in the world comes from the Caspian Sea where
the environment is most conducive for producing the
finest sturgeon in the world. Caviar, looks like small
grainy particles – black, grey, yellow and brown – but a
few varieties of caviar may be as large as peas.
Some believe that the ancient Greeks were eating
sturgeon centuries before the Persians and the Turks
discovered it. The fish’s image also appears on the
Egyptian temple carvings in Luxor, and on ancient coins
found in Tunisia suggesting the sturgeon’s range once
extended along the entire coast of North Africa. The
early Greek travelers have described two types of
sturgeon that was being sold in the markets of
Alexandria. During Roman times, fresh sturgeon meat was
a rare and expensive delicacy served as a special dish
during feasts and banquets. It is known through Pliny
that the Romans celebrated the defeat of Carthage by
serving sturgeon at a banquet with elaborate fanfare.
Cicero, writing in the first century before Christ
describes it as “a fish that fit for only a few choice
palates”. The absence of any clear references to caviar
in the ancient texts suggests that many knew about the
fish sturgeon, while caviar remained unknown in the
early years of recorded history.
The name ‘caviar’ given to the eggs of sturgeon, along
with the delicacy it denotes, reached Europe via Turkey
from Iran and came into the English language from the
Turkish word ‘Khavyar’ sometime late in the sixteenth
century. The leading linguists of the twentieth century
believe the word to be of Iranian origin, and connected
with the Persian word “Chav-jar,” which means a “cake of
power.’ It is believed that the ancient Azerbaijanis and
the Persians were the first people to taste roes, and
looked at it as a medicine that cured many diseases.
The first unambiguous references to caviar appeared
during the medieval times in the thirteenth century in
Russia. The Mongols under Batu Khan – the grandson of
the formidable Genghis Khan – had captured Moscow from
the Muscovite princes in the year 1240. A few months
later, Batu Khan left his headquarters along the Volga
with his wife Yildiz to pay a visit to his new subjects
at a nearby village. The Mongol hordes under Batu Khan
had conquered all of Central Russia, and had laid waste
to Kiev, before burning Moscow to the ground. Now, the
Asian warlord wanted to show the Russians of the
conquered lands that he could also be a civilized ruler.
The Russians prepared for him on his arrival an
elaborate feast that had a whole roasted sturgeon among
its many courses. As a final show of their respect, the
villagers presented at the conclusion of the meal the
final dish of hot apple preserves topped with a dollop
of salted sturgeon eggs. It is said that Yildiz was so
sickened by the smell of warm caviar that she was forced
to retire to her room without tasting the dish. However,
Batu Khan - the battle-hardened veteran – toughened by
years of military rations, stayed on the course. He must
have liked the dish enough to preserve an account of the
dish in his memoirs.
The Mongols of the Golden Horde under Batu Khan now
controlled the main water routes to the Black and
Caspian seas, which enabled them to control the regions’
rich fisheries and trade routes. When Batu Khan
established his capital, he chose a site just north of
Astrakhan, on an important crossroad of the Great Silk
Road. The strategic position enabled the Mongols to
profit from the caravan trade between China, Europe, and
the Middle East. The Mongol traders convinced the
European merchants to carry with them the occasional
barrel of caviar from the sturgeon fishery from the Sea
of Azov. The Arabs spread caviar to other countries when
they settled in Sicily, and from there, it was taken to
Provence in Mediterranean France.
Today, most caviar is preserved in a salt solution, and
sells at $6 to $16 an ounce. Fresh caviar made up of
high-grade eggs is much scarcer and sells for $300 an
ounce! Why is caviar so expensive? It is so because
there are only three countries in the world that produce
it: Russia, Iran and Rumania. Imitation caviar is
produced in few other countries from the eggs of cod,
salmon and other fish, but connoisseurs say it is far
inferior to the real thing!
Another reason for the high price of caviar is the
difficulties in obtaining it, for the sturgeon are in no
hurry to reproduce. They take as long as the humans to
reach the age of sexual maturity. Each fish carries a
millions of eggs in its belly, and the odds are that
only a single hatchling among them survives into
adulthood. This lone offspring will then risk its life
to reproduce, by traveling upriver along the same course
taken by its parents, swimming leisurely through narrow
channels where fishermen looking for it can easily snare
it from water. The highest concentration of sturgeon in
the world is found in the northern portions of the
Caspian where the River Volga spills into the sea.
Sturgeons are the most valuable fish of the world.
Twenty-five species and sub-species of sturgeons have
been identified so far, of which only three species
produce caviar, all living in the Caspian Sea. The
specifications of these valuable Fishes are as follows:
BELUGA (HUSO HUSO)
Beluga usually weighs between 75-100 Kilograms and is 2
meters long. It produces about 20 Kilograms of Beluga
Caviar and has a life expectancy of about 100 years.
Beluga Caviar has a dark to light gray color, and is
large with a thin shell.
ASETRA (ACIPENSER SP.)
Asetra on the average, weighs 20 Kilograms, is 1.5
meters long, produces 4-7 Kilograms of Asetra Caviar,
and can live up to 50 years. The Asetra Caviar comes in
dark to light gray and golden colors and has a delicious
taste.
SEVRUGA (ACIPENSER STELLATUS)
Sevruga has an average weight of 10 Kilograms, and is
1-1.40
meters long, produces about 3 Kilograms of Sevruga
Caviar, and can live up to 30 years. Sevruga Caviar is
dark gray, has small grains and a delicious taste.
The
sturgeon’s voracious appetite makes it a big fish that
never stops growing in size. The largest beluga - which
may live for more than a hundred years – that has been
caught weighed more than 4750 pounds and stretched
twenty-eight feet! A female beluga caught in 1766 in the
Ural River weighed 2520 pounds and yielded an impressive
nine hundred pounds of roe, which would have made her
worth half a million dollars at today’s prices. A
Pacific white sturgeon caught in the Fraser River near
Vancouver weighed about 1600 pounds and measured 18 feet
from head to tail.
Sturgeon eggs vary in color and are usually a refection
of its diet. For catching a sturgeon, precise timing is
essential. The sturgeons normally deposit their eggs on
the bottom of the freshwater riverbeds. Fishermen have
to catch the fish just before they are getting ready to
lay their eggs, and they believe that the best caviar
comes from fish caught four days before spawning. If
they catch a sturgeon, too early in its migration they
keep it alive until the eggs are ripe and deliver the
delicious pop when eaten for the eggs of the sturgeon
becomes lighter, tauter and flavorful as it gets close
to spawning.
They
place the fish in floating cages in the water and with
no source of food available; the hungry fish are forced
to feed the food stored in their roe. Once the food is
used up, the roe is fit to eat. The fish are killed and
their roe is taken out. The eggs are then strained,
washed, place in a brine or salt solution and packed in
tins or jars for shipping it to different parts of the
world. Good caviar should smell like fresh salt water
and it should have an unbroken glistening thin outer
membrane with distinct individual roe. The inner yolk or
oil should have a viscosity like honey and the eggs
should rotate slowly in a container at room temperature.
The most expensive eggs, which are highly prized, are
those, which have a golden yellow color.
The word caviar first entered the English language, when
it appeared among the imports of Europe from the Middle
East in the early part of the fifteenth century and may
have been known even before that time. For Shakespeare,
it served as a metaphor for elitist taste: “The play, I
remember, pleased not the million; ‘twas caviar to the
general.” (Hamlet, II, 2, 465). Bartolomeo Scappi, the
personal cook to Pope Pius V mentions it in his manual
of gastronomy, first published in Venice in 1570. He
writes, “Caviar is made from sturgeon’s eggs and is
brought from Alexandria and from places in the Black Sea
by merchants who pack it in kegs. It is served on hot
toasted slices of bread with an eggplant sauce and
capsicum.”
The best method of serving is largely a matter of
personal taste however, etiquette usually dictates that
caviar of the highest grades should not be garnished at
all and should be enjoyed for its own special and unique
flavor. Expert tasters tend to keep it simple by
enjoying it in its natural state. The idea of being able
to enjoy caviar for its own natural flavor has led to
traditional serving with neutral tasting bases (with no
salt) such as: plain white or toasted bread, hard boiled
eggs, potato pancakes, rice, and crackers.
Accompaniments, which do not detract from the unique
tastes of caviar, are avocado, sour cream and unsalted
butter. Some like to add caviar to recipes. As a rule,
caviar should not be overcooked for it will toughen and
lose its original flavor. Caviar tastes best when it is
added to dishes at the last minute to impart its flavor
to soups and sauces or after cooking is complete.
Caviar is served on any occasion where one wishes to
make it special, exciting, romantic, and memorable and
it is served during dinners with the proper ambiance.
Caviar is to be enjoyed as one of those wonderful and
simple pleasures in life like great art or serious
music, and its courses are enjoyed with a little
ceremony and attention to detail.
The story of caviar has long been one of conflict and
crisis. Over the years, the royalty of countries like
Russia, China, Hungary, Denmark, France and England
decreed sturgeon to be a “royal fish” and all sturgeon
caught belonged to the imperial treasury and must be
given to the monarch or the gentry. Over the years,
greedy businessmen have exploited the wealth of untapped
sturgeon in American waters. The Russian communists
established a sophisticated cartel to market caviar to
the rich Western clientele. The Russian mafias have also
tried to control its trade by selling contraband caviar
in the international market at absurdly low prices.
Americans eat more than 20000 pounds of caviar every
year. However, if the uninitiated who gets the chance to
taste the caviar for the first time may wonder what the
fuss is about. After all, caviar is nothing but salty
eggs got from a fish! | 
