About Caviar Connect
Who We Are
With 20 years in the industry, Caviar Connect has unique relationships with caviar farms around the world. They have been vetted for cleanliness, treatment of the animal and of course wonderful flavor. Our relationships with these farms allows for our discerning partners to serve caviar directly from the source.
The caviar is packed and graded on the day of harvest and never touched until opened by our customers. This minimal manipulation of the caviar preserves the integrity of the eggs as well as freshness of the flavor.
Why Work With Us
Caviar straight from the source has unique benefits to both the customer and the farm.
Buying directly from the farm guarantees customers receive the highest quality product and have access to the fairest price.
Buying direct also allows farmers to sell their finest caviar with their name and branding so their product is honestly represented.
Caviar FAQs
-
Caviar is the roe or eggs from sturgeon. Originally from the Caspian Sea these fish range from 3 feet to over 10 feet and take as many years to reach maturity.
Sturgeon have been around for 200 million years and were fished to near extinction. In 2005 The U.S. Fish and Wildlife stepped in and stopped the importation of all beluga products. Shortly after in 2006, they stopped all imports of wild caviar, thus creating a huge gap in the caviar market.
At this time, the first caviar farms were just beginning to produce enough of the coveted eggs to introduce it to the world. Learning from their predecessors, the farms sold to distributors. The distributors did as they always had, repacked from the original tin into smaller tins designed to be resold.
-
It all begins with fingerlings or young sturgeon being raised in large pools and ponds. During adolescence the males are separated from the females. The females are then checked regularly via ultrasound to see the maturity of their eggs.
If a female is thought to have eggs that are mature enough to harvest, a second look is taken via biopsy. After the biopsy it is decided whether her eggs are ready for harvest.
After harvesting the roe from the female her eggs are then rinsed and run through a sieve. They are lightly salted using the malossol technique. The roe from each fish is packed in its own tins with their individual lot numbers resulting in full traceability.
-
Over the last 20 years there have been some major changes in the caviar industry, mainly U.S. Fish and Wildlife's halt on the import of wild caviar into the U.S. in early 2006.
Since then the technology to breed, and raise the sturgeon that produce caviar has been making advances to create the tastiest supply of the world's favorite delicacy.
The farm waters are pristine and sturgeon living in the wild are able to replenish. Due to sturgeon farms, a supply of fresh caviar is readily available throughout the year.
-
Before the ban on wild caviar, sturgeon fisherman surrounding the Caspian Sea had to export their catch to known distributors within the U.S. in large tins.
Now caviar is farmed all over the world and sturgeon farms are able to harvest, grade and pack caviar directly into consumer tins. Caviar no longer needs to packed, sold, repacked and resold. Caviar farmers know their product the best. They have bred, and raised the sturgeon that produces the caviar that they produce.
The end result is caviar that is fresher anand better tasting than their repacked counterparts.