The Race to Satisfy Caviar Craving.

By Jane Black
The New York Times.

Elverta, Calif.
CAVIAR from farmed sturgeon used to be a tough sell. Now it’s tough to fill the orders. Last month two airlines asked Sterling Caviar, which operates the largest caviar farm in the United States, for 15 tons of it, nearly double the annual production, said Peter Struffenegger, manager of the company’s plant here in this dusty valley outside Sacramento.
No wonder then that for the first time since it began producing caviar in 1994, Sterling is conducting a second harvest this year. Traditionally, Sterling removed roe only in the spring, when white sturgeon, which have lived in the nearby Sacramento River for at least 80 million years, naturally spawn.
This fall’s harvest is the start of a global race to produce enough farmed caviar for the first holiday season since international environmental officials shut down much of the wild caviar market because of concerns about overfishing.
Mr. Struffenegger knows that if he cannot meet the demand, somebody else will. “A few years ago we were begging people to take farmed caviar seriously,’’ he said. “Now there’s worldwide interest and millions being spent just to meet demand.’’
In the mid-1990’s the farmed caviar industry was nothing more than a few marine
biologists with a dream. Today it is emerging as a global, multimillion-dollar business. Sturgeon farms in France, Germany, Italy and Uruguay are investing millions of dollars to expand facilities and to develop new technologies, like microchip implants, to create roe with a pop as perfect and a flavor as buttery as traditional wild caviar’s. In Bulgaria, Canada, China, Israel and the middle of a desert in Abu Dhabi, fledgling caviar farmers are breaking ground on new production facilities.
Closer to home, the caviar distributor Marky’s in Florida is importing and breeding beluga, the finest sturgeon species, with a goal of having 500,000 fish by 2009.
If estimates are to be believed — producers tend to be optimistic — farmed caviar production will almost double, from about 64 tons in 2005 to 125 tons in 2010. The Caspian Sea produced about 125 tons last year, with about 49 tons permitted this year.
Earlier this year the United Nations’ Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species refused to issue export quotas for caviar from sturgeon in the Caspian and Black Seas, other than some Iranian osetra.
According to Caviar Emptor, a coalition of scientists and environmentalists, overfishing, pollution and development have caused a 90 percent reduction in Caspian Sea beluga sturgeon over the last 20 years, and extinction of beluga and other caviar-producing species, like Russian osetra and sevruga, is possible. As a result, the legal supply of wild caviar has plummeted and the price for Iranian osetra, the only wild caviar legally sold, has topped $300 an ounce. Farmed caviar can sell for $60 an ounce.
Perhaps the most ambitious project to make up for the reduced supply is the farm in Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates, which will breed baerii, or Siberian, sturgeon. Backed by private investors, the $48 million facility is scheduled to be completed by the end of 2008, with the first caviar expected to be sold the next year. At its peak the farm will produce 32 tons annually, two times what is produced today in California.
Abu Dhabi may seem like an odd place to build a fish farm, but labor is cheap there and energy is cheaper. And there is a huge market for caviar on cruise ships that dock there, in the city’s hotels and among the Arab elite. Still, the project requires sophisticated water recirculation technologies to function in a desert. For the sturgeon to grow quickly and to produce eggs, for example, the water will need to be cooled to 68 to 72 degrees. And not a drop can be wasted. According to Christoph Hartung, chief executive of the German firm United Food Technologies, which has been hired to build and manage the farm, 95 percent of each day’s water will be filtered and reused.
United, which has farmed sturgeon in Fulda, Germany, since 1990, created a subsidiary, AquaOrbis, in 1999 specifically to provide technology and management services to the growing number of new sturgeon farms. “We’ve been overwhelmed by the interest, and we have a lot of bids out at the moment,’’ Mr. Hartung said. AquaOrbis is also planning to help open a farm in Guangzhou, China, next year that would produce eight tons of caviar annually.
More well-established farms are also using impressive technology. At Agroittica Lombarda in Calvisano, Italy, the world’s largest caviar farm, each female white sturgeon has a microchip containing its genetic information implanted in the back of its head. Besides noting the fish’s parents and grandparents, other information is stored, like first recorded weight, pond of origin and diet. Each time the fish is examined or moved, the digital record is updated. Its life history can be read by running a small scanner over its head. Such detailed records ensure that there is genetic diversity in the stock. It also helps for making more accurate production estimates, because the farm can chart when each fish is likely to mature.
Agroittica’s processing room looks like a hospital emergency room. The workers dress in white lab coats, surgical gloves and hairnets. To reduce bacterial contamination, the room is pressurized so that no outside air can enter while the eggs are being cleaned, weighed and salted. This, according to Agroittica’s managing director, Sandro Cancellieri, extends shelf life and improves flavor, since less salt needs to be added for preservation.
But the technology that every farm is racing to develop is one that would determine the optimum moment to harvest the eggs. Harvest too early and the caviar will be rough and dry because the fat is still in the fish’s belly, not the eggs. Harvest too late and the caviar will be soft and lack distinctive beads. (Wild caviar is always harvested at the ideal time because the sturgeon are caught as they swim upriver to their spawning ground.)
With farmed sturgeon, biologists must rely on educated guesses about when a fish will release her eggs. In general, baerii sturgeon, the breed grown in farms in established European farms and newer operations in Asia and the Middle East, mature within five years. White sturgeon, grown in the United States and Italy, mature in eight. To be sure, each fish must be individually biopsied. Marine biologists make a small incision, insert a plastic tube and manually suck a few eggs from each fish. If the test roe are black, the eggs are ready. If they are white, the fish will need about another year to reach full potential. Some fish are biopsied four or five times before they get it right, Mr. Struffenegger of Sterling said.
In France farmers use ultrasound technology to speed the process. Alan Jones, the managing director of a company called Sturgeon, which is based in Saint-Sulpice, Bordeaux, uses ultrasound scanners to determine the sex of his baerii sturgeon and to identify mature females that are ready for harvesting. (A sturgeon’s gender is not evident until the fish is 3 years old.)
“We scan them using a little portable TV with a probe,’’ Mr. Jones said. The fish still need to be biopsied, he said, but the process saves a lot of time.
Mr. Struffenegger has considered using ultrasound, but he hopes a new technology will replace invasive surgery altogether. His farm is working with scientists at the University of California, Davis, to develop infrared scans that would measure for compounds present inside the sturgeon when the eggs are ripe. But does all this technology produce great caviar? For years connoisseurs would not touch
farmed eggs, complaining that they tasted like dirty lake water or salty mush. And though processing and storage methods have improved, environmentalists deserve the credit for forcing people to give the industry another chance.
Thomas Keller of the French Laundry in Yountville, Calif., and Per Se in New York City tasted Sterling’s caviar over the summer and will put it on the menu at the French Laundry this week. The chef Terrance Brennan of the restaurant Picholine in New York City has also switched to a farmed roe. He is serving Agroittica’s Calvisius caviar, from white sturgeon, with sea urchin panna cotta and chilled ocean consommé.
“Everyone is thinking more about sustainability,’’ Mr. Brennan said. “And while it’s
different than wild caviar, it’s very good.’’
Still, said Michel Emery, the director of sales for the caviar distributor Petrossian, “real” Caspian Sea eggs still rule. Caviar from fish that swam freely in seawater have a fuller flavor than their farmed counterparts, which are bred in fresh water, Mr. Emery said. “The best caviar available is still Iranian osetra,’’ he said. “But the price is so high that farmed is a good substitute.’’
Petrossian sells its top Iranian osetra, Imperial Special Reserve Persicus, for $309 per 30 grams, about an ounce. It sells the same quantity of Sterling’s top white sturgeon caviar, Alverta President, for $119 and other grades of farmed caviar from Sterling and other companies for about half that much.
While caviar lovers will be relieved that any caviar is available, buying farmed roe can be perplexing. The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species mandates that wholesalers label their product with the species, the country of origin and the date of processing, but there are no rules about how caviar can or should be marketed to consumers. So it can be difficult to tell what you are buying.
For example, Petrossian calls Sterling’s white sturgeon caviar “transmontanus,” the official species name, like beluga, sevruga or osetra. But a consumer who purchases Sterling’s caviar directly from Sterling will see it labeled White Sturgeon. Tsar Nicoulai, another California producer of White Sturgeon caviar, markets its product as Californian Estate Osetra.
“It’s what people are comfortable with,” says Deborah Keane, Tsar Nicoulai’s director for sales and marketing. “The name tells them they’ll get a creamy, nutty osetra-style caviar. No one knows what transmontanus is.” Some producers of Siberian sturgeon also call their caviar osetra. Other types of fish roe, like paddlefish and hackleback, must be labeled as such. These days, though, marketing is the least of most caviar farmers’ worries.
“If I had twice as much as I do, I could sell it,’’ said Mr. Cancellieri of Agroittica, which produced 20 tons of caviar in 2005. “I spend all day on the phone telling customers no, no, no. It can be frustrating. But it’s a pretty good position to be in.’’