F stands for:

Whether it’s wild caviar from fishing or farmed caviar from fish farming, the techniques for making caviar are the same, and require the know-how of the best experts! Sturgeon caviar can take up to thirteen operations to make, and requires perfect mastery of the craft.

HOW TO MAKE CAVIAR?

To achieve its best taste, caviar must be entrusted to “masters”, caviar experts who treat it with the utmost care and in accordance with strict hygiene rules, particularly in terms of sterilization conditions. Indeed, everything that comes into contact with caviar (hands, clothes, equipment) is fully sterilized.

With the help of our connections, we work with Iranian experts who now supervise the production of farmed caviar on farms around the world.

Jacques Nebot and Iraj Toufani, one of Iran’s most talented caviar masters, supervise production to ensure that the product is as close as possible to wild caviar.

PRECISE, RIGOROUS STEPS

In breeding, when the sturgeon reaches 3kg (between 3 and 5 years of age), an ultrasound scan is used to identify the sex. With the exception of a few breeders, only females are kept in the tanks. Later, around the eighth year, a biopsy is taken from each female to assess the maturity of the egg taken (color and size). The female sturgeons are then ready for processing. Each fish is weighed and identified by a register number which will then be entered on all the caviar tins, to ensure the traceability of the roe.

After stunning and bleeding the fish, each sturgeon is transported to the preparation room for washing. The fish’s belly is then opened by hand, on a marble table. The roe, a pouch containing the eggs (representing 15 to 18% of the sturgeon’s weight), is carefully removed and placed in a container to be weighed Still by hand, the caviar is passed through a coarse sieve to remove any remaining skin and membranes.

We then move on to the most important operation: Preserving salt, which depends on the size of the caviar, the consumer’s taste and the specifications of each importer (Kaviari, the caviar boutique in Paris, has very precise specifications for caviar production and the percentage of salt used). We use either pure cooking salt or a mixture of it and borax (sodium borate), at specific rates. Quantities are constantly monitored. Salting is one of the most delicate operations in the preparation of caviar. If the salting is too low, caviar deteriorates quickly and if it is too high, it dries out and becomes sticky. It’s at this stage that we use the term “Malossol”, which means little salt. This is not a type of caviar, but a low-salt caviar (less than 3%). And it’s this mixture of salt and roe that gives caviar its unique taste!

After salting, the grains are dried so that the exudate (excess water resulting from the salt’s penetration of the grains) flows out. This is a crucial step, which ensures that the caviar is soft, neither too dry nor too sticky!
Finally, the filling of the original tins (1.8kg) is done rapidly. The tins are pressurized when closed to expel excess liquid and air bubbles, leaving only the minimum amount of moisture necessary for grain movement.

This is when the maturing or refining process begins, giving caviar its remarkable flavours!