NOT YOUR PARENTS’ CAVIAR

At San Francisco’s Palette, Chef Peter Hemsley turned the idea of the traditional hard-boiled egg accompaniment for caviar by placing a large dollop of white sturgeon eggs on top of smoked sturgeon cream using an edible clay eggshell as the serving vessel.

“Most people, if not inclined to luxury food, shy away from caviar as a category,” he says. “By presenting this caviar experience in a singular bite (at the start of the meal), we are asking the guest to take a culinary leap of faith with us — an icebreaker — and sets the stage for the rest of what’s to come.”

It’s clear caviar is having a moment. Chefs across the country are keeping the prized fish eggs as part of luxury experiences, but adding it into more approachable dishes as a way of introducing the product to new generations while educating them about why caviar can be more than just a taster on a blini.

For example, at the recently-opened RPM Italian at The Forum Shops at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas, the culinary team paired Kaluga Queen Caviar with fresh burrata. While the generous portion atop a pillowy white poof of dairy remains elegant, it’s certainly a far cry from traditional service, representing a bridge to help new taste buds understand the complexity of the delicacy.

Ensuring there’s a future market for caviar means educating eaters about harvesting caviar and how to support responsible farmers for a better-tasting — and less impactful — product.
The complex and highly-competitive culinary scene in Portland, Oregon has proven to be quite the ground for push- ing the boundaries in sustainable caviar as well.
Chef John Conlin uses caviar in a number of ways at his tasting-menu only restaurant Tercet, specifically using Tsar Nicoulai caviar from northern California — arguably America’s most sustainable caviar producer. It follows Conlin’s com- mitment to use responsibly-harvested products across his offerings, allowing guests to taste the difference.

While Conlin’s menu changes weekly based on what’s locally available (and extremely fresh), he starts each meal with oysters topped with a bit of caviar. Interestingly, he says it’s more “for tex- ture, not necessarily flavor.”

At Russian restaurant Kachka in Portland, Oregon, Co-Owner and Chef Bonnie Morales believes in caviar as a food that should be enjoyed “any way people wish,” even putting it on the happy hour menu as the “chips and dip” option. She’ll even spread it on top of challah bread with just a bit of cultured butter. “I grew up eating caviar at both cele- brations and in more casual gatherings at home, so I take that approach in my restaurant,” she adds.

Then, there are the chefs adding caviar to seemingly simple bites, elevating the food to an entirely new level. Back in San Francisco, the first Russian restaurant in America ever to be listed on a Michelin Guide, Birch & Rye, uses caviar as a finisher for dessert.The meal ends with rye donuts, caramel and Siberian sturgeon caviar. It’s a new, decadent take on sweet-and-salty that’s certainly a rare treat among tasting menus anywhere in the country. (The restaurant even extends this to the drink menu via a caviar-infused vodka.) As chefs continue to push the limit, caviar will only be opened to those curious about what makes this storied ingredient such a sought-after addition to meals everywhere.