Salmon Roe Seafood
Roe or fish eggs are an extremely popular delicacy, especially within Eastern Europe, Russia and Japan. You can buy already processed roe such as caviar, and eat it as a spread; additionally, you can buy fresh roe at your local seafood market. Salmon roe, though not considered real caviar by enthusiasts, is a great tasting alternative. Top quality salmon caviar, also called red caviar or salmon roe is actually quite plentiful and inexpensive. This is the type of roe, you will most commonly encounter. While purists dismiss salmon roe as too fishy or salty it actually contains less salt then black caviar. The taste of depends on where the roe comes from-whether it was wild caught or farmed and how it is handled after harvesting (handling roe requires a lot of care). The eggs are delicate and can spoil quite easily, which means they must be stored at near freezing temperatures to keep their flavor intact.
Roe is collected by harvesting female fish before spawning; the eggs are cut out and carefully preserved. Some caviar production factories actually stun the fish and then extract the ovaries; other fisheries have experimented with surgically removing the ovaries from living fish, so that they can continue to produce roe-this method however, is less common. Roe does have to be handled carefully. In fact, from the moment they are taken out of the fish, to the time they are ready to be consumed, they have to be refrigerated. Handling roe is a delicate affair. Individual eggs should be kept intact. They should be bright and colorful, rather than grey or discolored. When purchasing roe, try it first. It should pop in your mouth. If you purchase a fish with roe in it, cut off the oviducts, wrap them in plastic bags and freeze them until ready to eat.
When it comes to seafood, pretty much every specific product requires a fair amount of care and delicacy, unlike many other meat products (beef, for example) that merely need to be kept chilly, and other than that can be tossed around and hit like a punching bag at the gym. There is one kind of seafood product in particular that is more fragile and delicate than pretty much any other, and that would be roe. Whatever kind you have purchased, it is crucial when handling roe to keep it at very low temperatures and to make sure that the individual eggs have remained intact (not burst yet) and that their color is right, with no graying or other discoloration.
There are a few different kinds of roe to be found at the market. First of all, there is the black roe that is famous throughout the world and known as caviar, generally harvested from sturgeon in the Black Sea. Nonetheless, this is an extremely rare and expensive product, and a good replacement is wild Alaskan salmon roe-rich in proteins and omega 3 fatty acids, this product is a true bounty for the belly. Handling roe harvested from Alaskan salmon is not that difficult, but you need to know what you’re doing. To keep the flavor of this exceptional product at its ideal level, make sure you store the roe at temperatures just above freezing. Furthermore, make sure that the roe is in a sturdy container, like plastic or Styrofoam rigid containers, and not in a flimsy plastic bag-the eggs could be popped by this form of storage.
