White Sturgeon are generally a long, somewhat round fish that don’t have traditional fish scales. In the picture on the right you can however see the diamond shaped pattern found on the sides and back of the fish. These are called “scoots” which are thin individual scales; a carry over from their dinosaur days presumably. The skin is otherwise very smooth and slick when wet. As you’ll see in the photos of many of the products below, the skin holds in the rose colored outer layer of fat that contributes so much to the taste of the fish.
The skeleton of a sturgeon consists of cartilage similar to a shark. This has a number of benefits on the culinary side of things in that once harvested and iced, the rib cage cartilage will simply dissolve over a few days leaving a boneless cross cut steak. The cartilage of the back bone will remain, but is easily removed before or after cooking. So, NO BONES to pick out!
The “meaty” texture of White Sturgeon allows it to be prepared in many different ways. One friend of mine is a native of Japan who has tried our sturgeon uncooked in Japanese Sashimi and found it to be “quite good”. It has been prepared in sashimi as well as Mexican style Ceviche, and drawn rave reviews. All the more traditional fish cuts are excellent; including the skin off tail roast!
For more adventurous chefs, we offer sturgeon visega (spinal bone marrow with tail) for the Russian coulibiac or kiulibiak delicacy, sturgeon heads with fins (split from nose to backbone) and sturgeon skin for kosher soup base or gelatin, as well as sturgeon livers by order for an exotic pate. If you’re not quite ready for sturgeon liver, we recommend trying our smoked sturgeon; amazing!
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