Is caviar vegetarian?
I found an article about Sturgeon and caviar and here is a short excerpt, “A revolutionary caviar farm in Latvia has created a technique where caviar is harvested from live sturgeon, meaning that the fish no longer have to be killed to get the caviar out of them. This brilliant breakthrough in Latvia is helping to save the sturgeon from extinction. Another added benefit is that sturgeon that survive will produce finer quality caviar every year as they mature, so this is one of those rare and beautiful win win situations where the fish are kept in wonderful conditions and the caviar just keeps getting better.” I believe that the roe aren’t fertilized until the female sturgeon expels them and the male sturgeon releases his sperm in close vicinity. Soooo… I suppose if the caviar was the Latvian farmed kind it would be just as acceptable for vegetarians to eat the caviar as it is for them to eat chicken/duck/goose eggs… I for one will give it a miss though!!!!!! Hope that helped somewh
Firstly, it is vegans not vegetarians that don’t eat eggs and I have never met a vegetarian that wouldn’t buy free range eggs. Whilst I see the logic of the original question I think the need to kill the animal for the eggs to be harvested would take it off the list of most vegetarians. There is, however, a vegetarian version of caviar which is available for sale in the UK and approved by the Vegetarian Society. It is called CAVI*ART and is something like £5 for the jar. It is made of seaweed instead of fish.
Well these eggs are only available from the ROE of the sturgoen. Fish do not lay eggs like chickens. Sturgeon are HUGE fish, and have a roe full of around 10 lbs of caviar. At $35 an ounce, this is very pricey catch, so the sturgeon are slit open from ear to anus to extract every last liece of caviar and yes, they are killed, There is no way to get this caviar out unless you kill the fish.
