Choose the fish of the right maturity.  One of the first important steps in obtaining good quality caviar, which is often neglected even by professionals.  In the old days, this stage was not used, because fish came from the wild in massive numbers and there was no way or time to sort the fish.  Everything that was caught had been processed and then sorted by size, colour and ripeness of the egg.  Nowadays, all caviar comes from aquaculture, which allows us to control the quality of a future product even before the processing starts.

Catch the fish without stress.  All living organisms are producing a hormone called "cortisol" that is used to process proteins and nourish the body with sugars. Though not everybody heard that an animal under stress or just before the death releases a huge amount of this hormone into their body and in big doses it becomes violent.  For this it is called hormone of death.

Kill or milk the sturgeon quickly.  Regardless that these two methods are opposite from each other, they have one common goal, it must be done very quickly and without minimum pain.  There are rules in place on how to kill a fish without casing it to suffer, but we will not go into details.  Milking on the other hand is the only truly sustainable way to harvest sturgeon caviar, though it is still a stress to fish.

Caviar sorting.  After extracting the eggs from the fish by killing or milking, it is sorted by the colour and size.  An important stage and specially in the old times when sturgeon used to be caught from the wild only during spring time.  It would swim from the sea into the river for spawning and be caught by fishermen.  Caviar would be grouped by size and colour and processed in big bowls.  In present days, the volumes have decreased by 100 times, and producers are not grouping caviar anymore but rather process each fish separately.

Cleaning of caviar.  Caviar from killed or milked sturgeon processed in different ways. First one is passed through the special sieve to separate caviar from placenta.  Then it is washed with the cold water to clean it from the residues of the placenta.  Milked caviar has to be separated from the amniotic fluid that comes from the fish during the procedure.  It is then processed in a different way then the first one to get clean product.

Salting the caviar.  Equally important process, which will result in the taste of caviar. Caviar is weighted and the required amount of salt is added to the product. Percentage varies from 3% to 4% depending on the request of the customer and the intended market.  Many have heard the name "MALOSOL" (means "little salt" in Russian) or saw it being written on the tins.  History behind it goes way back when the only preservative to be know was salt, so in order to keep it from spoiling up to 10% of it was added. Nowadays, all caviar is malosol and to keep it safe from spoiling preservatives or pasteurisation is used.

Draining the caviar.   Salt makes caviar to release the brine from the inside of the egg. Depending on the manufacturer and the will of the client, the amount of brine varies. Some like it more dry, others prefer little bit of moisture.  In the classical Soviet tradition, caviar should be granular without excessive moisture.  Though one must be very careful, liquid like brine solution in the caviar can be the cause of bad quality of product rather then outcome of processing methodology.  Thus to be on the safe side, it is advisable to purchase caviar with low moisture content it gives extra assurance the product is of good quality.

Caviar packaging.  When the caviar is ready for packaging, it can be packed in the metal tins with a rubber band, in the metal tins with vacuum or in the glass jars with vacuum.  During the Soviet times, caviar for export was packed in the glass jars and with the 3 types of colour: blue, yellow and red.  Nowadays, the world market is dominated by primarily by metal tins with a vacuum.  The difference between glass and metal is significant and affects the taste, quality and shelf life of caviar.  Out of all types of packaging, metal tins with an elastic band is the worst method of packing, which unfortunately still present on the market.  This is certainly the oldest way of packing caviar, so some old buyers think that this how a real product should look like. Unfortunately they are mislead, for 2 reasons: first of all, the process of production requires to squeeze eggs which breaks them and thus caviar juice overflow under the rubber band; and secondly all good caviar producers are packing mostly in metal with vacuum or glass jars.  The difference between metal and glass packaging is significant: metal has a good look to it and once tin is opened it has nice view but shelf life is small then in glass jar due to oxidation of metal that leads to a metallic taste, after caviar lays for some time.  Glass jars store for a longer period, no oxidation but has a less of a look thus less attractive to clients.

Caviar packaging.  When the caviar is ready for packaging, it can be packed in the metal tins with a rubber band, in the metal tins with vacuum or in the glass jars with vacuum.  During the Soviet times, caviar for export was packed in the glass jars and with the 3 types of colour: blue, yellow and red.  Nowadays, the world market is dominated by primarily by metal tins with a vacuum.  The difference between glass and metal is significant and affects the taste, quality and shelf life of caviar.  Out of all types of packaging, metal tins with an elastic band is the worst method of packing, which unfortunately still present on the market.  This is certainly the oldest way of packing caviar, so some old buyers think that this how a real product should look like. Unfortunately they are mislead, for 2 reasons: first of all, the process of production requires to squeeze eggs which breaks them and thus caviar juice overflow under the rubber band; and secondly all good caviar producers are packing mostly in metal with vacuum or glass jars.  The difference between metal and glass packaging is significant: metal has a good look to it and once tin is opened it has nice view but shelf life is small then in glass jar due to oxidation of metal that leads to a metallic taste, after caviar lays for some time.  Glass jars store for a longer period, no oxidation but has a less of a look thus less attractive to clients.