Caviar
The Strange History and Uncertain Future of the World's Most Coveted Delicacy
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- ¥710
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- ¥710
発行者による作品情報
In the tradition of Cod and Olives: a fascinating journey into the hidden history, culture, and commerce of caviar.
Once merely a substitute for meat during religious fasts, today caviar is an icon of luxury and wealth. In Caviar, Inga Saffron tells, for the first time, the story of how the virgin eggs of the prehistoric-looking, bottom-feeding sturgeon were transformed from a humble peasant food into a czar’s delicacy–and ultimately a coveted status symbol for a rising middle class. She explores how the glistening black eggs became the epitome of culinary extravagance, while taking us on a revealing excursion into the murky world of caviar on the banks of the Volga River and Caspian Sea in Russia, the Elbe in Europe, and the Hudson and Delaware Rivers in the United States. At the same time, Saffron describes the complex industry caviar has spawned, illustrating the unfortunate consequences of mass marketing such a rare commodity.
The story of caviar has long been one of conflict, crisis, extravagant claims, and colorful characters, such as the Greek sea captain who first discovered the secret method of transporting the perishable delicacy to Europe, the canny German businessmen who encountered a wealth of untapped sturgeon in American waters, the Russian Communists who created a sophisticated cartel to market caviar to an affluent Western clientele, the dirt-poor poachers who eked out a living from sturgeon in the aftermath of the Soviet collapse and the “caviar Mafia” that has risen in their wake, and the committed scientists who sacrificed their careers to keep caviar on our tables.
Filled with lore and intrigue, Caviar is a captivating work of culinary, natural, and cultural history.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
As the Moscow correspondent for the Philadelphia Inquirer from 1994-1998 (she's now the paper's architecture critic), Saffron traveled throughout the former Soviet Union, reporting on those heady, hectic days. She also acquired a taste for caviar: "Those glistening black globules," she writes, "are a culinary Rorschach that unleashes our deeply held notions about wealth, luxury, and life." From the ghost town of Caviar, New Jersey to the illegal markets of Moscow, Saffron takes her readers on an absorbing journey as she details the bizarre and fascinating history of one of the world's most coveted delicacies. Caviar, long associated with wealthy Russian aristocracy (though originally considered a peasant food) and thought to possess both medicinal and aphrodisiacal properties, has been a source of great international controversy. Once considered the "black gold" of Russia, in the 1990's caviar became the symbol of American middle-class affluence: "When caviar prices were tumbling...Americans were making record salaries," Saffron writes, and their new wealth made them "crave the exotic." The continued demand for caviar and the sturgeon's placement on the list of endangered species has led to increasingly intricate smuggling rings. Saffron has taken an off-beat but intriguing topic, and, through her elegant and detailed prose, created a book worthy of gourmands and amateur historians alike.
