What fish is traditionally prized for producing true caviar?

What fish is traditionally prized for producing true caviar? The answer is sturgeon, whose salted roe is the traditional source of true caviar.

Caviar traditionally means salt-cured eggs from sturgeons, a family of ancient-looking fishes called Acipenseridae. The best-known classic varieties came from sturgeons of the Caspian, Black, and Azov seas, especially beluga, ossetra, and sevruga. Their large, delicate eggs made sturgeon roe a luxury food associated with royal courts and high-end cuisine.

A frequent mix-up is calling any fish eggs “true caviar.” Salmon, trout, lumpfish, herring, and other fishes produce edible roe and may be marketed as caviar substitutes, but traditional terminology reserves caviar for sturgeon roe. Paddlefish roe is also sometimes sold under broader modern definitions, but sturgeon remains the canonical quiz answer.

Sturgeon caviar has a complicated conservation history. Overfishing, pollution, habitat loss, dams, and poaching severely reduced wild populations, particularly around the Caspian Sea. International trade in sturgeons has been regulated under CITES since 1998, and much modern caviar comes from farmed fish rather than unrestricted wild harvests.