A new crowd cultivates a taste for caviar

— -- At some of the USA's hottest and hippest restaurants, young chefs are rediscovering a food once revered by their grandparents but largely ignored by today's jet-set diners: It's those salty little fish eggs, better known as caviar.

The trend comes as international bans tighten on imported caviar, leading chefs to turn to the cheaper — but some say equally flavorful — domestic caviar, sprinkling it into recipes previously considered beneath the upscale delicacy.

There are caviar spring rolls at the Hyatt Regency in Bethesda, Md. And caviar tuna pizza at New York City's Morimoto. Or fettuccine and caviar at Los Angeles' Locanda Veneta.

"Caviar is sexy," says Adam Stevenson, executive chef for Earth & Ocean restaurant at the swanky W Hotel in downtown Seattle. "When you enjoy it the right way, it can make people feel like they are indulging in something special.

"But I know what's going on in their heads at first," he adds. "Fish eggs. Ugh."

The secret to introducing caviar dishes to a new generation is to creatively incorporate the delicacy into familiar dishes.

Though Allison Andrews, 23, had tasted caviar before, on a cracker, she had never sought it out. It was stuffy food. Boring, she said. Something the queen and her court might munch on. "It seemed so regal," she says.

But now she regularly orders the caviar tacos created by executive chef Damon Gordon of Quarter Kitchen in San Diego. The restaurant opened last summer inside one of the area's hippest social scenes, the Ivy Hotel.

"The first time I tried it, it kind of knocked my socks off," she says. "Put it (caviar) together kind of taco style, and suddenly, well, everybody eats tacos."

And that's exactly the point, Gordon says.

"When it comes as a complement to something our younger diners are already comfortable with, then it's not so intimidating," he says. "And when they taste it, they say, 'Wow, great combination!' "

Gordon's now supremely popular mini caviar tacos are composed of thin, crispy potato shells filled with crème fraîche, horseradish, red onion, parsley, hardboiled egg and caviar.