You scan the menu at the latest NYC hotspot. Caviar pasta, caviar pizza. Caviar fried chicken. Then it gets progressively unhinged — stacked onto burgers, dolloped onto a dirty vodka martini.

Here are some examples of pearl-shaped foods, old and new. Fish roe is great on blinis, toast point and potato pancakes, but also eggs, shellfish and pasta. Not all caviar is pricy, either. California ...