ASK ANY FOOD LOVER where to find the best smoked ...

Homarus/Marshall, formerly known as Marshall's, the legendary Brooklyn smoked fish house that was recently acquired by East Coast conglomerate Sea Specialties, and the supplier of sturgeon and other smoked fish delicacies to these preeminent institutions, is in a sense ensuring the legacy of New York City as the de facto destination for smoked fish.

In a Middle Village, Queens smokehouse, Homarus/Marshall Smoked Fish has run its non-kosher division for the last few years, producing such pricey items as smoked scallops, shrimp and?sturgeon?

Surprisingly, the beloved sturgeon, a scaleless fish, "trafe" (i.e. verboten) by kosher standards, is wildly popular among old-school New York deli-goers, despite the delicatessen's inherently Jewish nature. Shock-value aside, customers at top destinations for smoked fish will pay anywhere from $30 to $60 for a pound of this luxurious item.

The cooking and smoking of fresh sturgeon is done in old-fashioned chambers?"Fifty years old if they're a day!" says Mitchell Gardner of Homarus/Marshall, who oversees this aspect of production?that are no longer being built.

In high contrast to so deluxe a food product, the five brick-lined "ovens," blackened with smoke and fish oil, bear a greater resemblance to a grungy sauna or torture chamber than to a vessel for the production of fine food.

At the start of the process, meticulously cleaned, dried and cured fillets of male sturgeon (the meat of the female, apparently, has an unpleasant, jelly-like consistency) are hung by hand in the oven, and start to cook once the gas vents inside are ignited. After it has been cooked, the sturgeon is smoked, which means that a small quantity of wood chips nesting in a pile of Easter-grass-like shavings is set aflame on the oven floor. The door is closed, and the smoke commingles with the fish for 20 to 30 minutes, giving it its soft, smoky flavor and distinctive tan veneer.

Though newer ovens allow for a more streamlined production, Gardner insists that these ovens, with their porous walls and years of smoked fish history, are one of Homarus/Marshall's secret ingredients.

"These ovens give a flavor profile that you do not get in modern ovens."

With an anticipatory grin, Gardner opens one of the cardboard boxes that stores the final product as though it were a treasure chest. He reveals dauntingly chubby sturgeon fillets oozing with oil and the enticing, slightly metallic smell of freshly smoked fish. Gardner takes a yellow piece of waxed paper and lifts a hunk onto a stainless steel surface, where he begins to cut it on angle, throwing fatty pieces aside, tossing every third sliver into his well-practiced gullet, and offering me some in between.

The flesh is white and pale, and compared to its other high-end brothers and sisters, has a meatier texture than the more delicate smoked salmon, and is moister than the flaky white fish. At first bite, the sturgeon is surprisingly fresh-tasting and juicy for a fish that is salted and smoked.

Between oily bites, Gardner manages, "We take a lot of pride in the fact that our sturgeon is that good."