Kazakh Cuisine

The traditional food is what a herding people could produce: meat, milk and grain, with vegetables marginal. Beshbarmak, five fingers, is the centrepiece, boiled horse or mutton served over wide sheets of dough with onion broth, eaten by hand from a shared dish, with the head of the sheep presented to the senior guest at a formal meal. Kazy is horsemeat sausage from the rib, sliced thin. Kuyrdak is offal fried with onion and potato. Baursak, fried dough balls, come with tea, which is drunk with milk in half-filled bowls refilled constantly. Kumis, fermented mare's milk, and shubat from camel's milk are sour and mildly alcoholic. Uyghur laghman and Korean-Kazakh salads are equally part of everyday eating.

What you actually see

• Beshbarmak - boiled meat over dough sheets, eaten by hand.
• Kazy - the horsemeat rib sausage sliced for the table.
• Kumis and shubat - the fermented mare's and camel's milk.
• Laghman and salads - the Uyghur and Korean-Kazakh everyday dishes.

When to go

Year round. Kumis and shubat are seasonal, best in late spring and summer when the mares are milked. Nauryz in March brings nauryz kozhe, a seven-ingredient soup. Bazaars are the place to buy kazy and dairy.

Honest expectations

Horsemeat is standard and unavoidable in traditional dishes. Vegetables are scarce in the traditional repertoire, and vegetarian eating means relying on Uyghur, Korean or international food. Kumis and shubat are sour and not to most first-time tastes. Portions at formal meals are very large and refusal is awkward.

Nearby

The Green Bazaar in Almaty; bazaars in every town.