When you ever enterprise to go to Katon Karagay within the Altay mountains in Kazakhstan, which it is best to as a result of it’s the greenest and most tranquil nationwide park in Kazakhstan, most educated individuals will let you know that it is best to enter by the “gate of Katon”.
The gate could be discovered round 400 kilometres from the picturesque mountain vary and its valleys. Sufficient to spark my curiosity.
Katon Karagay is a area on the coronary heart of the Altay mountain vary the place the borders of Kazakhstan, Russia and China meet. It’s a cascade of lush inexperienced valleys in between mountains, a few of that are lined with forest and a few, greater ones, with glaciers.
And the “gate to Katon” is a restaurant. Its official identify is Kurt & Wine, but it surely earned its nickname from vacationers due to its distinctive enterprise mannequin.
The restaurant is located within the japanese Kazakhstan metropolis of Ust Kamenogorsk (or Oskemen within the Kazakh language). It’s the closest place to Katon Karagay with an airport, however it’s greater than 400 kilometres from the Katon Karagay village.
Decided guests land in Ust Kamenogorsk after which take a six to eight-hour trip to the pure paradise awaiting them. Many determine to remain within the metropolis for the evening, have some relaxation and go to the “gate” or the “base camp” as it is usually known as.
A cultural and historic introduction to Katon Karagay
The restaurant is embellished with artefacts from the area and trendy artwork with conventional Kazakh motifs. Components of yurts, conventional chests that folks used to retailer items and garments in line the partitions. Vibrant woven belts that have been as soon as girths attaching saddles to horses now act as curtain tie-backs.
At first look, it’s spectacular, however we’ve seen related ethno eating places throughout Kazakhstan. And it nonetheless doesn’t clarify the “gate” factor.
Then we entered ‘the Room’. Most of it was occupied by a disappointingly empty huge desk with odd traces and inscriptions. After the proprietor, Mukhtar Toybazarov, who describes himself as a historian and mountaineer, comes and greets us, we cease wishing the desk have been full.
“I do know what they name us. I actually generally say we’re a touristic info centre greater than a restaurant,” he explains.
“They most likely reward us an excessive amount of, however we did attempt our greatest to elucidate to the vacationers who come to Jap Kazakhstan, what lies forward of them, what they’ll anticipate on their journey.”
Leaning in direction of us, Mukhtar begins to inform us, first in regards to the desk itself.
“We thought for 4 months what to make of it, after which we have been making it for 2 months. The traces listed here are rivers, the desk is the map of Katon Karagay.”
The story begins with the glaciers that soften and provide rivers with water, and in regards to the situations within the mountains. It continues with the individuals who lived there, the archaeological excavations that discovered burial mounds from the 4th and eighth centuries BC, during which individuals have been buried in gold-adorned garments.
He challenges our data in regards to the Kazakhs – those from Katon weren’t actual nomads, he claims – as a result of a extra reasonable local weather, abundance of water and luxurious greenery allowed them to remain in a single place the entire 12 months spherical. Mukthar supply one other mind teaser.
“They are saying Kazakhstan will not be linked to the ocean, however you can sit in a ship in Ust Kamenogorsk and paddle all the best way to the Arctic Ocean. The rivers Irtysh, created by the glaciers in Mongolia and Katun, which springs in Russia, will circulation into different waters and meet in Hanty Mansysk in Russia after which fill the Northern Ocean with water. Previous French maps known as that ocean the Tatar ocean.”
Along with the cultural and geographic introduction, you will get sensible info on the restaurant too, together with the place to remain, what to see, what to keep away from, what sort of automobile can go the place (some roads in Katon are dust or “tractor” roads) and the place to get such automobiles.
You may discover out the place to purchase well-known Katon honey alongside cellphone numbers, vacation spot names, and names of individuals to search for.
And, no, the proprietor didn’t simply sit with us as a result of we have been a TV crew; he really left us at occasions to go and sit with different vacationers. Everybody will get briefed.
Meals remains to be on the coronary heart of the restaurant
Even with all the info and assets, the restaurant remains to be primarily about meals. The map desk lastly fills, and the meals is manufactured from conventional components however with a contemporary contact.
“Our essential drawback was that when foreigners come, they need to eat Kazakh dishes and Kazakh delicacies is a house kitchen, it’s meant for the household, not for the restaurant. You noticed the primary dish ‘beshparmak’ and the way it is available in large shallow bowls. We can’t simply put a head or bowels of an animal in entrance of individuals in a restaurant,” Mukhtar says.
“So, we discovered the best way to save lots of the style and spirit, however modify it to trendy occasions. Take as an example, this dish with pears. The cream the pears are in is the normal kurt (onerous, dehydrated yoghurt common throughout Central Asia). You’d by no means guess.
“We grind it, add some liquid and blow air into it and we get this mousse. And that mousse goes effectively with fruit, pears, strawberries and with meat. However it’s nonetheless the kurt style”.
Baursaks (Central Asian doughnuts) additionally got here within the form I had by no means seen them in earlier than – sliced in half, dipped into milk cream and laced with a sort of native caviar and herbs.
Lamb chops have been marinated and roasted for 11 hours, and horse meat was uncooked, simply smoked. Nonetheless, it was as tender because the lamb. Probably the most conventional half was the bread, scorching from the oven, that our host tears along with his fingers and offers a chunk to all of us.
“My grandmother and my mom used to bake bread like this. We’ve got simply taken it from the particular oven (kazan) so as to style it scorching and contemporary. It’s our customized that the host offers the bread to everybody from his personal hand,” he says.
We parted effectively knowledgeable and higher ready for the lengthy journey forward of us, however we didn’t ask in regards to the hazard at present hanging over the restaurant. Its future might be restricted because the area expands journey choices to draw extra guests.
In an effort to make Katon extra accessible to vacationers and save them a prolonged journey from Ust Kamenogorsk, the federal government is constructing a brand new worldwide airport in Katon. It ought to open subsequent 12 months. It signifies that sooner or later, vacationers could get there by flying over the “gate”.