Water. The municipal water is more or less drinkable, with no real nasties, but try to boil it if possible. Bottled water is cheap and easily available. When at restaurants, ask specifically for "Sary-Agash" (of Asem-Ai brand) or Borjomi. Many other widely-known water brands can be found in restaurants and supermarkets.
Tea is widely available, mostly very good and often quite strong. If you are on a budget this is the thing to order with your food. Tea is culturally important in Kazakhstan - "chai" time is one of the most important things a visitor can engage in to learn about the culture.
Coffee. Modern coffee houses and western-style cafés are appearing. They serve good coffee. Coffeedelia (Kalinina and Furmanova) is popular with expats and does OK coffee. One of the best coffee in Almaty can be found at 4A Coffee where they roast their own daily. Gloria Jeans and Marone Rosso also can be found.
Kumis. Exotic mare's milk that you can find, taste and buy on markets.
Tan. Quaint fizzy beverage made of mare's milk.
Local beer. Becker, Staut, Tian Shan, Derbes, Irbis, Alma-Ata. Local brands brewed in Almaty are pretty good.
Local wine. Try the local variety, a good one can be had for less than $4 a bottle. "Bibigul" is perhaps the most consistently good wine, and it comes in a semidry red or semidry white. Avoid to drink wine in restaurants, it's usually very expensive.
Vodka. Good vodka at $8–10 per bottle. In restaurants that do not usually cater to foreigners you get 20(!) cl if you order a vodka, smaller servings not available. Buy a bottle of "Kazakhstan" vodka to take back. It is in a pretty bottle with a picture of Kazakh hunting with a falcon seen through a "window". Try Edil vodka, which is made with the pantacrene of local deer antlers.
The Most Frequently Asked Travel Questions about Almaty
Where To Stay & Best Hotels in Almaty - updated Apr 2024
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Almaty Travel Guide from Wikitravel. Many thanks to all Wikitravel contributors. Text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0, images are available under various licenses, see each image for details.
