Before K-Food Arrived, Kazakhstan Already Had “Korean Food”

Today, Korean food is no longer unfamiliar in Kazakhstan. Kimbap, kimchi, ramen, and Korean-style fried chicken have become increasingly visible, especially as K-pop, Korean dramas, and films continue to attract younger audiences.

But if the story of Korean food in Kazakhstan begins with the Korean Wave, an important chapter is missing.

Long before the term “K-food” became popular, Kazakhstan already had its own form of Korean food culture.

That history was created by the Koryo-saram, ethnic Koreans who settled across Central Asia.

A Train to an Unfamiliar Land

The story of the Koryo-saram in Kazakhstan begins not with food, but with forced migration and survival.

In 1937, the Soviet government deported around 170,000 ethnic Koreans from the Russian Far East to Central Asia. Many were sent to Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan after long and difficult journeys by train.

Among their major early settlement areas was Ushtobe in Kazakhstan. The deportees arrived in an unfamiliar environment, often without proper housing or basic infrastructure. Some survived harsh winters by building temporary shelters dug into the ground.

Yet they rebuilt their lives.

They farmed, raised families, and formed communities. And among the things they carried with them was the memory of food.

When Radish Was Unavailable, Carrots Took Its Place

Recreating the food of the Korean Peninsula exactly as they remembered it was impossible.

Ingredients were different. Seafood was scarce. Vegetables commonly used in Korea were not always available.

So the Koryo-saram adapted.

One of the most famous examples is morkovcha, a seasoned carrot salad often described as Koryo-saram-style carrot kimchi.

Unable to rely on familiar Korean ingredients, they used carrots that were widely available in Central Asia. Over time, the dish became popular far beyond the Korean community and spread throughout the former Soviet Union.

Similar foods became widely known as “Korean salads.”

To someone from South Korea today, these dishes may look only partly familiar.

But rather than being distorted versions of Korean cuisine, they are better understood as foods shaped by migration, memory, and adaptation.

Koryo-saram cuisine developed from Korean culinary traditions while also absorbing influences from Russian and Central Asian food culture.

It became something distinct.

“Korean Salads” in the Middle of the Market

One of the best places to see this legacy is the Green Bazaar in Almaty.

At stalls throughout the market, shoppers can find seasoned carrots, cucumbers, eggplants, mushrooms, cabbage, and other vegetables prepared in styles long associated with the Koryo-saram.

These dishes are commonly recognized locally as Korean salads.

And they are not eaten only by ethnic Koreans.

Over decades, they became familiar to Russians, Kazakhs, and other communities across the region.

In other words, for many people in Kazakhstan, their first encounter with Korean food may not have been Korean barbecue or instant noodles seen in a television drama.

It may have been a small container of seasoned vegetables sold by a Koryo-saram vendor in a local market.

Then a New Wave of Korean Food Arrived

Over time, something interesting began to happen.

For decades, Koryo-saram cuisine had represented one version of “Korean food” in Kazakhstan.

Then the Korean Wave introduced another.

K-pop, television dramas, films, and social media brought contemporary South Korean food culture into the country. Younger consumers began searching for foods they had seen on screen.

One of those foods was kimbap.

Vendors who had traditionally sold dishes such as kimchi and seasoned vegetable salads began adding foods associated with modern South Korea as customers increasingly asked for them.

The result is symbolic.

Today, two different Korean food traditions can exist side by side in the same market.

One is the cuisine developed by the Koryo-saram over nearly nine decades in Central Asia.

The other is modern K-food arriving directly from South Korea through the global popularity of Korean culture.

Both are described as Korean food.

But they carry very different histories.

Food as a Record of Koryo-saram Life

For the Koryo-saram, food has never been only about taste.

Languages changed across generations. Russian became the primary language for many families, while Korean gradually disappeared from everyday life.

Yet food often survived.

Families continued preparing kimchi, noodles, rice dishes, dumplings, and other foods associated with their heritage.

Recipes also changed.

Ingredients were replaced. Cooking techniques were adapted. Russian and Central Asian influences entered the kitchen.

The result was not simply Korean cuisine preserved abroad.

It was a cuisine created through migration itself.

Food became a way of remembering where people came from while also reflecting where they had learned to live.

In that sense, Koryo-saram cuisine is both Korean and Central Asian.

It is a culinary record of displacement, adaptation, and identity.

Korean Flavor Arrived Before K-Food

Today, K-food is part of a new wave of Korean cultural influence in Kazakhstan.

Young consumers try dishes they see in dramas. Korean restaurants serve increasingly familiar menus. Instant noodles, fried chicken, kimbap, and other popular foods continue to gain visibility.

But decades before that trend began, Korean communities in Central Asia were already making kimchi, seasoning vegetables, preparing noodles, and selling food in local markets.

Their dishes were not identical to the food served in Seoul.

They could not be.

Food moves with people.

And when people move, food changes with them.

The Koryo-saram did not simply preserve Korean food exactly as it had been. They reshaped it so that it could survive in a new environment.

Over time, those dishes became part of Kazakhstan’s own culinary landscape.

That is why the story of Korean food in Kazakhstan cannot be explained only through the rise of K-pop, Korean dramas, or today’s global K-food boom.

To understand where it truly began, we have to look much further back.

Before K-food became global, Korean flavors had already traveled across Eurasia with the Koryo-saram.

And long before the world learned the term “K-food,” Kazakhstan already had its own “Korean Food.”