24-hour Pizza on Tverskaya

This month, the fast-evolving Moscow bar and restaurant scene serves up some late-night Pizza a la Intourist, more Guinness Extra Stout, and a tap-room conspiracy.

Unholy Alliance

If you are looking for a good place to eat right in the heart of downtown, Moscow’s Patio Pizza has just opened its second restaurant ‐ this one at the base of the Hotel Intourist on Tverskaya ulitsa. Patio Pizza has built a legend for itself with its reasonable prices (including a $6 all-you-can-eat salad bar) and for cultivating something akin to a suburban American atmosphere in central Moscow.

Patio Pizza focuses on what it does best, with only the salad bar and its range of pizzas on offer. Pizzas r u n from $5 for tomato and cheese to $15 for the works. There is a full bar, with light and dark draft beer for $3 a glass. Bottled beers are $4.

The new Patio Pizza is open 24 hours a day, and serves breakfast from 5-10:30 am. What with the 24‑ hour Azteca Mexican Restaurant located on the top floor of the lntourist, this grey behemoth of a hotel now stands unrivaled in the central Moscow late-night category.

The Greening of Moscow

Also recently opened are Moscow’s fourth and fifth Irish pubs, The Irish Bar and Sally O’Brien’s. The first is on ul. Ostozhenka near the Park Kultury Metro station, the second on Bolshaya Polyanka, just south of the Kremlin and across the river. What these bars have in common (besides lots of wood and a pleasant atmosphere), are wholly uninspired and overpriced food selections. Stick to the beer here, and you’ll have a nice outing.

Where these two bars differ most is their clientele. The Irish Bar, located in a suitably dark courtyard basement, is the only of Moscow's Irish bars to attract an almost entirely Russian clientele. If you want to speak English here, you may be in for a test. When the Irish bar first opened, the prices were relatively reasonable ‐ around $4.50 per pint. This pricing scheme has fallen victim to a now common Moscow practice of “hook them and jack up the prices." Recently, a pint there was going for around $6.

Sally O'Brien’s features several Irish barkeeps and caters to a more mixed and ex-pat crowd. Prices here are Moscow standard at around $5 for a pint of Guinness, Kilkenny, or Harp.

Speaking of prices...

Moscow loves a conspiracy. And over the last six months, it seems that the capital's restaurant and bar owners have begun to collude on the price of their beer. There are few places left in Moscow that do not charge $4 for bottled beer and $5 to $5.50 for a large draft

One establishment that has managed to buck the trend is the centrally- located Armadillo Bar. The Armadillo, which bills itself as s Moscow’s only Tex-Mex bar (don't tell La Cantina, the Santa Fe, the American Bar and Grill, and a few others), is a sprawling and low-ceilinged basement affair located a stone’s throw from the Hotel Rossiya and Red Square on Khrustalny pereulok. Here one can buy bottles of Dos Equis and Sol for R15,000, or around $3 each. Bar-room gamers can take advantage of the Annadillo’s 5 pool tables (at R20,000or almost $4 per game) and 4 dart boards (free).

The decor here is mostly brick and wood, and you may have trouble finding a seat because there is always a large crowd. The Armadillo serves up a limited menu of stale nachos, over-priced French fries, chili, burritos, and the like. They also feature live music and dancing on weekends.