Midrange
Darbar
(http://darbar.ru/about/) - leninsky prospect, 38 hotel "sputnik", metro station "leninsky prospect", tel. +7 495 930-2925; +7 495 930-2365, email: [email protected]. it is situated a bit aside from the city-center, but has a very good location with a panoramic view over the city. the cuisine is authentic; arguably it's the best indian restaurant in moscow. average bill for two people is rub 2 500. staff speak english. also a great place to watch the salute away from the crowds.
Lavash
 cuisine from the caucus region. large menu with pictures, good choice of russian beer and vodka at reasonable prices. looks more expensive than it is. conveniently located 100 metres south of the nikulin circus on tsvetnoi bulvar. come out of tsvetnoi bulvar, turn right, walk 2 minutes.
Starlite
A small chain of American-style diners, where you can still try Russian borsch or pelmeni. Popular among Moscow expats as almost first places run by foreigners; among Moscow middle-class crowd for quality food and fast service.
Soup
More than a dozen of soup varieties.
Hard Rock Cafe
 on old arbat street. serves the same menu it does worldwide for reasonable prices. they are open for breakfast at 6am and serve traditional western breakfasts for what works out to be about $8 usd per person. fresh squeezed orange juice and hash browns are a highlight here. you can eat outdoors and watch the endlessly fascinating parade of characters that walk the street all day and all night.
Mi Piace
(http://www.mipiace.ru/) â a chain of italian restaurants. relatively inexpensive but quite popular among locals and expatriates working in moscow. addresses are: 22 chayanova 250-0893; 13/9 b. ordynka 951-52-50, 953-96-65; 20 tverskaya 650-7575; 20 sadovaya-samotechnaya 694-0001; 16/16 pokrovka 623-4411; 7, 1st tverskaya yamskaya 970-1129
Oprichnik
(http://www.oprich.ru/) ðð¿ñð¸ñð½ð¸ðº. 2, pyatnitsky pereulok 987-10-05. ancient dishes of russian cuisine including game.
Korchma Taras Bulba
 petrovka 30/7 near metro pushkinskaya/chekhovskaya. pyatnickaya st. 14 near metro novokuznetsckaya. ukrainian chain restaurant with a interior decorated like a ukrainian house. dinner costs $25 for two people.
Dyadya Vanya
 pushkinskaya/chekhovskaya. literally 'uncle ivan's', this place also showcases a nostalgic interior of the inter-war period.
Top end
Vogue Cafe
(http://novikovgroup.ru/re...) â situated right across the street from tsum on kyznetski most street building 7/9, the restaurant is a great little find but do not be fooled by the word cafe. it is quite trendy inside and can be busy in the evening. the prices are on the lower end of expensive fish dishes range between 800-1300 rubles and the wine list is extremely underpriced by russian standards - like at least 4000 rubles per bottle. overall, the food is absolutely delicious.
Carré Blanc
(http://www.carreblanc.ru/...) metro novoslobodskaya â french restaurant with an attached and much cheaper bar/cafe which also serves good food. good wine list. french/english/russian spoken.
Roberto
Genuine Italian restaurant frequented by Italians.
Ne dal'nii vostok
"not far east" (http://novikovgroup.ru/re...) tverskoy blvd, building 15. overall, it's a real splurge but definitely worth the indulgence.
Pushkin
Has a cafe and restaurant cafe is cheaper. A fake 19th century mansion built in 1999 that pretends to be a tourist attraction, not just a place to eat. The legend goes that so many foreigners were asking for the restaurant with this name that they finally opened one. With a stretch of imagination the food might pass for what it purports to be, the aristocratic Russian cuisine from the Czarist times.
Krasnaya ploschad dom 1
1 red square â in the heart of moscow, in the historical museum building on the red square to the right hand if you are looking at the lenin mausoleum. quite expensive, but worth visiting; dinner is about $70-80 per person.
Expedition
(http://www.expedicia.ru/) â northern cuisine was really excellent though this is really expensive place.
Riviera
 painfully slow white glove service but it's a beautiful restaurant with a harpist playing throughout the meal and expertly prepared authentic french dishes. expansive wine list.
Ethnic food
Viet Cafe
A modern fusion-like chain of cafes serves vietnamese cuisine but for a slightly higher price. normal meal will cost around 500 rubles per person.
Kharbin
Well outskirtsâbut worth a dedicated trip. Non-Europeanized authentic Chinese restaurant. with therefore generous portions, each main can typically fill a couple. Both run entirely by and where 80% of clients are Chinese. Try turtle soup; eggplants in caramel sauce. Loud karaoke weekend evenings. No credit cards.
Izumrudnaya Reka
"emerald river" a nice place for vietnamese food in the savyolovskiy market, close to savyolovskaya metro station.
Azerbaijani â Azerbaijani cuisine is probably the most popular in Moscow.You can find Azerbaijani restaurants everywhere in Moscow.It is strongly recommended if you want to try delicious food in Moscow.
Armenian - Similar to Turkish and Azerbaijani cuisine but with an exciting twist to it. Try out their mouth watering charcoal grilled kebabs and fish dishes. Many good restaurants available around Moscow and many of the chefs are actually natives from Armenia, which adds to the authenticity of the food. Try out Restaurant Gavan at the address: âulitsa Rossolimo 7, gorod Moskvaâ. Take metro to Park Kulâtury station, also not far away from the famous Gorky Park.
Georgian â Besides Russian cuisine, one variety of ethnic food that is strongly recommended while in Moscow is Georgian. This cuisine is generally spicier than Russian food, and there are a number of reasonably priced Georgian restaurants in Moscow.
Japanese â Muscovites have been obsessed with sushi since late 1990s, and the boom is not over yet. Japanese restaurants are probably most popular among young Russian women, easily competing with Italian and French restaurants. The picture menus are a great help when ordering, and the names of items are basically just Japanese transliterated to Cyrillic. Don't expect a proliferation of raw fish, though; the most popular rolls contain cooked items.
Thai cuisine can be found only in few restaurants, and its authenticity is debatable.
Vietnamese and Chinese cuisines are not popular with Russians, but can be found if you search for it.
You can find "authentic" Chinese and Vietnamese food in Vietnamese/Chinese Markets, such as Izmalovo Market. You will need to do some exploring deep into the markets or maybe ask a few vendors to locate the restaurants. The vendors themselves eat at those places.
Most tourists will find that going out to eat in Moscow is quite expensive. It does not have to be that way, it's just that the options most visible for the foreigner generally are.
There are a number of American franchise restaurants, such as McDonald's and TGI Friday's; it's a familiar, if boring eat at a reasonable price.
A huge and quickly growing range of restaurants, with a matching range of prices, has developed in Moscow. The average cost per person for a middle to top class restaurant will be $30 to $200 more if one goes for vintage wines. A quick 'canteen' style meal in a 'Stolovaya' can cost about $3 and is generally underground, near famous monuments and subway stations. These large food courts sometimes also contain a small mall. They will usually include toilets but be prepared to pay around $1 to use them. Lately a lot of new "middle-class" restaurants have opened, filled with families on weekends. The omnipresent McDonald's have outlets near many metro stations.
Non-chain restaurants and cafes promising "European and Caucasus cuisine" are equally bad in either one most of the time; seek a specialist single-region venue instead Georgian, Russian, Italian, French etc.
Many small restaurants within the Sadovoye ring are now offering prix-fixe "business lunches" at around RUB200-250, for the teeming hordes of white-collars populating the neighborhood during the day. These deals are valid in the middle of the day 12-3 PM and include a cup of soup or an appetizer, the main dish of the day a smaller portion than if you order a la carte; sometimes there's even a limited choice, bread no Russian eats anything without a slice and a beverage soda or coffee/tea; beer costs extra; it is a reasonably priced, freshly cooked quick meal in the middle of your wanderings which will tide you through to the evening.
tipping
Waitstaff in Russia are not as dependent on tips for a big chunk of their pay as, say, in the U.S., so the expected amount is correspondingly less, and you generally will not be looked at with hidden malice even if you take all of the change brought back to you, but tipping is still encouraged. If your total is under 500 rubles, round it up to the nearest fifty; under 1000 - to the nearest hundred; from 1000 to 1500 a hundred-bill is appropriate. If you are going above that, 10% would be reasonably generous; in really swanky places, though, all bets are off. Don't tip in cafeteria-like settings, where you travel along the counter with a tray and pay at the cash register. Throw a couple of tens into the tip jar for baristas. Note: there is no way to leave a tip on the credit card - when you receive the slip for signature, there isn't a place to write the extra amount in, so keep enough small bills in your wallet.