For those who like really good food....
As some of you know, I try lots of new places to eat. And now I have two more for your list and mine. Buddies Cafe - Asian and Thai food 12/8 Tverskaya Street (three buildings down the side street from Tverskaya and turn right) There have been lots of discussion on the list about this one. We went to enjoy the "All you can Eat and Help the Kids" special. Kelvin Pang, the owner, talked to us at length about the restaurant and what he is doing to make it attractive. As the prior owner of three restaurants in the US, I understand what he is going through. We sat in the bar area which has smoking. The second room is non-smoking and appears to hold more people. Not familiar with the menu, we let him bring us two soups, spring rolls, fried wontons, vegetables in oyster sauce, sweet and sour chicken, and two other entrees which names were missed. We topped it off with a nice desert of banana with glazed caramel. Presentation was excellent. We got there a bit after the normal lunchtime so we could miss the rush. The service was unpretentious with everything done on time. Everything from the soup to desert was excellent. We have visited many Asian and Thai places in many cities all over the world. I lived in LA for 15 years and knew the best Chinese places in San Marino where my Chinese boss would take us to dinner. Buddies is just as good, if not better than those places in San Marino. No question I would go back and that I recommend Buddies to everyone. Why? I like good food. And if I can convince everyone else to go, then the restaurant will be there the next time I want to enjoy the good food again!! Very greedy on my part, but that's life! Old Tower - Russian home cooking Revolution Square I've lived in Moscow for a long time and finally tried what I thought was a tourist trap. The restaurant is next to the metro station on the square. It turned out to be a very good restaurant with a Russian menu that includes a lot of entrees you would get in a fine Russian home. The decor is old Russian. The staff wear clothes from the time of Boris Goodenov. There are several levels with some private dining areas. It would be a great place to have a company dinner or special occassion with friends. The menu is in Russian with English under each item. We each had soup - a baked pumkin soup with cream and solanka that my Russian wife said was as good as any she ever had. Her entree was pelmeni that was perhaps not homemade. My entree was the shank of pork glazed with honey and served with a cranberry sauce. It was a large portion that we took home and made a lunch with it the next day. The food was excellent. The service was average. I would also recommend Old Tower as a good place to try some Russian cooking, especially if you have some visiting friends here for the first time. (One Red Square and Cafe Pushkin are still at the top of the list for Russian cooking, but this is a good alternative.) Phil Smith
_______________________________________________ Expat mailing list [email protected] http://www.lists.ru/mailman/listinfo/expat http://www.expat.ru/forum/
