Moscow is in the middle of a food renaissance,” says Karina Baldry, a Muscovite chef and an author, now a Londoner. Whereas a decade ago rocket salads, Argentine steaks and sushi were all the rage, now – because of economic sanctions and a renewed patriotic mood – high calibre chefs are rediscovering their Slavic roots. They have started to use forgotten or newly created ingredients, such as local marbled beef and Russian mozzarella, and old cooking methods, involving the use of pechka ovens. For most Russians, eating out is still a special occasion, so even the most “democratic” places (a popular term to refer to more relaxed, less exclusive places) invest in expensive design, fabric napkins and table service. With some 12,000 restaurants in this sprawling city, we asked six Muscovite gourmands for their favourites. “Venture outside of the touristy centre by taking the metro to Avtozavodskaya station for this gastronomical street,” says chef Karina Baldry who grew up in Moscow during Soviet times. “The food courts of my youth were either bare-shelved or exclusively for the top party echelons.” By contrast, StrEAT offers more than 30 street food stalls (mainly start-ups or small chains) from across the world: Lavka sells Dagestan-style flat pies (£1 a slice), and Crimean oysters; Kurkuma is very popular with a younger crowd for its version of Indian tikka masala, despite Russians traditionally being spice-averse. Opened in April 2018, in the not-quite-gentrified neighbourhood, StrEAT offers affordable prices (£3-£10 per dish) in a communal setting with diners sharing long tables. Karina recommends Georgian khinkali dumplings, pot-bellied pleated parcels with a mixture of beef and pork inside: “To eat them, you hold the dumpling by its doughy knot and carefully bite to suck the stock juices first, then munch on the rest. Delicious.” The word uhvat refers to a long-handled wooden utensil used to slide food in and out of a pechka, a wood-fired oven found in many Russian houses until the late 19th century. Uhvat is one of the restaurants leading the resurgence in traditional Slavic cooking, with slow-cooked dishes such as pumpkin kashas (a type of porridge) with honey and linden dressing (£3.50), baked roe with pickled bramble (£14) schchi soups with fermented cabbage and chichelindas, an old recipe for pate, here made with ox tail (£5). Don’t leave without tasting toplyonoe moloko, a thick creamy dessert made by baking milk for several hours. The pechka oven features in many Russian fairytales – the Baba Yaga witch shoves children into ovens – and takes the centre stage at Uhvat. Daily rituals, such as using goose feathers to dust out the ashes, enhance the magical atmosphere.