Anchovy's Club

Anchovy's Club on Kolokolnikov Lane runs as a seafood brasserie by Folk Team and Dreamteam, without a single meat dish. The idea alone looked unexpected for these teams, but the restaurant quickly found its own voice: there's no sense of a typical beer bar here, even though beer plays a major role, and the maritime theme never turns into a decorative gimmick. The place turned out lively, well put together and very cohesive.

Our guide's team finds that Anchovy's Club wins you over instantly, and serving beer in 0.2-liter pours keeps the place from slipping into an ordinary — forgive the slang — beer joint.

Inside is a tall room, plenty of open air, and an interior that reads as California ease mixed with yacht-club details. Lacquered wood, deck boards, precise furniture and lighting create a sense of an upscale yet unpretentious space. When the windows are open, the room connects to a multi-level terrace that runs into greenery, and the restaurant becomes especially striking. There's no excess noise in the design here — just an environment that makes you want to stay longer.

The beer program is thoughtfully done. At the center of attention is a two-tier cold room and house-made styles, but the real trick isn't the flashy presentation — it's restraint. An Oyster-man walks the room with oysters, and a Beer Boy tops off your glass until you stop him with a coaster, adding just the right lightness to the service.

Nikita Kocherygin runs the kitchen, and his menu is built on fish and seafood without trying to mimic meat classics one-to-one, though familiar formats are cleverly reworked here. Octopus mortadella, crab-and-shrimp chebureki, an octo-dog, raw-fish dishes, oysters, and hot dishes with a maritime accent all give the place a distinctive character. Our guide's team singles out the salmon Wellington as one of the strongest dishes here. On weekends, breakfast joins the main menu, put together just as imaginatively, with no rote eggs Benedict.

Our undercover guests rated it 8 out of 10 for dinner, for a precise seafood concept, a rare balance between gastronomy and a relaxed pace, and a format unlike any other Moscow brasserie. What makes Anchovy's Club so good is precisely that it doesn't fall apart into separate good ideas — the kitchen, the service, the beer and the space all work here as a single whole.