Dining in Russia

We had a night in St. Petersburg to go to dinner before the theatre. We told our guide we wanted authentic Russian food in a place locals would eat too. She narrowed it down to a couple of places and took me in to choose based on the atmosphere. The minute I saw these chandeliers and the painting on the walls I said "This one is perfect!" It was called Sadko.

We started with vodka, served chilled in little glasses. The waiter told us it's meant to be downed in one gulp. I'm a sipper. The girls had mors, a berry drink.

Then I ordered a few appetizers so I could taste a lot of different things and the rest of the family got entrees.

This was a pickled platter, with salted cabbage, really nice.

Then a herring salad with beets and egg. Very good.

I had to try the caviar too. As expected  it was very fishy and salty, yikes. I think I prefer the black eggs. We all had a taste and then ate the delicious blinis plain.
We also tried draniki (potato pancakes), beef stroganov, and chicken kiev.
A very cool experience we won't soon forget.