Best Russian Deli

No one beats the Russians when it comes to noshing, as Gastronom ably demonstrates. This sunny corner delicatessen overflows with the delicious sorts of tidbits that make full-fledged meals seem so unnecessary: tubs of red and black caviar, smoked salmon, herring, and whitefish, pâtés, three kinds of mushroom salad, a dozen cheeses, dolmas, flaky coulibiac, piroshki of all sorts, two dozen varieties of sausage, a silky beet-cabbage salad -- everything you need for the zakuski table. The shelves are stocked with candies, teas, pickled vegetables, fruit syrups and preserves, all manner of canned fish, Russian wines and vodkas, and heavy rye breads suitable for sandwich-building. A refrigerator case holds farmer's cheese, kefir, pelmeni shells, halvah, and several elaborate cakes, and there are a number of Russian-language newspapers to read while you sit at one of the little tables and munch on your cabbage roll.