Sipping vintage cognac under the brick arches of a cellar opposite the Bronze Horseman, relaxing to the strains of 1970s Western pop music, it was something of a surprise to see an Orthodox priest swinging incense around the room.
Bar Tribunal had just opened in the same week as the Kavkaz restaurant (see this week's restaurant review), which has the same owners, and they had decided that the public could not be admitted until the place had been formally blessed.
No doubt it was necessary to drive out the evil spirits of the past, the judges of imperial Russia who sent revolutionary thinker Nikolai Chernyshevsky to Siberia in 1864.
The trial took place on these premises, hence the name of the bar, and the author of "What is to be Done?" was sentenced to seven years' hard labor and exile for life.
It is not only Chernyshevsky who would be surprised at the way the former courtroom looks today. The priest was none too happy with the juxtaposition of religious sculptures and busts of Marilyn Monroe.
"Of course my reaction to this is negative, but it's the desire of the owners," said the priest. I just hope they'll correct this in time."