By day, the super-tourist heads not to the Russian-doll stalls outside Lenin's tomb, but to the chandelier-bedecked halls of the Gum shopping mall, to pick out their souvenirs.
Obviously, look for sugar-free gum! Don't shop hungry.
It is also a study in contrasts, with the ultrachic GUM (pronounced goom) shopping mall, itself once a dreary Soviet-era department store, looming over older people hawking red T-shirts and Kommunism-in-a-Kan gag gifts (there is nothing inside) and with hip young capitalists jostling past homeless people.
Prosecutors warn that the bizarre crime wave is now a "major problem" in cities across the UK, with thousands of pounds' worth of gum stolen from shops.
But the fact that — in addition to fresh baked goods (plum-nectarine galette, poppy-seed cake, pizza), whole milk, novelty toothbrushes, and a selection of vintage gums — the storefront shop stocks Cosmopolitan assures us that the period pose is all in good fun.
Set aside at least a whole afternoon, if not a full day, to shop through GUM in Red Square.
At Batch, Pichet Ong's new bubble gum-pink take-out shop, you can buy Vietnamese coffee cake, yuzu shortbread and durian ice cream, or packages of cookies and biscotti.
A few months ago I lied to myself that eating "omega booster seeds" or tiny squares of carrot cake was in some way a substitute for nipping out to get a packet of Fruit Gums from the corner shop, and signed up to get "nibbles" delivered directly to my desk.
Since opening in 1893, Moscow's shopping mall GUM - or State Universal Store - has mirrored many of the changes in Russia's politics and history.
It's the living, lunching proof of Andy Warhol's great insight into American pop vernacular: like chewing gum and detergent, the coffee shop is used by high and low alike.
A bubble-gum pink, spatter-painted bake shop with crystal chandeliers seems to fit Pichet Ong just right.
