Russian shops in the South of France: 46 across 12 cities

Over the summer we put this list together from directories, and in October we checked every shop again from scratch: the SIRENE business register, OpenStreetMap, and the shops’ own pages and social media. The number of addresses more than doubled. But three from the previous version turned out to be dead ends: Kazatchok and Matriochka in Nice, and Chez Tatiana in Toulon. We didn’t quietly delete them. They stay on the lists with a note, so nobody turns up at an old address.

The signs over the door vary. Besides Russian shops, the list has Armenian, Romanian and Bulgarian ones, a Polish shop in Marseille and a Ukrainian one in Perpignan: we go to all of them for the same things, so they’re all in.

Addresses by city, from east to west

Nice, Montpellier and Toulouse have pages of their own, with public transport stops and what each shop sells. For the other cities, the tables are right here.

Nice

Thirteen shops, more than any other city on our list, and three of them are right on boulevard Gambetta. We know the hours and phone number for certain at five of them, and you’ll find every address with its nearest stop on our page Russian shops in Nice.

Antibes

Chez Masha is in Juan-les-Pins, 250 metres from Juan-les-Pins station, and on weekdays it doesn’t open until 14:00. Moscow Market is by the Rochat bus stop, and there’s a shop with the same name and website in Cannes.

Addresses, hours and phone numbers checked on 6 October 2026 against the French business register (SIRENE), OpenStreetMap and the shops' own pages. Small shops change their hours, so call before a long trip.

Cannes

If your old list says Little Russia at 32 avenue Maréchal Juin, you can still go, but the sign has changed: Little Russia closed in 2018 and the address is now Moscow Market. For Kalinka Market on boulevard Alexandre III, we haven’t yet been able to check the hours or phone number.

Addresses, hours and phone numbers checked on 6 October 2026 against the French business register (SIRENE), OpenStreetMap and the shops' own pages. Small shops change their hours, so call before a long trip. Don't go to these old addresses: Kalinka Marché (153 boulevard de la République), closed in 2014; Little Russia (32 avenue Maréchal Juin), closed in 2018.

Toulon

Both shops are open every day. Inter Market is 50 metres from the Station Maritime stop, and Katuscha is on avenue François Cuzin (not to be confused with Katucha, the online shop in Metz, more on that below).

Addresses, hours and phone numbers checked on 6 October 2026 against the French business register (SIRENE), OpenStreetMap and the shops' own pages. Small shops change their hours, so call before a long trip. Don't go to these old addresses: Chez Tatiana - La Boutique Russe (5 rue de la Paix), closed in 2012.

Marseille

Six shops, but for none of them could we confirm both the hours and the phone number, which is why Marseille doesn’t have a page of its own yet. Anahit has two shops: one 200 metres from Saint-Charles metro, and the other, on boulevard de Pont de Vivaux, open daily 9:00-20:00. Anahit also delivers around Marseille (see the delivery section below).

Addresses, hours and phone numbers checked on 6 October 2026 against the French business register (SIRENE), OpenStreetMap and the shops' own pages. Small shops change their hours, so call before a long trip. Don't go to these old addresses: La Maison Roumaine (4 place de Pologne), closed in 2025.

We couldn’t confirm the Diana deli (5 boulevard Louis Salvator). It’s still on the business register, but according to the BODACC legal notices it went through liquidation back in 2013-2014, and Yelp marks it as permanently closed. Don’t go there on spec.

Aix-en-Provence

NOY Market is 80 metres from the bus station, closed on Sundays, and stocks tvorog (farmer’s cheese) and smetana (sour cream). Sheriff Alimentation is on cours Saint-Louis by the Bellegarde stop, but its opening hours are still unknown.

Addresses, hours and phone numbers checked on 6 October 2026 against the French business register (SIRENE), OpenStreetMap and the shops' own pages. Small shops change their hours, so call before a long trip.

Avignon

One shop, Épicerie Matriochka, 200 metres from the Place St-Ruf tram stop (line T1). It sells tvorog, vareniki (stuffed dumplings) and herring. We don’t know its hours, so phone first.

Addresses, hours and phone numbers checked on 6 October 2026 against the French business register (SIRENE), OpenStreetMap and the shops' own pages. Small shops change their hours, so call before a long trip.

Nîmes

Matrochka on boulevard Gambetta, and a Russian-Armenian shop at 45 rue Vincent Faïta. Both have phone numbers but no known hours, so give them a ring before you head out.

Addresses, hours and phone numbers checked on 6 October 2026 against the French business register (SIRENE), OpenStreetMap and the shops' own pages. Small shops change their hours, so call before a long trip. Don't go to these old addresses: Univermag (11 rue Vincent Faïta), no shop at this address (business register and maps).

Montpellier

Four shops, and for all four we know both the hours and the phone number. One of them, Épicerie Arménie on rue Anatole France, is our community partner: we shop there ourselves. What chat members have bought at the other three is on our page Russian shops in Montpellier.

Béziers

La Belle Russie on rue Paul Riquet belongs to the same company as La Belle Russie in Montpellier (they share one SIREN number in the business register), and it’s open even on Sundays, until 12:30. For Magasin Russe Anaita on boulevard de Strasbourg we only have a phone number.

Addresses, hours and phone numbers checked on 6 October 2026 against the French business register (SIRENE), OpenStreetMap and the shops' own pages. Small shops change their hours, so call before a long trip.

Perpignan

Four shops, and two of them, Alenka and Mriya, are open every day. Mriya is right by the Gare TGV stop, and Alenka stocks tvorog, buckwheat, sgushchenka (condensed milk) and pelmeni (Russian dumplings).

Addresses, hours and phone numbers checked on 6 October 2026 against the French business register (SIRENE), OpenStreetMap and the shops' own pages. Small shops change their hours, so call before a long trip. Don't go to these old addresses: Skazka (64 boulevard Félix Mercader), closed in 2014.

Toulouse

Five shops, three of them with both hours and phone number. Krystal and Alimentation Balkanique are a couple of minutes’ walk from Jeanne d’Arc metro, and the rest is on our page Russian shops in Toulouse.

What to buy in an ordinary supermarket when the shop is far away

A lot of what you’re used to is sitting in an ordinary chain supermarket, just under a French name. We cross-checked the online catalogues of Carrefour, Auchan, E.Leclerc, Intermarché, Super U, Lidl, Aldi and Monoprix against the Open Food Facts database (6 October 2026). We didn’t walk the aisles of particular shops in the South, so a small supermarket may not have everything.

Two last tips. Faisselle or fromage blanc de campagne (not the battu kind) gets closer to tvorog if you leave it to drain overnight in muslin in the fridge. And confiture de lait in a glass jar comes close to boiled condensed milk: Bonne Maman makes it, and Carrefour, Auchan, Super U, Lidl and Monoprix have their own brands.

For pelmeni and real tvorog, though, you’ll still need a Russian shop or a delivery.

Delivery across France: who ships, and what about chilled food

France has no shortage of Russian online shops, but not all of them deliver to the South. On 6 October 2026 we filled a test basket at each one and went as far as the delivery quote, without ordering anything. Prices below are as of that date.

Katucha (katucha.fr, Metz) ships by Colissimo anywhere in France, up to 20 kg per order. Delivery is priced by weight: a pack of tvorog to Montpellier would cost €7.25 to a pickup point or €10.50 to the door, and twelve packs of buckwheat (9.84 kg) €16.25 and €18.50 respectively. There’s no free-delivery threshold. Fresh food goes out on Mondays and Tuesdays, the site is silent on insulated packaging, and frozen food isn’t posted at all: pelmeni and vareniki are only delivered around Metz or available for collection. The catalogue has 15% tvorog (275 g, €2.40), buckwheat (800 g, €3.69) and 2% kefir (1 kg, €1.99), but no smetana. The FAQ section on the site is out of date and contradicts the delivery page, so go by the Livraison page.

La Maison Russe (lamaisonrusse.com, Saumur) is more of a gift shop with a small section of dry groceries. Colissimo to your door costs €8.49 (€9.99 with signature). Our basket with one or two packs of buckwheat came to €7.99 for delivery, without naming the carrier, and judging by the basket, free delivery starts at €75. Fresh food goes by express only, and only Monday to Wednesday, but on 6 October that section held a single surprise box for €29.99, with no tvorog or smetana in it. There’s nothing frozen in the catalogue. Buckwheat (900 g, €4.50) was listed as out of stock, with delivery in one to three weeks.

AKHTAMAR (akhtamar.fr, Strasbourg) ships within France and to Belgium and Spain: €5 up to about 2 kg, €10 from 2.4 to 9.6 kg, free over €100. A search of the site brought up 14 kinds of pelmeni and 7 of vareniki, and there’s buckwheat (800 g, €3.90) and 3.5% kefir (500 g, €1.99), but no tvorog or smetana. The big drawback: the terms of sale on the site are still an unfilled template, with no delivery times and no rules for chilled goods, and the “in stock” label can’t always be trusted. The basket accepted a bag of frozen pelmeni for the same €5 without a single warning, but nowhere does it say how the bag would reach the pickup point still cold. Message the shop before placing an order like that.

Anahit (anahit.fr, Marseille) does its own deliveries, chilled and frozen alike, but only around Marseille. The site names 12 towns, from Martigues to Nice, yet on 6 October Marseille was the only one you could pick for delivery, and people elsewhere are invited to sign up and wait until enough others are interested. Delivery is €10, free over €100. Anahit doesn’t serve Montpellier or Occitanie. Prices that day: tvorog 15% (300 g) €2.49, buckwheat (1 kg) €2.49, kefir (840 g) €1.99, smetana sold as crème fraîche 20% (250 g) €1.59.

Slavmarket (slavmarket.fr) only delivers in Paris and the nearest suburbs, so it’s no use for the South.

If you come across other sites on old lists: magasinrusse.fr has turned into a blog about trips and visas to Russia, chez-tema.com no longer loads, Prestige Russe has suspended orders, almost every price in Château Russe’s catalogue is zero, and we couldn’t confirm Magasin Russe France in Lyon.

Our takeaway is simple. Buckwheat and other dry goods travel by post just fine, but pelmeni, tvorog and smetana are safer bought in a shop.

The chat knows what’s on the shelves today

Addresses are a good start, but it’s people who know what’s on the shelves today and where a new shop has opened. That’s how it went with Épicerie Victoria in Montpellier: when it opened in summer 2025, chat members went along on day one and came back praising the prices. The Vibe South of France chat has several hundred Russian-speaking people living in the South, and news like that reaches it faster than we can update this page.

Join us: Vibe South of France community chat on Telegram - shops, relocation and life in southern France

Besides the shops, the community has its own second-hand marketplace on Telegram, Vibe swap and sell, where members sell, buy and give away used things: kitchenware, furniture, kids’ stuff, electronics. It’s a real help in the first months after a move, when you’re setting up from scratch and don’t fancy buying everything new.

See also

• Shops with transport stops and what they sell: Nice, Montpellier, Toulouse
• Épicerie Arménie in Montpellier: our community partner, what to buy there and how to get there
• French names and substitutes for tvorog, buckwheat, kefir, smetana, condensed milk and pelmeni
• An insider’s guide to the South of France: doctors, churches, translators, schools
• Moving to the South of France: housing, paperwork, first steps
• City guides: Nice, Antibes, Cannes, Toulon, Marseille, Aix-en-Provence, Avignon, Nîmes, Montpellier, Béziers, Perpignan, Toulouse