Twenty years ago, the first McDonald's opened in the Soviet Union, on Moscow's central Pushkin Square. 

To mark the 20th anniversary on Sunday, which foreshadowed the collapse of communism,  McDonald's sent a string of directors to the snow-bound Russian capital, including chief executive Jim Skinner.

A total of 30,000 Soviet citizens tasted hamburgers and Coca-Cola in McDonald's for the first time on that day, setting a new record for the number of first-day visits in the restaurant's history.

The massive queues of those first days have disappeared, but the restaurant still gets more visitors per year than any other McDonald's in the world. 

The formula of success may be the size of the restaurant.

[Jim Skinner, McDonald’s Chief Executive]:

"First of all, it was built big. You indicated earlier the queues were around the block when we first opened this restaurant, and it has continued this way. We serve almost two million guests a year here in this restaurant and it is a big restaurant."

Pushkinkaya restaurant can serve up to 900 people simultaneously. Back in the early days, customers queued for hours and some excited diners took home used paper cups and straws as presents for their children. 

People in Moscow still remember the queue.

[Muscovite Vichslav, Moscow Resident]:

"I was with my mama, I remember. It was something out of the ordinary and I really wanted to see it, we had only heard of it but never seen it, and then suddenly there it was, it was so unusual."

After the success of the first restaurant, a second and third followed. Now, some 218 McDonald's restaurants operate across Russia, serving 600,000 people daily. 

While many restaurants in Russia had trouble staying open during the global recession, McDonald's saw its number of visitors grow.

Most Russians seem to love the American fast-food, but not everyone agrees.

[Ludmilla, Moscow Resident]:

“I never go to McDonald's, for me it's idiotic stuff, I only eat Russian things, things that are home-cooked.”

The burger chain plans to have nearly 300 outlets in Russia by the end of this year.