Lottie Pikuzinski has been serving up pierogi and beer since she was a teenager, even though she didn’t open her own place until 1969.
Her tavern, the R&L Lounge, is on Mills Street, only a paczki’s throw from the Broadway Market. With Ronnie, her husband of 53 years, she runs a tidy holdover from the Sattler’s era, visited by regulars and “Airborne Eddy” Dobosiewicz’s Forgotten Buffalo Tours.
By now her surprisingly light cabbage rolls, and her Polish dumplings, each one marked with her fingerprints, have created lots of fans. But don’t try to order takeout, because the feisty saloon owner will shut you down. “This is a lot of work,” she said. “If people ask me to buy it and take it out, I won’t sell it to them.”
In January of 2009, I asked Marty Biniasz where to go for a good Fish Fry while I was visiting Buffalo. I went and took a guest for Lottie’s food. She serves a feast and sat right down with us at the table. She had us try everything – pierogi, fish, etc. It was fantastic. Her husband tended the bar and Lottie cooked, served and sat down to enjoy the meal with us. It is a memory I’ll hold for a very long time. Snow piled up outside, not very many cars at all on any street in or outside of the city – yet the trip was worth it for the food, the old world ambiance and the company of R & L !
Thanks for this article and video. It brings back a warm memory.
Lots of love to Lottie and Ronnie from Florida!