Borscht, pierogi and community: A revolutionary Russian restaurant nears its last days

“For many people, it’s not a restaurant but like a home to be somebody’s guest — like my grandma’s home, my grandma’s cooking,” said that manager, Tatyana Urusova, who has owned the restaurant since August 2020 and whose official title since then is president (she presides over a small, rotating crew of cooks and servers, all of whom are volunteers). “They feel it’s not a capitalistic place where people just try to get money from everybody. If people complain, it’s just at the entrance from people who expect fine dining and don’t want a buffet. In Google reviews, people say they don’t understand this place.”