Spotted Pig Team Says John Dory Will Resurface

Ken Friedman fights his Muslim neighbors at the Ace Hotel and vows The John Dory will rise again

By JOHN CAPONE

Updated 12:15 PM EST, Wed, Oct 28, 2009

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The John Dory

As the Breslin in the Ace Hotel lumbers toward its long-delayed opening, word comes from Ken Friedman (who is opening the restaurant along with his Spotted Pig compatriot April Bloomfield) that the team is going to resurrect the John Dory. And the problem with the venture was not that it was too expensive (though the next incarnation will be more casual) -- it was too small.

Not only will the shuttered west-side British seafooder be back, says Friedman (though he failed to say where), but it will be in a space four times as large -- "like the Spotted Pig with fish."

Friedman, it seems, was in an F-you sort of mood. When he made his Dory boast, he had been telling the Observer of his fight with the mosque across the street from Breslin, who have complained bitterly about being close to a bar and have even made a veiled threat to throw a brick through the Breslin's window (though he failed to say where). And though he agreed to cover the window to the bar with a curtain so his Muslim neighbors would not have to see that there was alcohol being served, Friedman's attitude is something less than contrite.

As the Observer writes:

Mr. Friedman and his partner, Spotted Pig chef April Bloomfield, did agree to nix plans for a dive bar in a townhouse next door, but as for the restaurant, “I said, ‘This is the United States of America and we’ll do whatever the fuck we want.’”