Bar-B-Que Restaurant Stepping into Casa Rica's Old Digs

Just over a month after the state officially cancelled the liquor license belonging to Casa Rica's principal owners, construction has begun inside on a new barbecue restaurant which hopes to be open within two months. 

According to Vic Prusinowski, a former town councilman who is involved with the new project, Cody's BBQ and Grill, as it will be known, is hoping to offer a family-style barbecue and grill menu, something he believes is lacking in the area.

"I think there is a need for it," he said on Wednesday afternoon. "I don't think there is any good barbecue on Eastern Long Island. There's the place in Greenport (BBQ Bill's), but the nearest I know is in Patchogue."

Prusinowski didn't compare it to Spicy's Bar-B-Que up the street on West Main, since he said he plans on offering steaks and burgers, in addition to a sports bar with ten televisions. 

Though Cody's will be the third restaurant to open on East Main Street in the past seven months - with the Riverhead Project due to open not too long after - as long as there is variety, said one downtown restaurateur, there should be enough to go around for everybody. 

"Restaurants are very good when they're bunched together," said John Mantzopoulos, owner of Athens Grill, five doors down from where Cody's will be serving food. "They create a kind of theme park, if you want to call it. If the cuisines are diversified enough it can be very successful. On the other hand if you have 20 restaurants selling burgers, that might get a little cutthroat.

"Either way, anything is better than Casa Rica."

Casa Rica, which closed its doors in early November, had a cutthroat reputation of its own. The restaurant was forced to stop selling alcohol after a man was stabbed in the abdomen multiple times in an altercation in the middle of October. The incident was the 11th documented fight at the restaurant in 18 months. According to Mike Smith of the State Liquor Authority, the state cancelled the liquor license held by the company's principal on Jan. 3.