The Merivale Fish Market and Seafood Grill is set to reopen its doors after it was forced to temporarily close from a fire last summer.
“I’m excited to be back,” said owner Anthony Epifano. “But it was a difficult four months.”
The restaurant and shop located at 1480 Merivale Road, will throw open it’s doors to customers on Tuesday.
In July, it was affected by a serious fire, which started in the vacant building next door.
The fire was deemed not suspicious, but it was a serious blow to the shop and restaurant after it had completed a renovation just weeks before.
“I don’t have an exact number,” said Epifano of the total loss. “But definitely in the hundreds of thousands of dollars between fish, between renovations, between damage to the building. It was, something that I hopefully never deal with again.”
Merivale Fish Market after a fire in July
The business has been in operation since 1993, with one half being a restaurant and the other being a store to buy fresh seafood.
After months of hard work to fix the place up, Epifano is happy to have patrons fill the booths again.
“We have a few new things on the menu,” he said.
“But I’ll leave that a surprise for people to come in on Tuesday. And then otherwise you can expect what we’re great at. You’re going to have our fish and chips, great pouring beer, great service.”
His dad, Joe Epifano, is the original owner and still works alongside his son.
“Seeing our friends and family coming in and our customers — we don’t consider them customers anymore. They’re a part of our family business,” he said.
“We’re kind of looking forward to the vibe of the of the restaurant itself.”
Customer Gale David says it was the first restaurant she went to when she moved to the area five years ago. She said she’s happy to see it return.
“I’m so pleased,” she said.
“I hate to see a nice place that I enjoyed going to being burnt. It’s lovely to see a family business that’s able to start up again.”
Epifano says the restaurant will open Tuesday to Friday from 11 a.m. until 8 p.m. and 11 a.m. until 9 p.m. on Saturday and Sunday.
With the fixes complete – Epifano says he’s now looking to the future.
“Hopefully it’ll set us up to be here for another ten, 15, 20 years,” he said.