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Restaurant That Promoted All-You-Can-Drink Four Loko Shuts Down After Raids

By Patrick Hedlund | December 1, 2010 6:23pm | Updated on December 2, 2010 6:19am
Chef Eddie Huang decided to close his Lower East Side restaurant Xiao Ye after multiple raids by the State Liquor Authority.
Chef Eddie Huang decided to close his Lower East Side restaurant Xiao Ye after multiple raids by the State Liquor Authority.
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By Patrick Hedlund

DNAinfo News Editor

LOWER EAST SIDE — An Orchard Street restaurant and bar owner who planned to host an all-you-can-drink Four Loko event has shut down after multiple raids by the State Liquor Authority.

Xiao Ye, chef Eddie Huang's four-month-old Taiwanese restaurant, had been promoting deals on the caffeinated cocktail before the state successfully moved to ban the drink and others like it by Dec. 10.

Huang stopped offering an all-you-can-drink Four Loko special at the eatery after the SLA ruled the practice illegal, but continued to sell the potent malt beverage a la carte, which contains 12 percent alcohol and the caffeine equivalent of two cups of coffee.

He told Eater that following one SLA raid at Xiao Ye, where agents destroyed his Four Loko supply, the restaurant underwent three more raids by the authority involving undercover agents posing as customers with fake IDs. So, Huang decided to close for fear that his liquor license would eventually be revoked, Eater noted.

"[C]an anyone really, honestly, truly say they were not entertained?" the chef wrote on his blog Tuesday, in the wake of the closure. "XY closing: your loss, not mine," he added.

Huang will now return to the kitchen at his other Lower East Side Taiwanese restaurant BaoHaus, Eater added.