Judd Fruia no longer with Fruia’s Tre Amici in North Dallas

by Teresa Gubbins

Restaurant will remove "Fruia's" from the sign, re-assign his employee parking spot, and spray-paint over the "Judd was here" graffiti in the rest room.

DALLAS — Fruia's Tre Amici will now be called Tre Amici, which is a roundabout way of saying that manager Judd Fruia has left the building and is no longer with the restaurant, as hinted at here.

Principal investor Scott Larson, who also owns the site, confirmed that Fruia left on Tuesday.

"Since opening for business in September, we’ve been well accepted in marketplace for our food and ambiance, which Judd and [chef] Tim Soufan have been working on together," Larson said. "But with the challenges of the economy and the time it's taking to ramp up the restaurant, Judd came to us and started discussions about finances and concerns by removing himself from the partnership in order to make sure the restaurant could survive.

"It's been his baby, something he’s been nurturing. It's a generous thing on his part to do, for the sake of the baby itself and its continued survival and success."

Soufan will take a bigger management role, and they've also hired Joey Kindred, who moved up from Austin where he worked with Ruth's Chris and the Belmont restaurant. The concept behind menu -- i.e., steakhouse with Italian flair -- is the same, but Soufan will offer more nightly specials.

"Judd Fruia is a lovely and wonderful person," said Larson. "I’m sad that he's not going to be directly involved on a day-to-day basis but he's offered us support, and we're going to continue the relationship with him, we’ll have him around for a long time to come."

Thanks to Jimmy Contreras.