By Lionel Beehner

K.F.U.C. Ahsin Choudhry is something of a maven at playing with words, letters and names—particularly with those of major food chains. His Brooklyn-based chicken joint, Kantacky Fried Chicken, sits diagonally across the street from a KFC. He also used to own Eleven Seven, the 24-hour deli that shares the same corner. His inspiration for the names? "I do it for fun."

In June 2001 he first opened up his chicken shop—a tiny two-table joint on the corner of Beverly and Coney Island Ave. in Flatbush—and named it Kentucky Fried Chicken. A short while later, KFC erected one of its 11,000 outlets just across the double-lane avenue. The name prompted a phone call from KFC lawyers, who demanded that Choudhry change it or face a lawsuit.

"Lawyers called four or five times and said, 'Your chicken is bullshit. I'm gonna take you to court,'" he said. "They were trying to make me scared. Then somebody came by to take pictures. I could have won [if it had gone to court] but I didn't want to waste the time and money."

But instead of giving in entirely and putting up a new awning with a different name, he just lazily stenciled "a"s over the "e" and "u" (the original lettering is still visible). Hence, "Kantacky Fried Chicken."

"No, we're the New Kantacky Fried Chicken," he corrected me. "But of course, I was laughing at them. It's nothing for them to be concerned with."

The manager of the nearby KFC outlet refused to comment, suggesting I "call Louisville," where KFC HQ is located. A spokesperson in Louisville was unaware of the dispute. No one from 7-11 ever complained about the Eleven Seven deli. If Choudhry had indeed gone to court, it's possible he could have won. In 2002 Victoria's Secret lost a trademark case against Victor's Secret, a Kentucky-based "adult novelty" store.

Unlike Choudhry's KFC doppelganger across the street, Choudhry serves jumbo shrimp, cheeseburgers and spinach rolls, all of it halal. His windows are wallpapered in fluorescent orange signs that announce food specials, and his customers, a mix of all ethnicities, are mostly regulars, many of whom Choudhry knows on a first-name basis.

Choudhry himself is an affable 51-year-old Pakistani-American who, in sandals, khakis and shirt half-unbuttoned, looks like a man on vacation. He's lived and worked in the neighborhood since 1986.

"It was a dead place," he said of Flatbush one sunny afternoon, looking out the neon-rimmed window of his shop at a treeless, concrete expanse along the double-lane Coney Island Ave. "But I know how to bring the corner alive. People are finally moving back and developing the area." o