Detroit’s Most Anticipated Restaurant and Bar Openings, Summer 2019

Spring was a mixed bag for Detroit’s restaurant and bar industry. Although the area welcomed some really exciting new additions such as Core City’s Ochre Bakery, Peso Bar, and Grandma Bob’s, several unexpected closures among relatively new restaurants were a reminder of how challenging operating a business in the Detroit market can be.

Still, there are plenty of up-and-coming establishments aiming to carve out their own spot in the Detroit food landscape. Longtime food truck and catering outfit Guerrilla Food is opening a grab-and-go restaurant near Palmer Park in the next few weeks, while the Siren Hotel’s final restaurant and bar holdouts — Karl’s, Sid Gold’s Request Room, and Paramita Sound — are all on track to open before the end of August. In Birmingham, two big name chefs are preparing to open a major collaborative project, Pernoi. Two burger ventures, Frita Batidos and Slyde are also setting sights on mid-summer debuts in Detroit.

Consider these projected opening timelines estimates. Naming opening dates is always a challenge, due to unexpected hiccups in construction, permitting, and inspections. Here, now, are the Detroit restaurants and bars to look forward to this summer.

Guerrilla Food

Location: 17740 Woodward Ave.
Key Players: Meiko Krishok
Projected Opening: Early July

Catering company Guerrilla Food, which operates the charming farmside food truck Pink Flamingo in North Corktown, is opening a new carryout restaurant and commissary kitchen near Palmer Park in July. The restaurant, located inside a former Bread Basket Deli, will offer grab-and-go items, Hyperion Coffee, a hot bar, and a juice bar year-round.

Michelle Gerard

Leila

Location: 1249 Griswold St.
Key Players: Samy Eid and Sameer Eid
Projected Opening: August

Metro Detroit’s celebrated fine-dining Lebanese restaurant Phoenicia will gain a more casual downtown Detroit sibling in Leila. The restaurant is currently under construction on the ground floor of the Farwell Building overlooking Capitol Park. The 4,500-square-foot space on the south side of the property will seat 130 patrons with a basement level, 20-person private dining room and lounge. The restaurant will focus on Lebanese mezze served family-style as well as seafood, Lebanese grilled meat dishes called mashawi, and a Phoenicia favorite — dry-rubbed pork ribs.

Pernoi/Pulp Media [Official photo]

Pernoi

Location: 310 E Maple Rd.
Key Players: Takashi Yagihashi and Luciano DelSignore
Projected Opening: August

Culinary dream team Takashi Yagihashi and Luciano DelSignore will bring Pernoi to the shuttered Cafe Via space at 310 E Maple Rd. Yagihashi, who previously owned Slurping Turtle in Ann Arbor, helmed one of metro Detroit’s most celebrated restaurants, Tribute, before going on to open Michelin-starred Takashi in Chicago. He’s returning to Birmingham with partner and Bacco Ristorante owner DelSignore to open a restaurant focused on global cuisine,. The interior will reportedly be designed by Kyle Evans with a “luxury yacht” finish. Expectations are extremely high for this one.

Michelle Gerard

Huddle

Location: 110 Clifford St.
Key Players: Kyle and Lea Hunt
Projected Opening: Summer

The team behind Gather is bringing the Eastern Market restaurant’s signature frozen custard cones to a nifty walk-up window, previously home to Chickpea in the D. The new storefront called Huddle will give folks visiting downtown one more spot to pick-up frozen treats on hot days this summer.

Ivy Kitchen and Cocktails

Location: 9205 E Jefferson Ave.
Key Players: Nya Marshall
Projected Opening: Summer

After nearly five years of renovations, developer Nya Marshall aims to bring a neighborhood dining spot to East Jefferson near the Villages this summer. Ivy Kitchen and Cocktails is expected to offer a refined, casual dining atmosphere with a full bar and an “American fusion” menu showcasing Caribbean, Mexican, and Italian food.

Jose’s Tacos [Courtesy Photo]

Jose’s Tacos

Location: 2518 Market St.
Key Players: The Orozco family
Projected Opening: Summer

The former Cultivation Station hydroponics and garden supply store in Eastern Market will be filled by a new outpost of Harmonie Park taqueria Jose’s Tacos. The restaurant will be roughly double the size of the Orozco family’s first location. It’s expected to offer similar dishes to the original such as fried and soft shell corn tacos, quesadillas, and burritos as well as fresh juices.

Frita Batidos/Scott Spellman

Frita Batidos

Location: Columbia Street
Key Players: Eve Aronoff
Projected Opening: mid-July

It’s relatively rare for a burger restaurant to get too much fanfare in Detroit these days. As some have pointed out, this city has a lot of good burger restaurants already. But diners seem willing to make an exception for Frita Batidos, chef Eve Aronoff’s wildly popular Ann Arbor restaurant known for its Cuban-influenced chorizo burgers. The new outpost located near the Fox Theatre seats 96 customers inside with a 45-seat patio. Diners can expect the burgers as well as tropical milkshakes, guava-cheese empanadas, and options like chicken and salsa verde. Frita also features a full bar with shareable fishbowl cocktails.

Michelle and Chris Gerard

Cold Truth

Location: 4240 Cass Ave #100
Key Players: Timothy Mahoney and Chris Reilly
Projected Opening: Summer

Formerly an Eastern Market pop-up, vegan and dairy soft serve brand Cold Truth is developing a new, more permanent location in Cass Corridor this summer. The shop will feature soft serve ice cream with all the fun toppings as well as a prep kitchen for even more Cold Truth pop-ups.

Michelle Gerard

The Siren Hotel Restaurants and Bars

Location: 1509 Broadway
Key Players: ASH NYC, Karl’s (Chef Kate Williams and Matt Wang), Sid Gold’s Request Room (Paul Devitt and Joe McGinty), Paramita Sound (Andrey Douthard, Zach Poley, and Anna Atanassova)
Projected Opening: July through August

The Siren Hotel is expected to round out its anticipated food and beverage lineup this summer in downtown Detroit. New York-based Sid Gold’s Request Room is on track to open in mid-July with cocktails and piano karaoke. Its debut will be followed by record store-wine bar combo Paramita Sound in late-July. Finally, Lady of the House chef Kate Williams and her partner in Candy Bar, Matt Wang, are looking to bring a “not-so-greasy spoon” called Karl’s to the hotel’s second floor hopefully by the end of August. The 85-seat, all-day restaurant and bakery will showcase “American classics” such as doughnuts and ham sandwiches made with Lady of the House’s thin-cut Parisian ham. Representatives for ASH recently teased to Eater that like Candy Bar, Karl’s will incorporate a single (on-trend) color into the design: green.

Prince Concepts [Official image]

Magnet

Location: 4848 Grand River Ave.
Key Players: Chef Brad Greenhill and Philip Kafka
Projected Opening: August

The team behind Takoi is aiming to bring a new “vegetable centric” restaurant called Magnet to Core City in August. The restaurant, located across from Ochre Bakery inside the former Magnet Radiator Works building, will feature dishes primarily cooked on a wood-fired grill and in a wood-burning oven. The interior, designed by Ishtiaq Rafiuddin, will feature 14-foot-high exposed ceilings with an open kitchen at the back of the space and a 32-foot-long rectangular bar that will be “sunken” into the ground.

Slyde

Location: 3700 Third St.
Key Players: LJ Nelson, Anitrah Nelson, Jem Frick, and Rayna Cook
Projected Opening: mid-to-late summer

It’s been a long road for fast-casual slider restaurant Slyde. The restaurant owners originally intended to open in a space beside the forthcoming Motor City Brewing Works on the Avenue of Fashion. After a lot of delays, the group eventually found a new home in Cass Corridor and made it to the final four in 2018’s Comerica Hatch Detroit small business contest. If all goes well, customers will be eating gourmet sliders in Slyde’s new brick-and-mortar space this season.

Also tracking...

• A floral-focused bar called Garden Flora is on track to open by the end of the summer in Virginia Park.
• Detroit-style pizzeria Michigan and Trumbull will begin popping up inside Fort Street Galley ahead of its fall opening in Corktown.
• Islandview’s Belgian-style beer hub Brewery Faisan is aiming for a September debut.
• Forthcoming Grosse Pointe Park neapolitan pizzeria the Bricks Pizza is on track to debut in July.
• The long-awaited Madison Heights outpost of Woodpile BBQ Shack is looking toward a late-summer opening.
• Hotly anticipated East African cafe Baobab Fare is shooting for an October opening in New Center after finally securing additional funding for the buildout.
• Poppies, the Polish restaurant and bakery from the team behind Rose’s Fine Food, is on hold while owner Molly Mitchell hunts for a new location.
• New Orleans-style restaurant, bar, and music space Gabriel Hall is eyeing a fall debut in West Village.
• Gathering Coffee Co. is aiming to open in the North End by late summer or early fall.
• Good Cakes and Bakes is in the process of expanding to NW Goldberg.
• Maya’s Indo-Pak is slated to reopen in a larger building on Woodward Avenue in mid-August.

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• All Coming Attractions Coverage [ED]
• All Eater Tracking Coverage [ED]