[HOT LIST] Fish fry

Photo by Chris Jones (stopherjones) on Flickr.

"You buy we fry." You'll see this sign posted in big block lettering on white cardboard or all lit up in red and blue neon everywhere you go in the city outside of the trendy central MidCorkDown districts. I love coffeehouses, creperies and craft beer bars as much as the next hipster (hey, I'll cop to wearing skinny jeans), but these places still don't represent the majority of the businesses and consumers in the other 100-and-some square miles of the city.

Take a drive down 8, 7 or 6 Mile. The Davison. Livernois. Grand River. You know what you see? Fish markets. An endless parade of fish markets. They aren't in the prettiest neighborhoods and they might not be in the prettiest buildings, but these neighborhood joints take the concept of the fish fry VERY seriously. Many are carry-out only, a lot of them also serve barbecue or chicken, and the "You buy we fry" means you can either buy the fish there and take it home to cook yourself or they'll fry it up for you while you wait. They might not be glamorous, but these places represent one of Detroit's unique regional specialties. (And a moment of silence for the old Dot and Etta's Shrimp Hut, a Detroit staple for decades.)

#1 Mr C Fish Market (Detroit)
Order a sandwich (which includes three pieces of boneless fish) or a dinner (five pieces with two sides) from their huge menu which includes whiting fillets, pickerel, orange perch fillets, crappie, crab claws, cod and smelt. They also serve fish-and-shrimp combos and sell shrimp, scallops and oysters by the pound. For those who don't like critters that swim, they have chicken wings and wing dings. For a great snack try their house specialty: perfectly breaded and seasoned catfish nuggets (and add some hush puppies).

Photo by Hane C. Lee (calamity_hane) on Flickr

#2 Scotty Simpson's Fish and Chips (Detroit)
Scotty Simpson's has been in NW Detroit's Brightmoor neighborhood for over 60 years. It is a Detroit classic, frozen in time with its old-school wood paneling and carved wooden fish hanging on the walls. It's not a market but a dine-in and carry-out restaurant, and they specialize in one thing in particular. If you guessed that thing is fish and chips, you are exceedingly astute. Flaky snow-white cod fried up to crispy, golden brown perfection - and to be clear, the difference between carry-out and dine-in is the difference between soggy (if flavorful) batter and hot, crispy-crunchy batter fresh out of the fryer. It's worth popping a squat and soaking in the ambiance of crusty Americana.

#3 Fresh Fish House (Southfield, Highland Park, Redford)
They pride themselves on carrying fresh fish from around the world (availability may change with seasons), but the local favorites are the catfish, cod and tilapia. Get your fish as a sandwich served simply on wheat bread with plenty of Frank's Red Hot, or get a whole dinner with tasty fries and slaw. Also try their house "Gumbolaya" (a Creole/Cajun hybrid of gumbo and jambalaya, just like it sounds) and don't miss out on their okra.

#4 Detroit Shrimp and Fish (Southfield, Clinton Twp., Pontiac)
The specialty at Detroit Shrimp and Fish is their tilapia, which is responsibly-raised and sourced from Regal Springs aqua farm. They also serve non-American and genuine American Southern-raised catfish, walleye, white bass, yellow perch, and truly JUMBO shrimp. Order a sandwich or lunch special, a half-pound dinner, giant one-pound dinner, or take home the fish only. The beer-battered cod served with steak fries (aka fish and chips) and slaw is another favorite, and don't miss their thick, indulgent banana pudding (made with Nilla wafers!) or the 7UP pound cake. 

#5 Lenten Fish Frys (Detroit, Hamtramck)
Okay, so not a market or restaurant but it is appropriate to the season. You don't have to be a Christian fasting for Lent to enjoy some good fried fish, but if you are, several local churches and community organization centers host weekly Friday fish frys. In Hamtramck, check out the Moose Lodge and the P.L.A.V. Post #10 (which is taking up the mantel of the old Hamtramck Knights of Columbus Friday fish frys after the building was sold to a Bengali group). Many other local Knights of Columbus chapters host a weekly Friday fish fry; call yours to check. Detroit's St. Francis D'Assisi will have a fish fry every Friday 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. for only $8 (and that includes the fish, fries, slaw, fruit, a roll with butter, cake AND beverage). The Polish ethnic Sweetest Heart of Mary Church in Detroit always hosts a Friday fish fry during Lent which includes fried fish, baked fish, mac and cheese, pierogi and more. For more area listings, check the Archdiocese of Detroit's website (they assured the complete listings will be posted this week).

Bubbling under Mr. Fish (Detroit), Nu Wave Fish and Chicken (Detroit, Southfield, Ypsilanti), Bet and Jessie's Fish and Chips (Redford), The Original Redford Fish and Seafood Market (Redford), Miley and Miley Shrimp Shack (Highland Park), Vergotes (Detroit), O'quin's Shrimp House (Detroit), Detroit Shrimp and Fish (Detroit - separate ownership from #4)

[Metromix] Tallulah Wine Bar and Bistro

Photo by VATO for Metromix.

Mindy VanHellemont opened Tallulah Wine Bar and Bistro in Birmingham in February 2010 – not exactly the most reassuring time in recent memory for a first-time restaurateur to be opening a brand-new business.

“It was a rough time to open,” she agrees. “But I really wasn’t terrified because I really felt I had something that was unique enough and special enough that people would want to come.” Tallulah is finally the restaurant she had always envisioned it to be. “I wasn’t worried about failing so much as I was worried about getting it right,” she says. “That took a year and a half and now it’s really becoming the program I wanted to see.”

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Note: Be sure to click through the image gallery for the full descriptions of each dish.

[Oakland County Prosper] Nothing Small About Peteet's Famous Cheesecakes

Photo by Nicole Rupersburg.

Peteet’s Famous Cheesecakes in Oak Park offers 30 different flavors of two-layer cheesecake daily (they make a total of 90 different varieties) whole or by the slice. But this isn’t just cheesecake: this is probably the best cheesecake you have ever had in your life – even the top chefs in metro Detroit think so.

“I remember I met with a Master Chef before I ever knew what a Master Chef was or that such a thing even existed,” says Patrick Peteet, owner and baker of Peteet’s Famous Cheesecakes. “So I met with [Master] Chef Kevin Gawronski at Schoolcraft College … I let him try out some of the plain cheesecake and he said, ‘This is very good,’ then I had him try the sweet potato cheesecake and he said, ‘This is the best cheesecake I’ve ever had in my life.’ Then Chef Sean Loving came in – and you know, he’s the sweet potato king – and he said, ‘This is beyond good.’”

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[EID Preview] Clubhouse BFD: It's a BFD

All photos by Nicole Rupersburg.

There are beer bars. And then there are beer shrines. Clubhouse BFD in Rochester is not just a beer bar; it is a juried gallery exhibit of the brewing arts.

Owner Scott LePage grew up in the restaurant industry. His parents are long-time area restaurateurs, at one point operating over two dozen different restaurants. (Currently they own Big Rock Chophouse in Birmingham, and will be opening a brewpub called Griffin Claw Brewing Company later this year ... Scott jokes it was all his mom's ploy to keep his dad, a 74-year-old with the energy of a hyperactive teenager, occupied and out of trouble.) Scott currently owns East Side Mario's, a chain of hearty Italian-American restaurants with locations in Rochester Hills and Livonia.

Next to the Rochester Hills location, a building sat empty for a long time. Scott owned the land but after he lost his previous tenant, every prospective tenant wanted half a million dollars for a build-out before signing a lease. "If I'm going to spend that kind of money, we might as well do it ourselves," Scott says. Thus the seed of Clubhouse BFD - which, to be clear, stands for "Beer Food Drink" - was planted.

The concept evolved from a sports bar to brewery (they considered moving Big Rock's brewing operations over) and then ultimately landed on craft beer bar. But not just any beer bar. "I don't want to have the same shit everyone else has," Scott states. The thing is, if you want to have a robust beer list it's pretty easy to come by. Most of the big-name local breweries have a handful of year-round beers in wide distribution so right there you can easily get a list of 50 pretty quickly, then pad it with the usual Belgian, English and French imports. And yes, an awesome beer list it makes, enough to keep even the most discriminating of connoisseurs happy (even if they've had the majority of beers on that list before).

But Clubhouse aims to be competitive not just with the best beer bars in Michigan, but the best beer bars in the country - the kind of places that get ranked by DRAFT Magazine and RateBeer in the top 100 across the nation. So Scott brought local beer guru Jason Peltier on board.

This is a beer nerd's beer bar; where most places carry Founders Porter, they carry Founders Imperial Stout. They've got the sole Michigan allotments of extremely limited releases, like Mikkeller/Three Flloyds Boogoop (they've got the only kegs in the state) and bottles of Goose Island's Kind Henry (they got four of eight available in Michigan). As a beer nerd myself, I was reduced to the vocabulary of a four-year-old watching Cars as I perused their tap handles, coolers and back inventory (there are 40 taps and over 150 bottles, plus a few off-list "goodies" for the really good customers). All I could utter was a breathless "Oh WOW!" repeatedly. After years in the industry, Jason and his team (who have worked together at places like Big Rock and Kuhnhenn) know how to properly court their distributors to get the best products. "Every night in here with the beer distributors was like the Last Supper," Scott jokes, miming them all sitting in a line at the bar studiously sampling beer. "One night we tried 97 beers!"



When Scott decided to move forward full-force with this concept, he put together a team of the area's best to make it happen. For the design, he hired Ron and Roman, a Birmingham-based design firm that has recently become the darlings of Detroit's architectural and interior design after some of Ron Rea's recent work has made him the new restaurant "It" guy (including Joe Meur Seafood in Detroit, Luxe in Birmingham, and a handful of other spots about to open including John D in Ferndale and Roadside Bar and Grill in Bloomfield Hills). Rea gave Clubhouse an open feel, incorporating design elements - and items of interest - that would be befitting of an adult man's ideal clubhouse. Stuffed deer, Rock-em Sock-em Robots, airline seats, mounted Cadillac seats, genuine WWI silk parachutes ... the kind of things a guy might want to have in his home if his wife would ever let him (but she won't). You could look around for hours and still catch new details you missed before, but at the same time it still manages to be a relatively minimalist, rustic design - sturdy wood tables, exposed brick. The sound design, with the speakers in the ceiling tiles, is equally as impressive though less likely to get noticed.

The concept of the Clubhouse evolved over the year and a half that they worked on it; in fact, that wasn't even going to be the name but as people kept calling it that, ultimately it just seemed to fit. And that is exactly what it is: a clubhouse for beer lovers. Like, REAL beer lovers. The kind who need a clubhouse. But if you're concerned that there may be too much beer snobbery, don't be - they'll have your Bud and Miller et.al. available in 16-oz. cans ... served in a brown paper bag.

There will be buckets of Little Kings bottles (a cream ale so named because the bottles are indeed little) for $9, and you can also mix your own six pack to go. There is also a small but excellent wine list with some eclectic labels (Michigan's own Left Foot Charley; Kung Fu Girl) as well as a respectable selection of brown liquors for serious consumption.

The menu at Clubhouse is going through its final adjustments, but will be a casual menu of polished bar food. Because of Scott's long background in restaurants, he is extremely particular when it comes to the food he serves and will just as soon test out 15 different versions of a dish and still not include it until he feels it's perfect. They'll have a simply Ploughman's platter (meat, cheese, bread: good), giant buffalo shrimp, mussels, Greek wings (in a lemon oregano marinade), burgers, shaved prime rib sandwiches, grilled cheese, fish and chips, etc. They'll also have something called "The Jersey Shore," modeled after the New Jersey-based Taylor Pork Roll which Scott describes as "the equal to our Coney" and "the ultimate late-night belly bomb and hangover cure." This pork roll is covered in American cheese and served with a fried egg on toasted brioche.

The same exceptionally high standards applied to the concept, design and product were also applied to the service staff. "They're all very polished servers," Jason says. "I'd say 15-25% of them were bar managers before this, but came here because they love craft beer and they love the concept." Upon hiring they were all given copies of the book Tasting Beer by Randy Mosher, and are required to have completed the Master Brewer's Association Beer 101 course within 90 days of hire; already four of them have gone the extra step by becoming Certified Beer Servers (a step below Cicerone). 

Clubhouse BFD is now open Tuesday through Thursday 3 p.m. to 12 a.m., Friday 3 p.m. to 2 a.m., Saturday 12 p.m. to 2 a.m., and Sunday 12 p.m. to 10 p.m. They also have free WiFi.

Want to see more? Check out the Flickr set here.

[HOT LIST] Paczki

At Elias Donuts. Covert cell phone photography by Nicole Rupersburg.

Fat Tuesday is coming February 21, and that means one thing to metro Detroiters: PACZKI. Paczki are dense doughnuts filled with any number of fruit fillings (including the less-common but more traditional rose hip and hibiscus) then glazed or covered with powdered sugar, but for me, I don't even acknowledge paczki unless we're talking custard. (If I wanted a mouthful of jam I would buy a jar of jam and eat it, the end.)

Plenty of places serve their own version of this traditional Polish pastry - an extra-rich doughnut originally made in order to use up all the remaining eggs, lard and sugar in the house before Lenten fasting began - but we all know Hamtramck is the place to go for the absolute BEST. Which is why Paczki Day in Poletown is a high holy day; check out the all-day parties at Small's (home of the Paczki Bomb!), Whiskey in the Jar (easy on the Jeyzy), a limo shuttle bar crawl leaving from Polonia (can you beat 45 bars in one day?), and whatever else. Na zdrowie!

New Palace Bakery.

#1 New Palace Bakery (Hamtramck)
I usually eschew making any end-all/be-all claims here, but when it comes to paczki New Palace IS. THE. BEST. Their paczki are big and doughy and a little lumpy and heavy and dense. Plus when you order a half dozen or dozen, they put them in a standard bakery box and use twine from a dispenser mounted in the ceiling to tie it ... which I just find Old-Worldy and cool. They have an amazing selection of breads in addition to their pastries and cookies, as well as a full deli counter and homemade pierogi. And here's the tip-top secret: they have paczki all year round, every day of the week. So you could wait in line on Paczki Day just for the thrill of it, or you could just get your paczki fix, like, tomorrow.

Flavors include standards (see New Martha Washington below) as well as raisin and rose hip, and also some custom creations: the Millennium Swirl is a chocolate + custard combo created in the year 2000 to commemorate the new millennium, the United Paczki is a strawberry/custard/blueberry combination introduced in 2002, the strawberry/custard combo was first made in 1997 to commemorate Hamtramck's 75th anniversary, and the Hamtramck Boat is kind of the banana split of paczki with strawberry and pineapple filling and banana custard covered in chocolate. Looks like New Palace got my custard memo!

#2 New Martha Washington Bakery (Hamtramck)
Smaller than New Palace (and they don't serve paczki year-round), Martha Washington has its own devoted following. Their paczki are rounder and more evenly-shaped, like fat little hockey pucks covered in powdered sugar. They started carrying paczki officially today, and on Paczki Day they'll have 14 flavors available - raspberry, strawberry, blueberry cherry, apple, apricot, lemon, prune, custard, Boston cream, chocolate Bavarian, butter cream, plain sugar and pineapple.

#3 American Polish Cultural Center (Troy)
Upholding Polish culture, customs and traditions over in suburban Troy (where there is a sizable population of people of Polish descent, the effect of Polish-American migration out of Hamtramck), the American Polish Cultural Center will sell thousands of dozens of paczki next Monday and Tuesday. They are taking pre-orders now; paczki are $9.50 per dozen if paid by Sunday and $10 per dozen after. They'll have prune, custard, apricot ,cherry, stawberry, raspberry, blueberry and hibiscus, all made from scratch in their own kitchen (which also does all their banquet catering and serves the on-site Wawel Restaurant, which serves hearty homemade Polish-American cuisine made properly by a group of little old Polish ladies and don't think I'm kidding). The building used to be an architecture and antique museum displaying woodwork from the homes of prominent families including the Rockefeller Estate. When the APCC acquired the building, many of the antiques and elaborate woodwork remained (including a stunning archway from the Rockefeller mansion) - the story goes that the rich guy who owned the building sold what he could and just left the rest, so the Center is not just a place that celebrates Polish culture but also a home of American history, a lived-in museum.

#4 Bartz Bakery (Dearborn)
Bartz is known specifically for their bread, but as a bakery with a Central European background, Bartz also makes their own paczki every year around Lent. As of last week they are now available every day, and they have a variety of different flavors ... including custard.

#5 Elias Donuts (Detroit)
Located in Detroit's Rosedale neighborhood, Elias Donuts has been around for 30 years. It has that old-school doughnut shop charm - a long formica counter and tiled floors with 1950's-style soda shop stools all the color of Good and Plenty's. In addition to doughnuts, they serve a variety of grilled sandwiches, fried fish dinners (catfish, perch and cod), burgers, breakfast sandwiches on their housemade bagel "thins" and flatbread, and ice cream from Hershey's Ice Cream, and it's all 24 hours. They also serve paczki all year round, but on Fat Tuesday they up the ante with additional flavors - blueberry, strawberry, regular and chocolate custard, and pineapple. FYI, they stick to the glazed varietals.

Bubbling under Supreme Baking Co. (Detroit), G M Paris Bakery (Livonia), Bozek's Meat and Groceries (Hamtramck), Srodek Deli and Bakery (Hamtramck)

[Concentrate] Ypsilanti's in the Mix (or Vice Versa)

Recent developments over in Ann Arbor's country cousin are making Ypsilanti quite a destination for those looking to support local artisan movements. Café Ollie recently obtained a tavern license, so they now offer a selection of Michigan craft beer and wine along with their coffee and comfort food. Next door the same owners opened the MI General Store, a specialty food store that specifically caters to all things Michigan-made: craft beer, fine wine, candies, snacks, and condiments. After a little over a month of operation, many folks are claiming the Wurst Bar is actually has the best gourmet brats, burgers, and large beer selection. And then there is Mix Marketplace, a brand-new artisans' market in downtown Ypsi (think of it as a farmers market but with artisan goods instead, much like Ferndale's Rust Belt Market).

"We had this empty beautiful building across the street and a lot of people were coming up with different ideas that were not going to work," explains Leslie Leland, who owns Mix New and Used along with her husband Markel and partners Ed and Bonnie Penet. "It's owned by our landlord, so we decided to start a dialogue about doing something over there."

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[EID Feature] I Dream of GC with the Sharp Gruyere: Cheese Dream Gets Ready to Open

All photos courtesy of Cheese Dream.

Are food trucks "over"? Not by a long shot. In fact, in greater metro Detroit they've only just begun. Detroit's El Guapo made headlines for its much-touted 60 trips to City Hall just to get the proper permits; recent food truck meet-ups in Eastern Market and the Royal Oak Farmers Market packed crowds to capacity with two-plus-hour wait times for tacos; and Mark's Carts in Ann Arbor was lauded for introducing a whole new kind of business model to Southeastern Michigan. (For my own little exposé series on metro Detroit's food truck scene, see here and here.)

As food truck fever hit the streets of America in the last several years, metro Detroit is finally getting up to speed. 2011 saw several high-profile ventures launch (including those listed above), and 2012 will see even more. One of which will be Cheese Dream.

Cheese Dream is a partnership between Jordan Ceresnie and Afrim Ramaxhiku. The two met while working together at Zingerman's Roadhouse, but both have equally fascinating (if drastically different) life stories. Ramaxhiku grew up in war-torn Kosovo; Ceresnie is the progeny of iconic metro Detroit furriers Ceresnie and Offen Furs. "It's funny - he's a Muslim [from Kosovo] and I'm a Jew from suburban Detroit. That we're collaborating on this is pretty cool." Both have worked in Michelin-rated restaurants - Ceresnie all over the country and Ramaxhiku all over the world.

Ceresnie always knew he wanted to be a chef. He started in his first "real" kitchen at age 17, then at 19 he moved to California and attended the Napa Valley Cooking School. He started working for Thomas Keller in Bouchon Bakery, then later moved to L.A. for an internship and worked at the now-shuttered Sona. Ceresnie was part of both teams when they received their first Michelin stars. "It's cool to cook at the top and be able to compete with the best chefs," he says.

While he was living in California he started his own garden. "You can grow anything in California," he states. "I started to become interested in where the food I cook in the kitchen comes from." When he moved back to Michigan, he enrolled in Michigan State University's organic farming program. "I really dove into organic food production and what it's all about." When he graduated, Zingerman's Roadhouse seemed like a perfect fit for him. "They have an organic farm and a restaurant where they use those products."

Despite his culinary pedigree, Ceresnie's passion has always been in comfort foods. "I grew up with the typical American comfort food, mac and cheese, nothing gourmet ... those are the kinds of foods that make me feel good." When he and Ramaxhiku were discussing their business concept they originally thought of having a wood-fired pizza cart (Ramaxhiku had opened a wood-fired pizzeria in Kosovo previously). Finally they decided, "Let's just do grilled cheese." "I guess whatever we're doing we want it to have something to do with bread and cheese," Ceresnie explains. "It's a staple of life. If you have bread and cheese, it's a meal."

"Who doesn't like it?" Ceresnie continues. "We take it from American cheese and Wonderbread and go beyond that. It was a blank canvas for us. Almost any meal or dish you can think of can be turned into a grilled cheese sandwich." They want to use artisan cheeses and local produce and products as much as possible, and also work with local food vendors and processors. The partners recognize how critical buying local is to the health of the economy and the community.

Cheese Dream is not fully functioning yet, but the cart itself (more of a trailer that can be hitched to a truck) is done and they are already signed up to be a part of Mark's Carts food cart corral when it reopens for the season in April. In the meantime, they've been doing test markets in Chicago and even visited the long-running Grilled Cheese Invitational in L.A., which they hope to compete in next year. They chose to stay in Ann Arbor because of their relationship with the community there already. "There's a tight community in Ann Arbor that's very supportive," Ceresnie says. "It has always been a progressive city ... Ann Arbor is really nurturing to new business ideas, and the idea of Mark's Carts is really cool too."

Right now, they're working on their recipes, and you bet you can expect some truly gourmet spins on this childhood classic. "Right now we have a play on French onion soup. It has rich, beefy caramelized onions with gruyere cheese; it's all the flavor components of French onion soup on a grilled cheese sandwich." (FOS!!!) They are also going to have the classic American cheese variety on challah bread from Dakota Bread Company in West Bloomfield, their bread of choice for all their GC sammies. "I chose it because being from a Jewish background I ate a lot of challah," Ceresnie says. "It's amazing by itself; on grilled cheese it can only be better."

At the Grilled Cheese Invitational 2011.

Some other grilled cheese variations include the Beastie, which is basically a BLT "with a lot of cheddar." And without even realizing it at first, they found themselves trying to approach different flavor profiles from around the world. "You can take a tour of the world through [grilled cheese] sandwiches!" An Italian-inspired sandwich features hand-pulled mozzarella which they make themselves with roasted tomato and olive tapenade. A Mexican-inspired creation features green chiles with cilantro, lime and Monterrey Jack cheese. They also want to have one based on an ingredient from where Ramaxhiku grew up called ajvar (a red pepper and eggplant spread) with feta cheese.

While a future traditional brick and mortar restaurant is not out of the question, for right now starting with the cart just makes economical sense. "There are lower overhead costs and greater ease of starting up versus a brick and mortar location," Ceresnie explains. "We also have the flexibility to not HAVE to be at one spot all the time." While Cheese Dream will primarily be at Mark's Carts this season, they have a greater vision of traveling to farmers markets and events "going to where the people already are rather than waiting for them to come to us."

Ceresnie sees a sort of renaissance happening in food trucks right now. "We're going from junky mass-produced food to artisan food," he says. "Just through watching TV and traveling, I'm seeing this trend of the classically-trained chef going back to the basics and back to comfort food, doing one thing and doing it really well."

Like grilled cheese.

Through this experience, Ceresnie has reconnected with old friends he hasn't seen in years, people like him who have a passion and the guts to go off and start their own business. One of them owns a screenprinting business in Detroit and is making all their T-shirts; another does vinyl graphics and is making the decals for the cart. "You know you're on the right path when everything falls into place [like that]," he says. "I'm really excited about doing grilled cheese but more than that I'm really excited [to be surrounded by] like-minded entrepreneurs. We're kind of a rare breed but where there's one there's usually more."