Saying goodbye can be tough. Especially when it comes to some of our favorite restaurants. From Italian staples, hole-in-the-wall diners, and trendy eateries, here are some of metro Detroit’s restaurants that left too soon (and for some, not soon enough.) Either way, these dining destinations forever hold a place in our hearts — and stomachs.

Antietam If you ask Antietam owner, there was nothing to eat in Detroit before he and Slow’s BBQ arrived. Then the city gentrified and got too cool for his tastes, so he closed shop in 2018. Photo via Yelp, Antietam
The Soup Kitchen Saloon The old, well-loved Rivertown blues and creole spot closed sometime in the 1990s and was destroyed by a fire not long after. Photo via MT file
Chin Tiki This tiki-themed supper club opened in 1967 and closed in 1980. But before its demolition in 2009, it played a cameo as a setting in the Eminem film 8 Mile. Photo via Flickr, Joyce Pederson
Coach Insignia The fancy restaurant at the top of the Renaissance Center closed in 2017. But a new restaurant run by a James Beard-award winning chef will open in its place. Photo via Facebook
Twingos This Midtown favorite in what’s now Shangri-Las was a hip dining spot in an area that didn’t have much to speak of in the early 2000s. Closed sometime around 2003. Photo via Yelp Duke A.
Carl’s Chop House A classic restaurant opened in 1951 by Carl Rosenfield, the business closed in 2008 and the building was demolished in 2010.Photo via Facebook
St. CeCe’s Thought known more as a watering hole, many culinary talents passed through its kitchen before it closed in 2016. It reopened as Lady of the House in 2017. Photo via MT file
Under the Eagle Is your favorite Hamtramck Polish restaurant Polonia or Polish Village? Ours was Under The Eagle but sadly it closed in 2011. Photo via, Hamtramck Review
Local Kitchen & Bar Ferndale’s Local got in early on the whole local food movement, but its owners recently decided to get in early on the ax-throwing craze. Closed in 2017. Photo via Facebook
Joey’s Stables Classic eatery of the old style, established in 1933, and proudly serving surf ‘n’ turf in a well-appointed room on Jefferson across from Zug Island. Closed in 1989. Photo via Facebook
Dangerously Delicious Pies Headed up by co-owner Don “Doop” Duprie (yes, the guitarist and singer of Doop & the Inside Outlaws fame), the endeavor was originally a spin-off of Baltimore-based Rodney Henry’s pie shops out East. For years, Duprie was slinging his pies out of Comet Bar and Third Street Bar. As of last year, there were two brick-and-mortar shops, in Midtown Detroit and Wyandotte. They closed last year. Photo via Facebook
Gracie See Pizzeria An institution on the west side, Gracie See lasted 40 years. When it opened back in 1969, pizza was a treat. When it closed in 2016, pizza had become one of the five food groups. You can still get a taste of the good old days at the surviving Inkster location. Photo via Facebook
Delray Cafe This longtime holdout remained a stubborn fixture on Jefferson Avenue even until a decade ago. It was destroyed by fire in 2014. Photo via Yelp, Lorna E.
Mae’s in Pleasant Ridge The tiny Pleasant Ridge shop was the quintessential hipster breakfast spot and it was wonderful and we miss it. Closed in 2016. Photo via Facebook
Top of the Pontch Another casualty of the Great Downtown Detroit Rooftop Collapse of 2017. Photo via TopOfThePontch.com
Tre Monti Ristorante A mini-state with fewer than 30,000 inhabitants, San Marino fielded a culinary outpost in Troy in Tre Monti Ristorante for many years, behind the San Marino Club. The restaurant featured a well-known Sammarinese dessert called Monte Titano, resembling the emblematic three-peaked mountain for which the restaurant is named. Photo via MetroAlive.com
Watkins Burgers The classic Downriver burger joint opened in 1937 but met its demise in the early 2000s. But Wyandotte bars still have what they call “Watkins night“ which we’re told is basically burger night. Photo via, The News Herald
Cheesesteak Institute of America How could you not miss a Cheesecake Institute? Sadly, the Wyandotte shop shuttered in 2017, but its food truck rolls on. Photo via Yelp, Cheesesteak Institute of America
Oslo A hip sushi spot in downtown Detroit before it was hip to be hip in Detroit. Photo via MT file
Pete’s Place In the spring of 2008, Peter Mel opened Pete’s Place, transforming a dreary coney island into a hip eatery inspired by live theater. The long narrow room was decorated with colorful Broadway show posters and featured art-deco fixtures. Show tunes dominated the restaurant’s playlist. Even the menu used theatrical metaphors. Photo via Facebook
Roma Cafe The well-loved Italian spot was Detroit’s oldest running restaurant when it closed last year. The good news is one of its old chefs remodeled and reopened a new restaurant in the old spot. Photo via Facebook
Plaka Will Greektown ever be the same without this 24-hour spot to feed the creatures of the night? Closed in 2016. Photo via Yelp, Plaka
Torino Fresh off a 2012 retooling, Torino was heaped with praise from multiple publications, including a 215 reader’s pick as Best Restaurant in Oakland County. But in June of 2015, the owner, chef, and bar manager decided they’d rather close than deal with repeated trouble from the Health Department about how small their kitchen was. Photo via Facebook Nicole Rupersburg
Schweizer’s Restaurant Once upon a time, an immigrant community swept over Detroit and changed its character forever: the Germans. Downtown’s restaurant scene suddenly was filled with the lip-smacking gemütlichkeit of hearty peasant fare washed down with beer. A stalwart of that dining scene was Schweizer’s, established 1862. We once reprinted an old recipe of the restaurant’s we found for sauerbraten and potato pancakes. It closed in 1991, and in 2014, General Motors tore the building down. Photo via MT file
Angelina Italian Bistro After a decade of enlivening Broadway, this nifty Italian eatery closed in December 2017. But there’s hope: We see an announcement on the restaurant’s website that information on a new location is promised soon. Photo via EatDrinkMichigan.wordpress
Topinka’s There were two Topinka’s in Detroit: Topinka’s on the Boulevard across from the Fisher Theatre and Topinka’s Country House, at Seven Mile Road and Telegraph. The Detroit location was taken by fire. Photo via Flickr, CardBoardAmerica
The Summit The restaurant at the top of the Renaissance Center back in the old days, the Summit was something of a standout, one of that rare breed of restaurants perched atop a building upon a rotating floor. It was also atop the Western Hemisphere’s tallest hotel. The Summit closed before the space received a $10 million makeover in 2004 that did away with the revolving platform. Photo via Flickr, Wikipedia
The Golden Mushroom The Golden Mushroom was a Southfield institution, started when co-owner chef Milos Cihelka left Detroit’s London Chop House to strike out on his own. The restaurant’s prized Golden Mushroom soup can still be had at Steve & Rocky’s in Novi, where it’s renamed Chef Milos’ Mushroom Soup. No photos seem to exist of the Mush, but lawyer Jeffrey Fieger loved the damn place so much he had the bar installed in the basement of his law offices. Photo via , Facebook
Victor Lim’s With a prime location on Grand Circus Park, Lim’s has been described as the closest a Detroit chop suey joint got to fine dining in the middle of the 20th century. Images online of the elegantly designed menus support that view. Photo via Detroit Historical Society

Have something to share?

SEND US A NEWS TIP

Since 1980, Metro Times has been Detroit’s premier alternative source for news, arts, culture, music, film, food, fashion and more from a liberal point of view.