[Real Detroit Weekly] Orleans Billiards Cafe

All photos by Nicole Rupersburg. "Downtown Mount Clemens has seen plenty of change over the last two decades. Before it was the charming, somewhat quaint brick-paved hub of independently-owned businesses and outdoor art installations that it is now, it was ... well, NOT that. When Orleans Billiards Café opened 15 years ago, it was right at the beginning of downtown Mt. Clemens' transformation, and the place is still evolving.''We have to keep it...

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Halal [HOT LIST]

Chicken Tikka Pizza from Halal Desi Pizza. Photo by Nicole Rupersburg.Sunset today marks the end of Ramadan, the Islamic month of fasting, and the beginning of Eid, the two-day Muslim holiday following Ramadan. Here in metro Detroit we have an estimated population of over 200,000 Muslims, and we also have the highest concentration of ethnic Arabs outside of the Middle East. To honor our Muslim friends (truth be told, Dearborn is one of our favorite...

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[EID Feature] Star Lanes Inside Emagine Theatre: It's a Restaurant, Too

All photos by Nicole Rupersburg. I have a secret. This secret might shock you. Some of you might be disappointed. Others might even be so devastated they'll choose never to read this blog again as a silent act of protest. I accept these potential consequences because I feel that it is time to unburden myself so I can stop living this shameful, deprived lie. I love food, I do, OBVIOUSLY I do because I'm doing this, but there is something that has...

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[Real Detroit Weekly] Wolfgang Puck Grille

Sauteed Alaskan Halibut. Photo by Nicole Rupersburg. There is no doubt that "foodie culture" has gripped the nation with the kind of obsessive, feverish madness reminiscent of family fallout shelters in the '60s and the Great Bottled Water Rush of Y2K. This has led to the rise of the Food Network and the celebrity chef (an exquisite irony for most of these so-called "celebs," who started their careers when the idea of being an American chef in...

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[HOT LIST] Hot dogs

"The Frenchy" at Rosie O'Grady's, Ferndale. All photos by Nicole Rupersburg. No, NOT Coneys ... we'll get to that eventually, but Detroit's Coney dog scene is well-documented enough already. What isn't well-documented is the quietly-growing gourmet hot dog trend. It makes sense: Detroit is so close to Chicago and Toronto (Chicago, where hot dogs are SERIOUS business, and Toronto - even Windsor - with the best damn street hot dog vendors in North...

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[Real Detroit Weekly] Steve's Backroom

Photo by Nicole Rupersburg. "Steve's Backroom started as a back room in Harper Woods: in the early '80s Steve Khalil opened a bakery and deli on Kelly Rd. then decided to open a little restaurant in the – you guessed it – back room. The St. Clair Shores location is their second location, owned by Steve's cousin Charlie Raffoul.'The general concept is essentially the same, but this restaurant and deli serves breakfast, lunch and dinner, has a full...

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[Real Detroit Weekly] Snacks from the Mitten

All photos taken inside Holiday Market in Royal Oak by Nicole Rupersburg. We Michiganders don’t screw around when it comes to our snack foods. Some of our all-time favorite snacky-cakes and cheesy poofs (etc.) are made right here at home and they’re some of the best products on the market. We love to support local, but we love it even more when our local products are better.Kelly’s KaramelsKelly’s Karamels, based in Troy, are a long-held family...

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[HOT LIST] Raw | Vegan | Organic

These should really all rightfully be their own separate categories, but this ain't California and we ain't dreamin'. For a person adopting the raw and/or vegan and/or organic lifestyle, the options in metro Detroit are just a wee limited. BUT! They do exist, and that's why we're here, so here they are. Photo courtesy of Detroit Zen Center, Hamtramck 1) Living Zen Organics HamtramckThe Detroit Zen Center, in what is probably the most ethnically...

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[EID Feature] The Root: Back to Basics

Pan-seared scallops. All photos by Nicole Rupersburg. Earlier this week we gave you "The Best of Waterford," but there's one place we did not include. (a) Because it's not actually in Waterford; it's in White Lake (next door), and (b) save the best for last, right?The Root Restaurant and Bar in White Lake has only been open two and a half months, but greater metro Detroit is already taking notice. They've got over 100 reviews on Open Table, more...

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[Metromode] What Food Trucks Say About Ferndale

Last month in Concentrate, the Ann Arbor-based sister publication to Metromode, we looked at the burgeoning food truck scene in Ann Arbor, with the arrival of the new food truck courtyard Mark's Carts. We also looked at Portland, Ore.'s successful "pod" model, groups of food trucks located in semi-permanent positions on privately-owned lots. The scene has been so successful that there are now over 600 food carts operating in Portland, and they regularly make national headlines in food, travel, and business publications. This week in Metromode,...

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[944] Director's Cut: The Toronto International Film Festival Travel Guide

View from the Thompson Toronto's rooftop infinity pool. All photos by Nicole Rupersburg. For film aficionados and movie nerds, spending a few days immersed in back-to-back screenings of the outlandish, edgy, quirky, profound, and always wholly unique offerings of an international film festival is a sacred experience. But too many film festivals are more about celebrities and their seekers preening and neck-craning than about the movies themselves....

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[Real Detroit Weekly] Pancho Villa's

(All photos by Nicole Rupersburg) "Pancho Villa's has been the home of the flaming fajita for 12 years now, but they can also lay claim to being the home of something else: the Margorona.'"It all started with a customer who ordered a margarita with a Corona and said, "This is gonna sound weird but can you dump the beer bottle upside-down inside it?'" explains co-owner Nick Hartigre. This customer had recently been down South and a popular way of...

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[HOT LIST] The Best of Waterford

"Covert" camera phone shooting inside Calabrese's Pizzeria Waterford. It is the Macomb County of Oakland County, the bastard child of Pontiac and White Lake, the butt of all local hillbilly, redneck and white trash jokes. And yes, Waterford isn't all hoighty-toighty like Birmingham, and the people are decidedly blue collar (however, there is also a lot of money out there on the western and northern borders of White Lake and Clarkston, FTR). The...

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