Hamtramck Is Worth the Drive

Hamtramck is technically a separate city, fully surrounded by Detroit, covering about two square miles. It has been described in reporting from the Detroit Free Press and Michigan Radio as one of the most ethnically diverse small cities in the United States. That description understates what's actually there.

The food scene in Hamtramck reflects the successive waves of immigration that reshaped the city over decades: Polish families who came to work in the auto plants, Yemeni immigrants who arrived in the 1970s and 1980s, Bangladeshi and Bengali communities who established a corridor on Joseph Campau Avenue that has become the most concentrated South Asian food street in Michigan. Bosnian restaurants opened after the 1990s. More recently, the city has drawn artists, musicians, and younger residents from Detroit who have layered a different kind of food economy on top of what was already there.

The result is a city where you can eat Polish pierogies, Yemeni lamb, Bengali fish curry, and Bosnian burek within a few blocks of each other. That variety is not a tourism pitch. It is how the city actually eats.

I have not eaten at all of the restaurants in this guide. Hamtramck has been underrepresented in this publication's coverage, and I'm being honest about what I know from direct experience versus what I know from the reporting of others. The Detroit Free Press, Eater Detroit, and MLive have collectively covered this city for years. I'm drawing on that record, and I'll say so when I am.

The Bengali Corridor (Joseph Campau Ave)

The stretch of Joseph Campau Avenue between Caniff and Evaline is, according to coverage in the Detroit Free Press and other Michigan outlets, the most concentrated cluster of Bangladeshi and Bengali restaurants in the state. Most of the businesses on this stretch are South Asian-owned and cater primarily to the local immigrant community.

Al-Haramain Restaurant is one of the longer-running operations on the corridor. The menu centers on South Asian staples: biriyani, daal, fish curries, and goat. Regulars describe the goat curry as slow-cooked until the meat falls from the bone, with a gravy that has the depth of something that's been on the stove for hours. The biriyani is the dish that most accounts lead with: long-grain rice, whole spices, a protein that's been cooked into it rather than added on top. Prices are low by any measure. A full plate rarely exceeds $12.

Al-Amana Restaurant is another Campau Avenue anchor that appears regularly in Hamtramck food coverage. It serves halal Bangladeshi food with a menu that overlaps substantially with Al-Haramain but has its own regulars and its own dishes that get mentioned by name. The hilsa fish curry, made from a fish brought over frozen from Bangladesh that has cultural significance in Bengali cooking well beyond its taste, is the most-cited dish in coverage of the restaurant.

The corridor operates in a way that is consistent with immigrant food districts across the country: the restaurants are not decorated for outside visitors, menus are sometimes in Bengali alongside English, and the clientele is predominantly the community the food is made for. None of that is a barrier. Go hungry, point at what looks good, and pay less than you would for a worse meal at most restaurants in Ann Arbor.

Yemeni

Saba Restaurant on Joseph Campau has appeared in Eater Detroit and Detroit Free Press coverage as one of the strongest Yemeni restaurants in metro Detroit. The saltah, a Yemeni stew built on a fenugreek-foam base with meat and vegetables, is the dish most cited by people who have eaten there. Saltah is one of those preparations that has almost no equivalent in other cuisines: the fenugreek gives it a slightly bitter, vegetal edge that the fat from the meat runs against. Mandi, a rice-and-meat dish cooked in a sealed pit, is the other anchor of the menu. You eat it with flatbread, scooping from a shared plate.

Yemeni restaurants are rare in Michigan outside of Dearborn, and Hamtramck's Yemeni food community is well-established enough to sustain multiple restaurants. Saba is the one that gets the most attention from food writers covering the city.

Polish

Hamtramck was a Polish city for decades before its demographics shifted. Some of that cooking tradition has faded, but not entirely.

Polonia Restaurant (2934 Yemans St) is one of the Polish holdovers that food writers covering Hamtramck return to. The pierogies are handmade, the kind that have visible crimp marks and irregular edges rather than the machine-uniform look of frozen. The stuffed cabbage (golabki) is slow-cooked in tomato sauce until it has softened completely, the rice-and-meat filling binding together inside the cabbage leaf. Kielbasa with sauerkraut is the other dish that appears in most accounts. This is not refined cooking. It is the kind of food that has kept a community fed for generations, and that is a different and legitimate standard.

If you're building a full Hamtramck eating day, Polish lunch at Polonia in the early afternoon before moving to the Bengali or Yemeni dinner corridor is a reasonable structure.

What Makes Hamtramck Different from the Rest of Metro Detroit

Most diverse food destinations in southeast Michigan are the result of particular corridor development: Mexicantown on Vernor, the Lebanese community's concentration in Dearborn, Greektown's small footprint downtown. What is different about Hamtramck is the density of diversity within a very small geography.

You can eat your way across several continents within a mile. The Bangladeshi restaurants are not adjacent to a "diverse food hall" designed for food tourism. They are adjacent to a Yemeni restaurant that is adjacent to a Polish one, because those communities have been neighbors for decades and the businesses reflect that. There is no organizing theme except immigration history, and immigration history turns out to be a better organizing theme than any food writer could invent.

Detroit food coverage has historically underrepresented Hamtramck. The city does not have restaurants in the same price range or with the same critical attention as Marrow or Selden Standard, so it rarely appears in roundups. That is a category mistake. The standard for a good Bengali fish curry is not the same as the standard for a good tasting menu, and applying one to the other tells you nothing useful. Hamtramck has excellent food. It is not expensive. It is not famous in food media. All three of those things are true simultaneously and the third does not change the first two.

Getting There

Hamtramck sits directly north of Detroit, bordered by Eight Mile to the north and roughly Caniff to the south. From Ann Arbor, take I-94 East to the Conner Avenue exit, north to Joseph Campau, and you'll be on the main restaurant corridor within a few minutes. The drive is about 50 minutes from Ann Arbor, slightly less from Ypsilanti.

Parking on Joseph Campau is generally easy, especially on weekday evenings. The street is commercial throughout, with small lots and street parking in front of most restaurants.

Go hungry and plan to eat more than one thing. The pricing at most Hamtramck restaurants is low enough that eating at two or three places in an afternoon is not expensive. Build a day out of it. The Bengali corridor for lunch, Polish dinner at Polonia, or Yemeni food at Saba as a later stop. The geography is small enough that you can walk between most of these places.

I will be writing more about Hamtramck as I eat my way through it. This guide is a starting point, not a complete map. But the starting point is worth your drive.

Hamtramck is located immediately north of Detroit, accessible from I-94 East via the Conner Avenue exit. Joseph Campau Avenue is the main commercial corridor. Saba Restaurant and other addresses can be verified on Google Maps before visiting, as hours in this neighborhood can vary.