Where to Eat in Midtown Detroit
Between the DIA and Wayne State, Detroit's densest dining neighborhood keeps getting better.
Midtown is where Detroit eats when Detroit wants to eat well. The neighborhood sits between the Detroit Institute of Arts and Wayne State University, roughly bounded by the Lodge Freeway to the west and I-75 to the east, and it has accumulated more serious restaurants per square block than any other part of the city. Students, museum-goers, hospital workers from the DMC, and people who just like good food share the same sidewalks here, and the restaurants reflect that mix.
I started coming to Midtown before I started writing about it. The first time was for a DIA exhibit, and I ended up eating dinner at Chartreuse because someone told me the small plates were worth driving from Ann Arbor for. They were right. Since then, Midtown has become my most frequent Detroit destination, and the dining options have only gotten denser.
What sets Midtown apart from Corktown, which gets more national press, is the range. You can eat a wood-fired meal at a multiple James Beard semifinalist and then walk five minutes to a brewery where a pizza and a sour ale run you under twenty bucks. Fine dining and casual spots share the same blocks without competing. They feed different appetites at different hours, and the neighborhood is better for having both.
Selden Standard
3921 Second Ave. If Midtown has a flagship restaurant, this is it. Chef Andy Hollyday opened Selden Standard in 2014, and it has been a multiple-time James Beard semifinalist for Best Chef: Great Lakes.1Selden Standard has been recognized as a James Beard semifinalist multiple times. Andy Hollyday was a semifinalist for Best Chef: Great Lakes. The cooking is built around a wood-fired oven and an approach to sourcing that prioritizes Michigan farms without making a performance of it. The menu changes with the season, which means repeat visits rarely feel repetitive.
Vegetable dishes carry as much weight as the proteins here. Roasted carrots with yogurt and dukkah. Beet hummus that people order as a main course. Wood-fired bread with cultured butter that arrives warm and doesn't last long on the table. The proteins are strong, too: roasted chicken, pork chops, a lamb dish that rotates seasonally. But Selden Standard is one of those restaurants where the sides and starters sometimes outperform the entrees, and the kitchen seems fine with that.
The room has high ceilings, natural light during lunch service, and an open kitchen you can watch without craning your neck. Brunch on weekends draws a crowd. Dinner reservations are a good idea, especially Thursday through Saturday. Expect entrees in the $24-$38 range.
Chartreuse Kitchen & Cocktails
15 E Kirby St. Chartreuse sits in a corner of the Park Shelton building, a block from the DIA, and treats its menu like something that should change often enough to keep regulars curious. Small plates rotate with the season. The kitchen takes creative swings that mostly land. A beet dish with goat cheese and pistachio might sound like something you have had before, but the execution here makes you reconsider what that combination can do.
The cocktail program is long, inventive, and knows when to be simple. A well-made Old Fashioned is as easy to get as something with house-made bitters and seasonal fruit. Order four or five plates for the table and let the argument about which was best carry you through dessert. Chartreuse is a restaurant built for sharing, and the prices (small plates mostly $12-$18) reward that approach.
I wrote about Chartreuse in our broader Detroit guide, and my opinion hasn't changed. It's the restaurant I'd take someone to if they had never eaten in Midtown and I wanted them to understand what the neighborhood does well.
Republic
3011 W Grand Blvd. Republic calls itself a tavern, and the space earns that word. Dark wood, a long bar, the kind of room where you settle in rather than pass through. But the kitchen has more going on than the label suggests. The burger is one of the better ones in Detroit, seared hard with a good bun-to-meat ratio. Seasonal dishes rotate frequently enough to keep regulars from ordering on autopilot.
Republic doesn't chase press. It doesn't need to. The crowd is neighborhood-heavy, a mix of Wayne State faculty, nearby residents, and people who know West Grand Boulevard well enough to have a regular order. Entrees run $16-$28. The beer list is solid, the whiskey selection is deep, and the bartenders are fast without being rushed. If Selden Standard is where you go for a date, Republic is where you go on a Tuesday because you don't feel like cooking and you want to eat somewhere that doesn't require planning.
Jolly Pumpkin Midtown
441 W Canfield St. The Ann Arbor sour ale brewery's Midtown location occupies a corner of the Willys Overland Lofts building, and it has become a default gathering spot for the Wayne State crowd and Midtown regulars who want a beer and a meal without a reservation. The sour ales, brewed in Dexter, are the draw: La Roja, Bam Biere, Calabaza Blanca. If you have had them at the Ann Arbor or Dexter locations, the lineup will feel familiar. The food menu runs pub-style with enough range to feed a group: pizzas, sandwiches, salads, a pretzel with beer cheese that keeps people ordering it.
Jolly Pumpkin didn't invent the Midtown dining scene, but it helped normalize it for a crowd that might not have wandered into Selden Standard on a Tuesday. The patio is good when the weather cooperates. Prices are moderate. You won't plan a trip from Ann Arbor around it, but if you are already in Midtown, it's a reliable stop.
The Neighborhood
Midtown's restaurants don't exist in a vacuum. They benefit from the foot traffic that the DIA, the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History, the Michigan Science Center, and Wayne State all generate. A Saturday in Midtown can start with the museum, move to lunch, and end at a bar without requiring a car.
Second Avenue and Woodward are the main corridors, with Canfield and Kirby running east-west between them. The neighborhood has been the target of significant development over the past decade, and that development has brought both new restaurants and new apartment buildings, which in turn brought more customers. It is a cycle that has worked well for Midtown's dining scene, even as it has changed the neighborhood's character in ways that longtime residents have opinions about.
For coffee, Anthology Coffee on Woodward serves well-roasted beans in a bright, minimal space. Great Lakes Coffee Roasting Company has been a Midtown fixture for years, with a wood-paneled interior and a drink menu that goes beyond drip. Neither is trying to be a destination, but both are good enough to anchor the start or end of a meal.
How to Do Midtown
Park once. The neighborhood is walkable enough that you can cover Selden Standard to Chartreuse to Jolly Pumpkin on foot in under fifteen minutes. Street parking is available on most blocks, and there are surface lots near the DIA. A parking garage at Woodward and Warren serves the museum crowd and spills over to the restaurants.
From Ann Arbor, take I-94 east to M-10 (the Lodge Freeway) north, exit at Warren Avenue. Forty-five minutes in normal traffic, less on a weekend.
If you are coming for dinner, make a reservation at Selden Standard or Chartreuse. Republic and Jolly Pumpkin are walk-in friendly most nights. If you are coming for lunch after the DIA, Selden Standard's brunch and Chartreuse's lunch menu are both strong, and you will be glad you ate in the neighborhood instead of driving home hungry.
Midtown keeps getting restaurants because people keep showing up to eat at them. That's the whole story. Four blocks, four good restaurants, and a neighborhood that gives you a reason to linger after the check comes.
Midtown Detroit is roughly 45 minutes east of Ann Arbor via I-94 and the Lodge Freeway. See our Detroit dining guide for restaurants across the city, and our Corktown guide for the neighborhood next door.