The Sussman Brothers, Eli and Max, have opened a coney in Brooklyn called Ed & Bev’s Detroit Style Coney Island. Couple thoughts hit me right away. Detroit is so dang hip, restaurants with Detroit style food are now seeding around the country. 

I got wind of a place last week called Via 313, a joint in Austin serving up Detroit style pizza. And no doubt there are others. Perhaps its not that Detroit will be the city that people from other cities flock to, but rather the city that people from here take with them other places. It’s Detroitification, it’s nuts.

It is with insane pleasure that Max Jeff and I take this opportunity to share with you a very special moment for our family on what we know is a very serious day in NYC. We want to let all you Detroiters and New Yorkers know that yesterday we launched “Ed and Bev’s Detroit Style Coney Island” inside Bergn directly next to Samesa shawarma shop. Ed an Bev’s is based on our love for the Detroit “coney island” which is a greek style diner specializing in coney dogs (hot dog with chili, white onions and mustard), greek salad, saganaki (flaming cheese) and other Detroit delicacies. We are using organic, grassfed, hormone and antibiotic free meat products. Our cheese sauce, dressings and pita are made in house. We’re getting spinach pie from Astoria and bringing in cool things from Detroit. We’ll be serving Vernors, McClures, Better Made Potato Chips and a bunch of other rotating small batch detroit products. If you know a great detroit product we should carry let us know! We just opened yesterday so we’re still tweaking but expect a Sanders Ice Cream dessert, a CPF, perhaps a Faygo flavor here and there and maybe even some Mackinac Island fudge down the line?? Why call it Ed and Bev’s? The restaurant is named after our incredible Papa Edward and our endlessly loving and caring Nana Beverly. They loved incredibly together and today is our Nana’s birthday. So we were able to call her on her birthday and share with her the news that we just opened up our second restaurant and named it after them. #Bergn #edandbevs #coneyisland #detroit #coneydog #diner #brooklyn #crownheights #thesussmans #bk #detroit @edandbevs

A photo posted by Max and eli (@thesussmans) on

Another thing, Brooklyn is literally obsessed with Detroit. As we all know, there is a myth that Detroit and Brooklyn share a common kinship. This artisanal coney island is going to be huge. This is peak artisanal. Art coneys. The coney sauce is chili made with brisket. 

 Couple more thoughts hit me real quick just now. I should disclose that actually know Eli Sussman, he was an old college acquaintance. Next thing – Last year in New York, I went to a place he worked at called Mile End, which specialized in Montreal style smoked meats, and it was fantastic.

They are opening up the coney in a hip beer garden in Brooklyn called Berg’n, right next to another one of their detroit inspired shops called Samesa, a middle-eastern joint shawarma shop. Besides coneys you can get all sorts of Detroity Treats, including Saganaki and Faygo.

I’m sure Ed & Bev’s is great too. I sort of wish there was an Art Coney here in Detroit, because well, we invented Coneys. 

Actually, I take that back. Nobody would buy a $7.50 coney dog. Nobody here, in coney land, would pay that much for a hip, organic, gastropub experimental coney dog. This is Detroit, where loyalty and cheap prices reign supreme. Coneys here aren’t broken, and they don’t need to be fixed. When I venture to New York next, where this kind of thing is normal, I will buy one and write home about it.

A photo posted by Max and eli (@thesussmans) on

Recently the Sussman Brothers came back to the Detroit Area to tour all their favorite old food haunts and give New Yorkers the inside lane on where their favorite places eat in Detroit are. 

A tip for the Sussman Brothers on their next visit – the most artful coneys in the Detroit region are at Red Hot’s Coney Island in Highland Park. This is no squeeze-bag chili dog, and it runs a third, lesser known narrative to the American-Lafayette duel that dominates the downtown coney options. Travel to the coney less talked about. There is more to learn on your coney sauced path.

Now I admit, though slightly unorthodox, the coneys at Ed & Bev’s look pretty good. And we wish them the best, lest Brooklynites not forget the coney-laden motherland of Detroit, whose food is now infecting the world.

Share this post