Welcome to Detroit Soul

Acclaimed as a local hot spot that serves hearty portions of delicious healthy food.

Our Mission

Detroit Soul offers down-home cuisine with down-South hospitality to all the souls in our community using locally sourced farm-fresh food and health-fortifying cooking methods–and at affordable prices.

COME AND VISIT OUR NEW LOCATION ON EAST JEFFERSON!

Detroit

We come from scratch: we come from a people who, ripped from their respective lands in Africa and enslaved on this one, recreated our lives and nourished our souls with what was available to us—including our faith. Through the hardships wrought by that peculiar institution and its offspring Jim Crow, we scratched out our paths to freedom to lands such as Detroit. We nourished our travels—full of travails and triumphs—with Grandma’s hopes and dreams of a better world, of other suns, packed in shoebox lunches and Green Book diners.

We gathered each Sunday dinner after our souls were made whole by the balm of good preaching and good singing, each family reunion where Motown was our city soundscape and our soundtrack, each repast where we hugged and cried in knowing our departed would be held in the palm of His hand. We assembled to celebrate our being here through it all and those who have go on to glory by sharing the food that helped us survive the decimations of desegregation, Devil’s Night, and the Detroit auto industry.

And now we are here, cooking and catering the very food that helped us survive it all. In remembrance of our yesterdays and in celebrating our tomorrows, we prepare our food so we—as a people, as neighbors, as fellow Detroiters–can thrive, using locally sourced food and healthier cooking methods.

Following the edict of our faith, which has brought us a mighty long way, let us assemble ourselves and eat together in neighborly love at Detroit Soul!

About Detroit Soul

Our Story

Detroit Soul is an indwelling spirit made clear in the nourishment of love.

Our grandmothers bequeathed us the practice of feeding our extensive family as they, our mother, and our other female relatives convened in the kitchen and around the grill during our annual family reunions in Alabama for so many Julys. They infused the food that started as the meat scraps from slavemasters’ slaughterhouses–along with seeds cultivated from Indigenous people and their lands and smuggled from African nations through enslaved women’s intricate braiding–with cooking traditions and spices synthesized from Indigenous, African, Caribbean, and Western European cultures. These women got up early and gave thanks before fueling us children with blessed 7AM breakfasts and high-noon lunches. In the meantime, they fried, marinated, baked, broiled, boiled, and barbecued love into every dinner morsel we savored and shared over laughter and recollections.

Those memories traveled back with us to Detroit. As we matured, so did our abiding affection for the fare of our foreparents. We cultivated that love and our culinary skills through the practice of catering for our families, be they of birth, the church, or the neighborhood. Our practice of setting food before our communities became–by brick, by mortar, by passion, and by faith–Detroit Soul in 2015.

Thanks to the love and faith that our communities have reciprocated since we have opened our doors, we will soon offer a place in the Jefferson/Chalmers neighborhood where all who enter will have a place to sit and commune over the food that nourishes our bodies and edifies our souls!

Press

Jerome B. Brown & Samuel VanBuren | Black History Month

Jerome and his brother Samuel took the time to get to know the community in the neighborhood where they planned on establishing their business to better understand their needs, and Detroit Soul was born. A farm-to-table Soul food restaurant with healthy food options made available to folks who often lack access to these choices.

This Detroit Restaurant Serves The Best Soul Food In Michigan

There’s nothing like digging into a delicious meal, and soul food is often a good way to go. Luckily, you won’t have to travel far to find it. Love Food, the publisher that hails itself “the tastiest guide on the web,” spotlighted the best soul food restaurants in the U.S. Its report states:

Detroit Entrepreneurs Redefine Soul Food

In 2010, Detroit residents Jerome Brown and Samuel Van Buren started a catering business that served homestyle cooking, but with healthful substitutes. “My childhood memories are family gatherings where we all got together around food. But we wanted to make it better for you. The same soulful flavors, just made with lighter options,” says Brown.

Motor City Match program expanding, helping local businesses like Detroit Soul

Hard work and dedication is the soul of Detroit, and at Detroit Soul on 8 Mile, that hard work and dedication is combined with some classic home cooking.

Top 5 Most Popular Barbecue Restaurants in Detroit, Michigan

Amazing barbecue places abound in Detroit, where you can savor softened meats, smoky handmade sauces, and traditional soul dishes. So, where exactly are these incredible barbecues located? The following is a list of the top 5 most popular barbecue restaurants in the Detroit metropolitan area.

In the Spotlight

COME AND VISIT OUR NEW LOCATION ON EAST JEFFERSON!

Motor City Match program expanding, helping local businesses like Detroit Soul

Tasty Tuesday: Detroit Soul

Detroit Soul on Live In The D

Our Supporters

Motor City Match

Motor City Match connects new and expanding businesses with services and space to grow, providing them with the funding and tools to fuel the city’s entrepreneurial revolution. Last fall Detroit Soul was one of the Motor City Match recipients, being awarded $60,000 in grant money.

Fair Food Network

Fair Food Network is a national nonprofit and investor that fuels the success of food entrepreneurs through catalytic capital, wrap-around business services, and a commitment to place-based impact investing collectives. Detroit Soul received a loan from Fair Food Network’s Fair Food Fund Collateral Initiative to open a second location.

Michigan Good Food Fund

Michigan Good Food Fund is a statewide loan fund that invests in food businesses working to increase access to healthy food and spark economic opportunity in places that need it most. The statewide collective of partners provides financing and business assistance to good food enterprises like Detroit Soul. Michigan Good Food Fund partners Detroit Development Fund and Fair Food Network worked with Detroit Soul to help their business needs.

TechTown Detroit

TechTown Detroit helps tech startups and small businesses develop, launch and grow by connecting entrepreneurs to learning and networking events in Detroit, resources, and meeting spaces. They’ve been an instrumental support to Detroit Soul and connected the business to Detroit’s entrepreneurial ecosystem.

Detroit Development Fund

Detroit Development Fund is a non-profit (501(c)(3)) organization and a certified community development financial institution, incorporated in the state of Michigan. Detroit Development Fund was created in 1998 with an initial mission of helping revitalize an economically distressed target area in Detroit’s far East side neighborhoods. Detroit Soul received a loan from Detroit Development Fund to open a new location.

Guest Reviews

I have to say the dressing surprised me; I’ve never had restaurant dressing taste so much like grandma’s. We will definitely be back!!

Legitimately the best mac, collards, and fried chicken I’ve had in Detroit. Can’t wait to go back!

Excellent food and excellent service! The best quality soul food to feed yourself and your family, plus they have a catering menu. I highly recommended!

Catering

Detroit Soul brings the nostalgic flavors of down-South family reunions to wherever we are called to go, be it a public event, a corporate function, a business meeting, or a home gathering. We offer our menu items as well as specially prepared foods for the function. Please see below for starting prices for our catering service and fill out the form to let us know how we can bring some homecooking to the occasion!

Fill Out Our Interest Form

We look foward to hearing from you

Contact Us

(313) 366 – 5600

2900 East 8 Mile Road Detroit, MI 48234
14300 E JeffersonDetroit, MI 48215

Tue- Sat: 12pm – 8pm
Sunday: 12pm – 6pm

Email Us

Questions? Comments? Want to say hi?

We look foward to hearing from you

© 2023 Detroit Soul, All Rights Reserved

2900 East 8 Mile Road Detroit, MI 48234
14300 E Jefferson, Detroit, MI 48215