Frita Batidos Is Finally Bringing Cuban-Style Burgers to Downtown Detroit

Chef Eve Aronoff’s hit Cuban burger restaurant Frita Batidos is finally expanding to Detroit with a new outpost near the Fox Theatre and the new Little Caesars World Headquarters. The restaurant — Frita’s second outpost — will be located along Columbia Street in Olympia Development’s self-described “European-style promenade.” It’s on track to open in early spring 2019.

Aronoff has been talking about a possible Detroit location of Frita Batidos since 2015 and redoubled her efforts to find the right space in January 2017. Last summer after winning the Burger Battle at Eastern Market, the Frita Batidos team announced plans to open a location in Midtown; however, the deal later fell through.

Frita Batido’s Detroit menu will look similar to the Ann Arbor original with egg and fry-topped chorizo burgers, tropical shakes, pressed sandwiches, and churros, but it will also feature a menu tailored to “game days,” per a release. Olympia Development could not provide a specific address for the space, but confirmed that the restaurant would occupy a 2,400-square-foot property and will be designed by architecture firm PUSH Design.

The pedestrian promenade was announced in February and is expected to bring 40,000-square-feet of retail and restaurant space to the area with the first tenants opening this summer. However, the progress appears to have been slower than the initial timeline. Frita Batidos is the first official tenant for the development. Though the release describes “multiple storefronts” as “under development” and teases “a number of new announcements” in the hopper. The Ilitch’s continue to stall in other areas of their dubious District Detroit development, which has drawn attention for transforming many Cass Corridor properties into surface parking lots.

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