DETROIT (WWJ) -- Joe Louis was a boxing icon and a Detroit legend.
The stats speak for themselves. He had 66 wins in 69 career fights and successfully defended titles on 25 straight occasions, endearing himself to a city and a nation.
His name adorned an arena in downtown Detroit for decades.
And now, on what would’ve been the Brown Bomber’s 107th birthday on Thursday, his legacy is set to be carried on at the Joe Louis Southern Kitchen in Detroit’s New Center neighborhood.
A ribbon cutting ceremony was held Thursday ahead of the restaurant’s grand opening Friday morning at 7 a.m. The new restaurant will be open seven days a week from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m.
The all-day brunch restaurant at Woodward and E. Grand Boulevard will feature an array of southern fare, ranging from cinnamon roll flapjacks, to cajun fried stuffed turkey legs and of course, Joe Louis’s favorite -- country fried steak cheese grits.
Managing partner Johnny Cannon says the country fried steak and cheese grits was the one item that had to be on the menu.
“My father would walk into some of the best restaurants in the world -- my mother told me one time they walked into Maxim's in Paris and my father said, ‘chicken fried steak!” Joe Louis II said.
The boxing legend’s son says he had been offered by the Illitch family on multiple occasions to open a restaurant bearing his father’s name in the District Detroit, near the new Little Caesars Arena downtown. But if he was going to open a restaurant in his father’s honor, he wanted it to be accessible to everyone.
“I’ve been close to the Illitch family for a very long time. It would’ve been very easy to do that. But until the District is truly inclusive, there’s no way I’d put my father’s name on anything down there,” he told WWJ’s Jon Hewett. “Because unless everyone can afford to go and enjoy it, then it doesn’t work.”
A full menu for Joe Louis Southern Kitchen can be found on their website and more pictures of food items can be found on their Facebook page.