‘Chef To The Stars’ To Open 3 Detroit Restaurants

DETROIT, MI — A chef who has cooked for the Price of Dubai, rapper Missy (Misdemeanor) Elliott and former NBA star Amar’e Stoudemire says he plans to open three new restaurants in Detroit over the next year. Maxcel Hardy will open the first, River Bistro, on Aug. 1, just ahead of the release of a cookbook of coffee-inspired cuisine he wrote in collaboration with Bob Marley’s son.

Detroit-born Hardy, 33, also has plans to open his flagship project next year in the entertainment district surrounding Little Caesars Arena — a full-service, African-inspired, 120-seat restaurant dubbed Honey. Hardy will also be a vendor in the Detroit Shipping Co. project, a collective of bars and restaurants in Midtown that will do business out of repurposed shipping containers.

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Hardy, who showed his moxie as an aspiring caterer in high school by placing “chef to the stars” business cards on luxury cars around town, spent two decades in New York City and Miami, but came home to build his culinary legacy.

“One of the reasons for me to move back home is to show that black chefs are here,” Hardy told the newspaper.“There are black chefs out there that are just as good as any other chefs, but we get fewer opportunities,” he continued. “What I wanna do in the city is open the doors to these chefs that didn’t have the opportunities I did.”

» For more on how Hardy went from a teen who hustled “chef to the stars” business cards to actually cooking for them, go to the Detroit Free Press.

In this 2014 photo, Chef Maxcel Hardy, Principal Asya Johnson, Keke Palmer, and President and CEO, Food Bank For New York City Margarette Purvis are seen at a high school in Harlem where the Change One Thing truck brings healthy recipes, snacks and prizes to teens. (Photo by Brian Ach/Invision for Food Bank for New York City/AP Images)