The Flint Coney: A Savory History

by Dave Liske

Overview

A Vehicle City Success Story

The history of Flint's food culture has always been largely overshadowed by the stories of its industries. But the origins and rapid expansion of the number of Macedonian Coney shops in Flint paralleled the explosive growth of the city's automotive industry throughout the twentieth century. Born of an immigrant escaping the war-torn Balkans in the early 1900s who combined his idea for one dish with the skills of butchering and meatpacking experts from Wisconsin and Germany, the simple Flint Coney became an institution among the city's autoworkers, tradespeople, and families. Mainstays such as Flint Original Coney Island, Angelo's, and Atlas were frequented by regular patrons for decades, with others such as Capitol and Starlite carrying on those traditions today.

Genesee County native Dave Liske explores these global origins and the cultural history of the Flint Coney.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781439674680
Publisher:	The History Press
Publication date:	04/25/2022
Series:	American Palate
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	176
File size:	4 MB

About the Author

A graduate of Grand Blanc High School, Dave Liske has been a technical writer for the U.S. Navy, the Toyota Technical Center and the University of Michigan, as well as having written and tech-reviewed computer programming books for Wrox Press in the United Kingdom. A former kitchen manager, he began writing the Luna Pier Cook food blog for the Monroe News in 2006 and operated a popular Flint Coney stand at the Lake Erie beach in Luna Pier, Michigan, during the summer of 2008 with his stepson Caleb and the other five kids he and his wife, Mary, share. With Mary now working as a travel nurse, Dave is making Flint Coneys both for home meals and for Mary's co-workers to enjoy on occasion, from Wyoming to Maine.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements 9

Introduction 11

1 Backstories 15

2 Origins of the Flint Coney 30

3 Success and Competition 45

4 Second-Generation Coney Shops 58

5 Further Developments 72

6 The Flint Coney in the Twenty-First Century 86

Maps 103

Conclusions 107

Appendix A Flint Coney Sauce Recipes 111

Appendix B A Representative Full Greek Coney Island Menu 139

Appendix C Michigan's "Higher" Hot Dog Standards 147

Appendix D Further Reading 151

Notes 153

Bibliography 163

About the Author 175