Restaurant Hall of Fame

For the restaurant industry, this week marks the final push of the year: Sell those gift cards! Book the holiday parties! Throw open the new doors and get some butts in chairs (welcome Otho and finally Red Stag)!

Last week was different. Before all the hubbub there was time for a moment of reflection.

Last Monday night, I found myself jammed into Mancini’s Char House with a throng of industry lifers for a little celebration of the old-school. It was the Minnesota Restaurant Association’s big soiree, a night when they induct honorees into the Hall of Fame and present their award for Restaurant of the Year.

First of all, it wasn’t the James Beard awards. Standing there, swirling my Maker’s Mark as I surveyed the room, it was obvious to me that the night wasn’t about cutting-edge chefs and daring cuisine.There were plenty of suits sporting names like Kozlak, Cossetta, and Murray on their badges, but not a McKee or Woodman or Becker in sight. Maybe for some that’s reason enough to poo-poo the whole affair, but I’m happy for their short-sightedness: more room for me at the prime rib carving station.

The Hall of Famers this year included the late Bob Casper of Casper’s Cherokee Sirloin Room, Louis Tinucci of Tinucci’s Restaurant, and the man I was there to applaud, Pete Mihajlov of Parasole Restaurant Holdings.

It has been said that if you don’t like Pete, you don’t like Santa Claus. His boisterous and snarky partner, Phil Roberts, is usually the one to get the press, which is just as Pete would have it. While Phil is the buzz, Pete is the undercurrent, working behind the scenes to build the Twin Cities dining culture. When you read about the staff at Manny’s who have the almost unnerving ability to recognize and remember frequent guests, that’s Pete at work. His guest-focus is the core of the Parasole culture, which has further influenced the local dining scene as former employees (Town Talk’s Niver was a Pronto manager, Tim McKee a Figlio cook…) branch out and make their mark.

It wasn’t lost on me that we were celebrating these groundbreakers in a place that started as a small 3.2 beer joint, just serving some Italian sandwiches. When Nick Mancini decided to buy a bar instead of a gas station in 1948, the "good" part of town was still a few blocks away. Over the years, Mancini’s has become a jewel of West Seventh and a St. Paul institution. Nick Mancini died earlier this year, but his love for the business clearly infected his sons who proudly accepted the mantle of Restaurant of the Year.

Nestling into one of the iconic, high-backed, red leather booths for a good gossip session, I kept one eye trained on the shrimp station. As soon as it was refilled, I made a bee-line for the young man serving. It’s true I get a bit "chatty" after a measure of bourbon, and thusly discovered that the food was being served by culinary students. Of course I asked him my favorite question: Why do you want to be a chef? And of course he started out with the usual blah blah I’ve always loved food blah blah my grandmother taught me to cook blah blah I want to bring new food to the Twin Cites blah blah. But then he added: If I could create a restaurant that would last as long as this, wouldn’t that be something?

No school like the old school.