Sizzling news: Manny's is moving to Foshay

Manny's Steakhouse, the always-packed downtown Minneapolis gathering place for free-spending sports giants, business titans and other 8-by-10 glossy types, is leaving its original home to partner with another City of Lakes landmark: the Foshay Tower.

The 20-year-old eatery perennially resides near the top of every best-steakhouses-in-America list and is arguably the city's most famous -- and certainly one of its top-grossing -- restaurants. Its $45 porterhouses and curtain rod-sized asparagus spears are casting aside their low-profile address deep inside the Hyatt Regency Hotel for a front-and-center location at developer Ralph Burnet's soon-to-open W Minneapolis-the Foshay.

Goodbye, windowless mall. Hello, the sidewalks of 9th Street and Marquette Avenue.

"It's time for Manny's to renew itself," said Phil Roberts, partner of Parasole Restaurant Holdings, the steakhouse's parent company. "All restaurants need to be repotted now and again, or else they get root-bound. And this was an opportunity that was too good to pass up. Ralph is a good egg, and the Foshay is an iconic building."

Parasole, whose operations include Chino Latino and Figlio in Minneapolis, Salut Bar Americain in Edina and Pittsburgh Blue in Maple Grove, is going through a major growth spurt. The company launched its second Manny's last week, in downtown Miami, and Salut's first sibling is opening on St. Paul's Grand Avenue on June 15.

Parasole will also manage the W Foshay's catering and room-service operations, as well as Prohibition, the hotel's 27th-floor lounge.

There was speculation that Culinary Concepts by Jean-Georges, run by globetrotting chef Jean-Georges Vongerichten, would land the W Foshay contract, since the company also runs food and beverage at Burnet's nearby Chambers Hotel.

But Burnet went with a hometown player instead. He said Manny's wasn't a hard sell to the finicky W folks in New York, despite the chain's penchant for such starry names as Tom Colicchio, Todd English and Vongerichten.

"They're very protective of their brand, so have a very short list of what they'll accept," said Burnet. "But there was no hesitation when it came to Manny's, because so many of them had eaten there."

The restaurant has about 18 months left on its Hyatt lease. "We'll make a settlement," said Roberts. "We handed their ring back, and they were very gentlemanly about it."

It was a brief courtship. Parasole made its first Foshay inquiry two months ago, and construction is proceeding at a breakneck pace. The plan is to close Manny's at the Hyatt on a Sunday night at midnight, and reopen six blocks away at the Foshay the following day at noon, sometime in mid-August.

Other than adding lunch service, Roberts said that regulars won't notice much of a change at the new Manny's location. The restaurant will retain its separate bar and dining-room layout, and the staff and menus will make the move intact.

"We'll be washing the cat and hanging new flypaper," said Roberts. "But it's really going to have the same Manny's DNA that people have come to know and love."

Rick Nelson • 612-673-4757