Christopher Rohe, Prescott’s Grill
By Mike Mitchelson

While Minneapolis and St. Paul are touted as Minnesota’s culinary headquarters, there are other cities within the state demanding attention. It’s safe to say the stereotypical “Midwestern palate” is history. “The Food Network changed everything in the last 10 years for everybody,” said Christopher Rohe, executive chef at Prescott’s Grill in Rochester. “People are demanding and expecting more from restaurants, so you have to stay up on that stuff.”

Rohe stays up on that “stuff,” but not to be trendy. No, Rohe’s restaurant, which he owns with his wife, Jenna (who is GM and the restaurant’s sommelier), is old-world in its execution, producing a fine dining experience with European flair.

Classic preparation methods were ingrained in Rohe early. “When I was six—30 years ago—my mom said that I wanted to be a chef,” Rohe said, and he watched Julia Child’s and Martin Yan’s cooking shows. He earned a culinary degree at a Rochester vocational school, and in 1990 sent a letter asking for a job to the Broadstreet Café (which, according to Rohe, was one of the “finest restaurants in town”). Two years later, he was in the kitchen. He stayed for seven years, and worked his way to executive chef before leaving for the top job at the Rochester Athletic Club.

Now, Rohe is competing very well for that “finest restaurant” in Rochester designation. Since Prescott’s opened in January 2006, it’s won considerable word-of-mouth praise and a “Best Of” award from Rochester Magazine for his stuffed pork chop, which is breaded, sautéed and topped with veal demi glace.

Creating an award-winning dish—or any dish—is a matter of finding one key ingredient, Rohe said. “It’s one piece of the puzzle first, and then building it up from there,” he said.
For instance, one of his meat purveyors, Stock Yards, offered a rolled and tied beef short rib. “It’s a circle of meat with a bone that sticks straight up,” Rohe explained. “Which is a great, really funky plate presentation. And I think, I’ve got to do something with it.”

Rohe stepped back from his European instincts and prepared a pseudo-Korean barbecue dish for the short rib. “People went crazy for it,” he said. “It was kind of different and fun.”

With the award came a bump in business, and proof that his quest to add a fine-dining option to the Rochester scene wasn’t such a gamble. “I think there was a definite need,” Rohe said. “And in Rochester, the chains really haven’t saturated this market. We’re still small enough yet, at about 100,000 people, but you have probably another 50,000 transients that come for the (Mayo) Clinic and IBM.”

Attracting those “transients” is key for any ambitious dining room in Rochester—many have high incomes and well-traveled palates. “We have a great relationship with the area hotels and the concierge desks,” Rohe said. “We constantly have good comments and reports, so they keep referring us, and we’ve been really successful that way.”

Prescott’s menu and prices are not exclusive, however. Rohe said he keeps 18 entrees on the menu, ranging from pastas to seafood to steaks, ranging in price from $15 to $28—cheaper than what he would have to charge if he were based in the Twin Cities, a market he hopes to crack with some advertising to capture destination diners.

Like the Twin Cities’ fine dining restaurants, Prescott’s has felt the economic squeeze on the segment during the past year. “I totally feel the crunch, the pressure of high gas prices and groceries getting more expensive every day,” he said. “I think it’s just going to keep getting tougher for a while until the economy turns around and the war gets over.”

Prescott’s location works in its favor, however. While searching, the Rohes found existing restaurants pricey, and determined they could find a good building and design the restaurant themselves for a similar price. That building is within Rochester’s Crossroads Mall area, and has a wall of windows overlooking downtown.

Prescott’s isn’t too big or small—it seats 87—and they have space in the kitchen to prepare their own breads and desserts from scratch. And having 1,200 parking places nearby doesn’t hurt, either, Rohe said, “as opposed to being downtown, where there’s no parking.”


Family affair

Rohe and his wife met working in restaurants, and they’re both at Prescott’s, six days a week. With two sons, aged seven and eight, they might have a second generation of restaurateurs on their hands. “They come and help with the restaurant, with the bread a little bit—more playing, of course,” Rohe said, laughing. “When we opened, they unpacked all the plates and silverware and ran them through the dishwashing machine. They think it’s fun, they don’t really understand.”

The restaurant’s name also has family ties. Prescott’s is named for Rohe’s great, great, great, great, great grandfather, Brigadier-General Frank C. Prescott, who, as a captain in the 53rd infantry, served in the Phillipine Insurrection in 1898. Prescott also become heavily involved in the nation’s telegraph industry, and later served in the California legislature. “It’s always been a family name—my brother has it as his middle name,” Rohe said. “I think it makes restaurants that much more interesting if you can tie it back to something and build up a story.”

The story won’t end with Prescott’s, either, if Rohe has his way. Rohe wants to add more restaurants in the relatively near future, although different concepts than Prescott’s. “Three or four is my goal,” he said. “Maybe a breakfast restaurant, or a ’50s diner. I’d just like to do different things like that, making really good, high quality food. There are so many bad restaurants that use cheap food, have bad service, aren’t clean, and it’s so frustrating when you know how good it can be.

“Our secret is we’re here every day,” he added. “I’ve got my finger on the pulse. The restaurant is clean, the service is good, the food is good—we’ve got it.”

Prescott’s Grill, 507-536-7775, www.prescottsgrill.com.