On a Mission

Hemisphere Restaurant Partners has distinguished itself as the company that can succeed where other restaurants failed. Atlas Grill and Clubroom took off in U.S. Bank Plaza where Seagull had folded. Mission American Kitchen & Bar established a strong following in the IDS Center where Aquavit hadn’t. Via brought life to a dead space across from Southdale where Pizzeria Uno faltered. And that’s not all.

In 2007, Hemisphere partners Anoush Ansari and Hadi Anbar also demonstrated a willingness to take risks, testing new markets without compromising the company’s attentive service and high standard of cooking.

In March, they bolstered their already strong kitchen corps by hiring Doug Flicker, one of the region’s top chefs, who brought Mission to a higher level. As 2007 ended, they developed their first full-service, casual concept, Flame, which will open in May at Rosedale mall. And they have maintained continuity at their other Twin Cities operations—Good to Go, the Minneapolis skyway takeaway; Atlas Grill, which popularized fire-roasted meats downtown; and Kabobi, the company’s casual quick-service  “kabobery” in Eden Prairie.

As a result, Hemisphere enjoyed its best year since Ansari and Anbar joined forces eleven years ago. Their success on diverse fronts, in both quick-serve and high-end environments, has positioned the duo as arguably the most versatile and dynamic operators in the region.

Hemisphere is already one of the largest restaurant groups in the Twin Cities, but its properties are all owner-operated. Its principals aren’t socked away in some distant city or antiseptic suburban headquarters; they are greeting customers at the door and overseeing operations.

Anoush Ansari is the face of Hemisphere. The handsome forty-five-year-old with dark, curly hair is the one at the front door welcoming guests with charm and sincerity. He divides his day between the restaurants, noting—and catering to—customers’ likes and dislikes. “He has his brain wrapped around five different properties all at the same time,” says Doug Flicker, Mission’s executive chef. “I find that impressive.”

Hadi Anbar is the man behind the curtain, scheming about ways to trim spending without sacrificing quality. Shuttling through the back doors of the restaurants, he monitors food and labor costs. He has devised operational systems, hired and trained strong managers, and ensured that the kitchens are under control. He also takes his daily turn greeting customers and serving food, modeling for staff the level of attentiveness the partners expect. If something goes awry, he is often the first to spot it and set it right.

Fate seems to have brought these two men with complementary strengths together. They met at Anbar’s wedding reception, a traditional Persian affair catered by Ansari, who was D’Amico + Partners’ special events manager at the time. They discovered they had similar backgrounds and interests as Iranian immigrants who had forged careers in the American restaurant business.

Ansari had come to the United States in 1978 to visit his sister, a student at Macalester. Shortly afterward, the Iranian Revolution occurred, and he stayed stateside. The sixteen-year-old worked his way up the business from valet to dishwasher to waiter to management. Anbar had moved to Dallas in 1977 to attend North Texas State University. He worked in a cousin’s restaurants while in college, then partnered with the cousin to open a dozen restaurants of various ethnic varieties throughout the eighties. He moved to the Twin Cities in 1991.

In 1995, Anbar joined Ansari at Morton’s, where Ansari had become the Chicago–based chain’s regional manager. Six months later, in 1996, they decided to start their own restaurant company. That same year, they opened Atlas Grill, which garnered a loyal following for its Persian–style fire-roasted meats. Five years later in 2001, they charmed the skyway lunch crowd by fashioning those same meats into the town’s best wraps at Good to Go, which opened above Atlas (and uses its kitchens).

Then they got ambitious. They scored big among power lunchers in 2003 with Mission and brought kebabs to the suburbs with Kabobi in 2005. Last year, hoping to continue their knack for reclamation, they purchased the defunct Cattle Company on I–394 with the intention of putting an upscale restaurant in the suburbs. But when the Pizzeria Uno location across France Avenue from Southdale became available, they pounced. The Cattle Company site would wait.

Via presented challenges for Hemisphere. It took the partners outside of their downtown Minneapolis comfort zone. They had charted suburban waters with Kabobi, but it was a quick-service, low-risk venture. Via, which introduced sophisticated cooking to tables where pizzas once perched, represented new territory for the pair. Knowing they couldn’t simply replicate Mission, they were forced to develop a new concept. “We didn’t want to come in too sophisticated and overwhelm people, but we didn’t want to hit below the mark either,” Ansari recalls.

The resulting compromise was a menu that includes delicate crab puffs in mango-ginger chutney, offset by flash-fried walleye with Buffalo seasoning. The ambiance created by burgundy wing-backed booths and heavy wooden table tops plays to the business crowd and the shoppers venturing across France.
The restaurant showcases Ansari’s atypical ability to be detail and big-picture oriented at once, as well as Anbar’s skill at implementing cost-effective systems—David Fhima’s notorious failure across the street meant this location was no gimme for upscale fare.

A warm reception from critics and customers alike validated their strategy. Via hit the mark, in large part because Hemisphere knows its customer. That knowledge has guided the success of its other restaurants, Mission in particular. Aquavit’s notorious failure in the space, despite national critical acclaim, had to be a top concern. But Aquavit was crafted by an out-of-town chef and owners who had walled off the restaurant to the street and hidden its entrance from Crystal Court pedestrians. Hemisphere would make no such mistakes.

Mission is upscale, but little of its menu is haute cuisine. “Most of our clients have a sophisticated palate, but they can’t eat that type of food day in and day out,” Ansari says. Omelets, black cod, and Buffalo chicken salads are best-sellers at lunch.

Ansari and Anbar take pains to get to know their customers and meet their expectations. One of Mission’s most loyal customers, Irwin Jacobs, asked why the restaurant didn’t have a signature soup, like the chicken noodle soup his mother used to make; three days later, Mission had homemade chicken noodle soup on the menu. “We listen to what people want,” Ansari says. “At the end of the day, it’s about them and not about us.”

Mission has moved into a different league, though, thanks to the addition of Doug Flicker, who established a reputation during his ten years at Auriga as one of the region’s most creative and inspired chefs. After Auriga closed, Ansari, who knew Flicker from their days together at D’Amico, invited the chef inside. “I always wanted Mission to be a lot more sophisticated,” Ansari explains. “I wanted Doug to take it to the next level.”

Few corporate restaurateurs would have partnered with a chef of Flicker’s caliber and ambitions. Ansari is realistic enough to know that the creative itch will likely lead Flicker to start another restaurant of his own someday. Until then, it’s a win-win that allows Flicker to participate in the company’s ambitious growth.

Mission already had an accomplished chef in James Foley, who opened the restaurant. “Sometimes having two chefs of that caliber in the same restaurant would be like having your wife and girlfriend live with you,” Ansari says. “But they became friends. They played off one another’s strengths.”

It also freed Foley to take over the Via kitchen. Ansari credits him with being able to create production-friendly dishes, that is, flavorful yet practical offerings that do not require excessive labor. Ansari also praises Foley’s patience and concern for customer satisfaction, in harmony with the company philosophy. “If a guest wants their food a certain way, some chefs would throw a knife at them,” Ansari says. “James goes out and talks to them. He fixes their meal the way they want it, then checks back with them.”

Just when Ansari and Anbar thought they would resume work on the Cattle Company space, a spot at Rosedale became available, and Hemisphere created Flame. Ansari and Anbar hadn’t been planning to break into the east metro, but when they realized Rosedale was the state’s second-best-performing shopping center—after Mall of America—and that its AMC theater had the highest seating rate in Minnesota, they changed their minds.

Flame, located between the theaters and Borders, will not be Roseville’s Via. Instead, it will be Hemisphere’s first full-service casual restaurant, as casual as Hemisphere will go in the future. “We realize our strong suit is in full-service dining,” Ansari says.

Flame presents challenges Via didn’t. Hemisphere could not expect people on their way to a movie or on a shopping trip with kids in tow to sit for a leisurely meal. So the partners devised a menu anchored by platters of roasted meats, at a moderate price, for meals that can be consumed in forty-five minutes. The space will be stylish, differentiating Flame from the chain restaurants that surround it.

According to Flicker, Flame will “work with elements of fire.” Meats will be all-natural, in keeping with the company’s policy of not using products that contain antibiotics or hormones. Flicker—who became known for his support of local growers via the farmers’ market he hosted in Auriga’s parking lot—has motivated Hemisphere to seek organic and seasonal food from local vendors whenever possible.

A key question for Hemisphere is, When does growth at this speed move from ambitious to reckless? The company still wants to expand, rolling 70 percent of its profits into expansion. Yet it has tempered its ambition. “We don’t want to take our eye off the detail we’re known for,” Ansari says. “It’s not how many restaurants you have, but how they are performing.”

His metric is simple: return visits. “If you exceed what customers expect,” Anbar says, “you have won them back.”

The tactics are both ambitious and obvious: If a customer complains, they listen and prepare a dish to her liking. If a regular customer’s car is spotted pulling into the parking lot, they have his favorite drink waiting. “We show bartenders and managers the value of knowing who guests are and serving them right,” Ansari says. “It’s like having guests at your home. You know what they like and how to take care of them.”

Would it surprise you to know there’s a For Lease sign outside the I–394 Cattle Company? It’s been there for months while Ansari and Anbar developed Via and Flame, raised Mission to a new level, and tended to the success of their other restaurants. They’re willing to step aside so another company can utilize the space, as they have no intention of developing more than one new restaurant concept in a year. But that doesn’t mean they don’t have ideas of their own percolating. The vacant building still could become the site of their next venture, or they could surprise with a creation in some unexpected location.

One thing is certain: What’s come from Hemisphere thus far may be only the appetizer.