Drive down Colorado Street this summer and you will pass a building that did not exist eighteen months ago. It replaced the old T-Shirts & More storefront, a fixture of downtown Prior Lake for decades before it closed and made way for something new. What went up in its place has a name that most passersby will not guess just by looking at the building. It is called the Railhead Building, and Prior Lake residents chose that name themselves.
The story of how that happened tells you more about what downtown Prior Lake is becoming than the restaurant menu inside it does, though the menu is very good too.
A Contest, Not a Committee
When the new building near the corner of Colorado and Dakota Streets was ready for its identity, the developers did not hand the job to a branding firm. They opened it up to the town. Three hundred sixteen residents submitted nearly 900 name ideas, all asked to reflect Prior Lake's history and its momentum as a growing community. A judging panel of three, Dan Stanley of Stanley & Wencl Construction, restaurant owner Manny Perez, and Mayor Kirt Briggs, picked a winner: Railhead Building, submitted by resident Lauren Fries.
The name is a nod to the Milwaukee Road railroad, which once ran directly through Prior Lake and helped build the town before the tracks disappeared from daily life. Most people walking past the building today have no memory of that railroad. The name puts a piece of that history back into the sentence people use to describe where they are eating dinner.
Five Years Before the First Table Was Set
The restaurant that anchors the Railhead Building is Chula's Mexican-Latin Food & Spirits, and it opened its doors on May 22, 2026. Owner Manny Perez had been circling the idea for roughly five years before construction ever started. He is not new to running a business in Prior Lake. Perez has spent 35 years in the restaurant industry, at one point owning 16 Subway franchises, and he still runs the Prior Lake Subway location along with three others. In 2024, the Small Business Administration named him Minnesota's Minority-Owned Small Business of the Year.
Chula's carries a personal note that has nothing to do with any of that professional history. The name comes from Perez's granddaughter, Sawyer. Chula is a Mexican term of endearment, and Perez built the restaurant with his daughter Mercedes and his partner Suzie Dahl, both of whom worked on the concept's design and menu.
When the project broke ground back in 2025, Mayor Kirt Briggs connected it to something the city hears constantly from residents.
"One of the things we hear in our community surveys quite often is, 'We'd like to see more restaurants.'"
Chula's is one direct answer to that complaint, and the building itself, with a restaurant as its anchor tenant, was built to hold more than one business over time.
What's Actually Inside
The space is built for lingering rather than a quick lunch stop. The main dining room serves a menu built around Mexican and Latin flavors, including walleye tacos finished with pickled cabbage and lime crema, a nod to the fact that this is still Minnesota even with a Jalisco-inspired kitchen. The Topopo Salad piles pulled chicken, refried beans, guacamole, and jicama over crushed tortilla chips, the kind of shareable plate built for a table of six rather than a party of two.
Upstairs, a mezzanine level called the Jalisco Room overlooks the main floor and comes equipped with a projector screen and velvet curtains, giving groups a private corner for a birthday or a work gathering without leaving the building. The outdoor terrace is designed to flow directly into the indoor space rather than sitting off to the side as an afterthought, so the patio and dining room function as one continuous room whenever the weather cooperates.
The bar leans into craft. Chula's pours tequila and mezcal flights alongside handcrafted cocktails, and one beer on tap did not come from a distributor at all. It is a custom light lager brewed with a hint of chili pepper, made specifically for Chula's by Boathouse Brothers Brewing, the nautical-themed taproom that has anchored downtown's Main Avenue for several years.
A Corridor, Not a Single Address
That collaboration matters more than it might first appear. Boathouse Brothers sits at 16211 Main Ave SE, close enough to the Railhead Building that a night out downtown can now realistically move between the two without anyone needing to drive. Boathouse Brothers built its own identity around lake life, with pontoon boat seating, more than 18 taps, and a rotating cast of food trucks parked outside since it has no kitchen of its own. It has been open long enough to become a known quantity in town, while Chula's is still new enough that regulars are just starting to form. Together they give downtown Prior Lake two distinct reasons to park once and stay on foot for the evening, something the corner of Colorado and Main did not offer in the same way two years ago.
Chula's has not waited around to become part of that rhythm. One month after opening, the team was already noting how quickly the dining room filled with families, first dates, and familiar faces. By August 1, the restaurant hosted Rev It For A Reason, a community motorcycle ride paired with live music, food, vendors, and a Best Bike Contest, with proceeds supporting the Think Great Foundation. A restaurant that opened in May was running its own charity event by August.
A Week Later, an Even Bigger Crowd
That same month, downtown Prior Lake turned out for its long-running summer tradition. Prior Lake Days ran August 7 and 8, opening Friday evening with Sip & Stroll, a ticketed tasting event from Viking Liquor that brought together 51 liquor vendors offering more than 300 tastings along Main Street. Saturday's Family Fun Day filled the same stretch of downtown with a different crowd entirely, running from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. with a Kids Zone built around an obstacle course, a rock climbing slide, and water races, plus a cookie eating contest, a Children's Market, and a Cornhole Tournament. Food trucks lined the street too, including Kona Ice, Pony Expresso, Brick Oven Pizza, Blue Loon Concessions, and 2Sisters Vietnamese Street Food.
None of that is new to Prior Lake. Prior Lake Days has been a summer fixture for years. What is new is that this year, for the first time, that weekend of downtown foot traffic passed directly by a restaurant and a building that did not exist the summer before, one that the town itself had a hand in naming.
What This Adds Up To
A single new restaurant opening is not unusual anywhere. What is less common is a town using a public naming contest to decide what its newest building will be called, choosing a name that reaches back to a railroad most residents never saw, and then watching that building's restaurant become a community event host within ten weeks of opening. Downtown Prior Lake did not just get a taco spot this year. It got a small, deliberate act of civic memory attached to a place people will now use as a landmark for directions, dinner plans, and eventually, their own stories about the town.
If you already call Prior Lake home, the next time someone asks where to meet downtown, you now have an answer with a little more history behind it than "the new Mexican place." And if Prior Lake is a place you are watching for other reasons, whether that is a growing family looking at what a neighborhood offers on a Tuesday night or simply curiosity about where the south metro is headed next, Jen Azure has spent two decades paying attention to exactly this kind of local detail. Let's Connect if you would like to talk about what a town like this has to offer beyond the restaurant reviews.
