Prairie Plate Restaurant

"Over eighty-five percent of the produce we serve comes from our co-located certified organic farm and more than ninety percent of our food expenditures go to local producers. We select seed varieties for flavor and prepare dishes with a respect for those ingredients. As a produce farm, vegetables are always front and center. The restaurant moves through the seasons with the farm and local producers and we highlight the incredible flavors of ingredients grown with care. Our farm and kitchen are designed to maximize the flavor of each ingredient."

Bison meatloaf with sweet corn spoonbread and wilted fresh spinach; baby-shiitake Stroganoff with house-made pasta and wilted spinach; pork chop with rhubarb sauce, barley and sweet potato pilaf, and roasted asparagus.

Prairie Plate has got to be one of the most unique restaurants in the country. It was opened in farm-town rural Nebraska by two married former Navy helicopter pilots who dreamed of a straight-from-the-farm spot to showcase the cool things they grow on their forty-acre vegetable farm. One of the owners, chef Renee, or her husband Jerry, tend to stop by each table, often offering extra produce to the dinner guests -- it's a farmers' market visit along with dinner. Most American farm dinners are pop-up affairs of a single night, with tables set up in a field, but Prairie Plate is a dedicated farm dinner every growing season, spring through frost.