what's on your plate?

Greens Restaurant was a pioneer in establishing vegetarian cuisine in the United States. Long affiliated with the San Francisco Zen Center (for many years, Zen students were the only employees at the restaurant), Greens has traditionally been a place for students to work together, extending their Buddhist practice into the workplace. Serving local and healthy food goes hand-in-hand with the restaurant’s service orientation. "Sourcing locally, organically and sustainably is the heartbeat of Greens,” says Executive Chef Annie Somerville. “We support our local growers and producers, and they in turn support their families, employees and the greater community,” she says. Somerville has earned a...

Seattle’s Café Flora, which recently marked its 20th anniversary, invited a group of local farmers and food producers to celebrate at the restaurant in a kind of local food hoedown not unlike the farmers markets where the producers sell their wares.  That’s the kind of respect this restaurant and its owners show for the farmers and artisans who make their vegetarian fare as popular as it is. “When it is your neighbors growing the food, I think you can taste the difference. Guests visit us from all over the country and all over the world to get a true taste of the Northwest because they know it's going to be fresh, local and flavorful," says owner Nat Stratton-Clarke. Since opening...

James Tracey is Executive Chef at Craft Restaurant and Colicchio and Sons Restaurant in New York, the two flagships in Tom Colicchio’s Craft Restaurant Group. A graduate of the Culinary Institute of America, Tracey has also worked at The Gramercy Tavern and the St. Regis Hotel in New York, before helping Colicchio launch Craft in 2002.  The restaurant won the James Beard Award for Best New Restaurant that year and has continued a successful run of serving local, seasonal fare ever since. Tracey says being able to rely on a trusted group of farmer-producers makes his job easier, and it’s been a key to the success of both restaurants. "When you can look, taste and feel what the...

Originally from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Manresa Restaurant’s David Kinch now calls the California coast home. Kinch, who was GQ’s Chef of the Year in 2011, is fanatical about the ingredients he uses in his cooking.   That’s why the award-winning chef struck such a unique relationship with a champion produce grower near his Los Gatos restaurant. Cynthia Sandberg and her Love Apple Farms have worked almost exclusively with Kinch and Manresa for about six years now. Sandberg owns the farm, but she and Chef Kinch work together closely to raise the best possible ingredients for Kinch’s signature style of cuisine (Kinch, a James Beard Award finalist, has serious cooking chops, having...

In a few short years, Burlington’s Skinny Pancake creperie has become something of an institution. Co-founder Benjy Adler started his business in 2003 as a two-man operation with his brother Jonny. Together, they manned a cart on the main pedestrian walking mall in Burlington, making sweet and savory crepes for hungry passers-by. In 2007, they opened a full-fledged restaurant on Burlington’s waterfront. Benjy later launched a second Skinny Pancake location in Montpelier, and in 2010, he launched The Chubby Muffin in the Old North End of Burlington. All three locations – along with the still-running food cart – source a majority of their food locally from a group of about 30 farms and...