5 places to eat less meat in Lincoln

May 5, 2021

Lets get this out of the way first: eating or not eating meat has always been a topic with many strong opinions, and these days there are plenty of strong opinions out there. I certainly have my own, probably strong opinions on the topic, but I really have no desire to post them or discuss them here. So I’m going to stick to the facts: there are people out there who want to eat less or no meat, and there some really good restaurants in Lincoln that can cater to them. Also, my own experiences in visiting these restaurants circles back to why I started this blog in the first place: holy cow! (no pun intended) there’s some really good local food here, I need to tell the world about it! I see two different categories of “less meat” restaurants: locations which are exclusively meat free or have a strong focus on their meat-free options. Then there are the more traditional restaurants, but still go beyond the token vegetarian entre and give one or two items that have a little creativity. My focus is on the former, but I’ll highlight a couple of the latter at the end.

1. Pepe’s Bistro

I go through phases of craving one restaurant in town over any other. For whatever reason, the restaurant I crave right now is Pepe’s. One of the things that gets me excited about any restaurant is 1) a creative menu which changes often or has a lot of specials, 2) comes from the creative mind of an on-side chef and then of course 3) is really good, or makes me want to come back again and again. Pepe’s accomplishes these three things and judging from my craving level, is accomplishing them very well.
Favorite dish so far: Pepita pesto mushroom quesadilla … or like 20 jars of the fresh salsa.
https://pepesbistro.com/

2. Juju’s Vegan Cajun and Creole Cuisine

I have to admit, I’m a little jealous of anyone who lives close to 11th & B. A lot of the same things I love about Pepe’s also applies to Juju’s, and it’s right across the street! Just like Pepe’s it is vegan, chef-inspired, with a menu that changes often and is absolutely fantastic. Chef Derik does a great job taking his favorite Cajun/Creole food and putting his vegan spin on it. If I lived closer to 11th & B, you might just find me walking or riding over every day. I’m typically not on top of things enough to pre-order a lot of the amazing looking specials, so make sure you check Juju’s social media feeds to see the current offerings and pre-order something.
Favorite dish so far: White bean trio bowl & honey-matcha cornbread.
https://www.facebook.com/jujusVEGAN/

3. Grateful Bread/Freakbeat Vegetarian

If you can catch them 1) open and 2) without a line out their door, Grateful Bread is fantastic. They have some great bread, soup, mac & cheese and more. Who doesn’t like bread or soup or mac & cheese even if you eat meat? Good news, they do a really good job with these and are worth a visit. As far as being open, they have been mostly closed during the pandemic, but open here or there. As far as a line out their door, I think this is a better indication than me telling you it’s good, take it from the people, the love the place! Set your notification to check their page for open times and go check them out.
Favorite dish so far: Mac the Goat, Three Billy Goats Gruff mac & cheese. It is good on it’s own, but probably gets the nod because it pulls at my heart strings for being named after one of my favorite books to read to my kids. Get off my bridge!!
https://www.facebook.com/Grateful-BreadFreakbeat-Vegetarian-312793177888/

4. Rutabagas Comfort Food

Rutabagas now occupies the downtown spot where Lazzari’s used to exist for years. Which makes it the go-to vegan spot for anyone in the downtown area, especially with the loss of Maggie’s vegetarian wraps. Rutabagas is yet another vegan restaurant with a lot of creative specials and changing menu items that has impressed me every time I’ve been in.
Favorite dish so far: Reuben and tots
https://www.eatrutabagas.com/

5. Hub Cafe

Hub Cafe isn’t exclusively vegan/vegetarian, but I feel like Hub has always encouraged their meat-free entrées more than their other food. Even if I’m just making that up in my head, they have plenty of vegetarian & vegan options which are always creative and really good. I love that Hub is owned by Branched Oak Farm, which makes it hard to get more farm to table than that. It’s also right on Lincoln’s main bike trail (Billy Wolff), so hop on your bike and get to the Hub Cafe.
Favorite dish so far: I hated squash my entire life, but thank goodness I got over it. My life is certainly better with Hub’s Squash banh mi in it.
https://www.hubcafelincoln.com/

Honorable mention

Dish: They don’t become my favorite restaurant in town without doing everything else really, really well. So I’m not surprised their vegie options are spot-on too.
Prairie Plate Restaurant: When they open their dining room again, you can dine out on a farm where they grow their own vegies and have great meat-free options. The fall tomato flight is still one of the neatest things I’ve had in any dining out experience.
Yia Yia’s: I realized one day that two of my favorite three pizzas at YiaYia’s are meat-free, sneaky! The Francais and The Greek. They even have a few more creative meat-free pizzas that go beyond plain cheese.
Blue Orchid: A large majority of the items on the menu at Blue Orchid require you to add a protein and offer tofu as a protein option. Which tells me they were designed to be awesome no matter which option you choose.
Venue: There aren’t a ton of vegetarian options, but a couple of my more memorable vegetarian dishes were from Venue restaurants so they are worth a mention. The beyond meatloaf at Venue & Red Reuben from Piedmont Bistro were both very good.

Have you found any awesome places to go meatless that I’m missing? Let me know in the comments!

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