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Where to Eat

Ottawa's Restaurant Week Returns!

This special week-long event, cooked up by the Ottawa Visitors Center and Ottawa Area Chamber of Commerce, will give you the rare opportunity to try new meals made from ingredients grown right here in Starved Rock Country. Pairing knowledgeable chefs with unbeatable farmer's market quality fruits and vegtables, Ottawa's second annual Local Foods Restaurant Week sets out to showcase some of the delicious dishes that can be prepared using Starved Rock Country-grown ingredients. This unique program, that blends agritourism with local dining, is the result of a novel partnership between The Ottawa Visitors Center, Ottawa Chamber of Commerce and Illinois Stewardship Alliance. The result? Eight of Starved Rock Country's best growers have signed on this year to provide chefs from four of your favorite Ottawa restaurants with all the fresh produce they need to craft some unique and delectable menu items.

By Ryan Searl

This special week-long event, cooked up by the Ottawa Visitors Center and Ottawa Area Chamber of Commerce, will give you the rare opportunity to try new meals made from ingredients grown right here in Starved Rock Country. Pairing knowledgeable chefs with unbeatable farmer's market quality fruits and vegtables, Ottawa's second annual Local Foods Restaurant Week sets out to showcase some of the delicious dishes that can be prepared using Starved Rock Country-grown ingredients. This unique program, that blends agritourism with local dining, is the result of a novel partnership between The Ottawa Visitors Center, Ottawa Chamber of Commerce and Illinois Stewardship Alliance. The result? Eight of Starved Rock Country's best growers have signed on this year to provide chefs from four of your favorite Ottawa restaurants with all the fresh produce they need to craft some unique and delectable menu items.

Chefs at all four of this year's participating restaurants are no strangers to using farm-to-table ingredients. While all of these establishments regularly use locally grown ingredients in their core menu, they'll have free reign to create whatever kind of dishes they want with these ingredients during this week long special event. Chefs have reached out to the farmers, to discuss produce will be coming to harvest around Restaurant Week, and tailored special limited menus highlighting these ingredients. Featured restaurants will include returning favorites like Tangled Roots, B.A.S.H. and Pine Hills, along with a newcomer for Restaurant Week 2020, Iniga Pizzeria Napoletana. Throughout this weeklong festival, running from September 5th through the 13th, these restaurants will be serving up these special menu items for dine-in or carry-out.

Wise Family Farms, of rural Ottawa, is ran by Ilana Larson, on land that was originally purchased by her grandfather more than a half century ago. She's now growing heirloom herbs, vegetables, and micro greens with the help of her husband and son. Wise Family Farms is a sustainable operation, using no chemicals or toxins to grow their greens. You can find them weekly at the Ottawa Old Town Farmers Market. Brian Severson Farms, located in rural Grundy County, specializes in heirloom organic grains forgotten by most modern farming practices. This family run operations raises, cleans, stores and stone mills these great tasting grains to order, right on their farm! You can find their grains in flours, meals, grits and rolled oats. They've even begun baking these grains in breads and pretzels, on site.

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