Some mornings the smell of griddle butter hits you before the door even closes behind you, and you know the drive was a good idea. Nebraska has a quiet talent for this kind of place: a plain storefront on a county-seat square, a counter full of coffee cups, and pancakes the size of a hubcap coming out of the kitchen.
None of these cafes advertise much, which is part of the fun of finding them. Here are six across the state where breakfast is reason enough to set an early alarm on a Saturday.
1. Cafe on the Square, Seward, NE
Plate-sized is not an exaggeration here. The pancakes at Cafe on the Square arrive thick and wide enough to hang over the rim, and the cinnamon roll version turns breakfast into something closer to dessert with a fork.
Seward is a town of roughly 7,200 people, and the cafe sits right on the historic downtown courthouse square in a beautifully restored building. The motto posted out front, big city taste with small town charm, sums up the kitchen fairly…