Flora Restaurant Salt Lake City, Holladay

Chef Bryan Rubey has been featured on ABC-4's Good Things Utah for his Shetland salmon with mango-pineapple salsa—just one recipe that demonstrates his deft culinary touch. Before opening Flora Restaurant, Rubey helped to steer the kitchens of Via Emilia in Mobile, Alabama, and the Snowbird Resort's Arie Restaurant, where he mastered French and Italian cooking techniques such as poaching, braising, and putting miniature berets on steaks. He melds those styles with Southern and Southwestern flavors in dishes such as South Carolina-style mustard baby-back ribs with roasted-pepper polenta or housemade spinach linguine in lemon cream sauce with chicken, olives, and roasted peppers. Flora Restaurant's dessert menu is just as well thought out, with options such as lavender-scented honey cheesecake to sweeten palates.