Hey Omaha, it’s Sarah Baker Hansen.
I’m back this week to wrap up my yearlong series, Steak Town USA, which included a dozen stories about steakhouses in Omaha and greater Nebraska.
I know a lot of you have enjoyed following this series — mostly because many of you have emailed me or spoken to me in real life about it. I’ve also had fun learning a lot more than I knew about Omaha’s steak history and why the steakhouse itself has such staying power for so many Nebraskans. It is our past and our future of dining at once.
But now, it’s time to hand out some scores. We tried several dishes at every single steakhouse we visited and ranked each one on a scale of 1 to 5. This week, we recap each dish and share our top-scoring steakhouses. We also name what, in one critic’s opinion, is the city’s best steakhouse.
I’ll be back with many more food stories in 2026, along with the return of my annual food bracket, which will now be hosted on Flatwater Free Press. I can’t wait.
Until then, check out our winners at this link, or by clicking the photo above.
See you soon, and happy new year.
Sarah Baker Hansen is an award-winning writer who has covered Omaha’s food scene for more than a decade. She posts restaurant reviews and food news on her blog, sarahbakerhansen.com.
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Our first story on Omaha’s lead Superfund site has been read by roughly a half-million people on our website and our partner ProPublica’s site. It’s a triumph of public service journalism, but we’re nowhere near done raising awareness and reporting on the city’s lead contamination problem.
If you live in or near the Superfund site, we will test the lead levels in your soil for free. Please fill out our online form and we will collect a bit of dirt from your yard and send you the results when they are ready.
Have questions or a story to share about lead? Contact Chris Bowling.
The Douglas County Board of Commissioners reviewed November data from the Youth Center showing 54 youth admissions and an average daily population of 80, with significantly longer stays for youths charged as adults. The report highlighted racial disparities: Black youths made up 50% of admissions despite representing only 14% of the county’s youth population. Commissioners questioned prolonged detention times, the impact of probation violations and the need for more placement and programming options outside of detention. Read the full summary here and the full meeting notes on the Documenters website.
Want to help inform your community and create better journalism while getting paid? Become a Documenter today.
— Leah Wambui Keinama, Nebraska Journalism Trust
What began as a silly argument over whether an amateur could land a plane has turned into a semester-long endeavor that took FFP reporter Destiny Herbers and me to the beating heart of aviation education.
During our infiltration of UNO’s Aviation Institute, we’ve commanded finicky flight simulators, absorbed lectures on planes and aerodynamics, conversed with the future captains of the sky and squeezed rubber chickens for good luck.
But now we return to our original question: Could either of us land a plane well enough to keep all souls aboard alive?
You may recall that Destiny believed she could in an emergency and that I doubted her, myself and all other first-time pilots.
Finally, we’ve got an answer … sort of.
Because a debate between Destiny and me can never truly be settled, what occurred in a UNO flight simulator on Nov. 13 is disputed — or, at least, subject to various interpretations.
I’ll let Destiny describe her landing attempts first.
The controls of this simulator were much more sensitive than for our first attempt in September. A strong left-turning tendency, caused mostly by the plane’s propeller spinning, required constant corrections.
It was a lot to think about, but after a semester of classes, I felt confident reading the dials and using the yoke to move the plane toward the direction, speed and altitude that flight instructor Patrick Ryan recommended.
Pilots often follow a pattern when they approach the airport to land that basically involves flying parallel to the runway, then swinging out and around to come down in a series of turns. That pattern confused me immensely, and I started to sweat as I tried to line up with the runway while rapidly dropping.
That left-turn pull came back with a vengeance, and I was going to miss the runway. I pulled right to correct. The plane’s movements seemed much sharper so close to landing. I tried to pull back the other way, but my wing clipped the ground and we came down in the grass. A good landing — we would have walked away — but not a great one. The plane was definitely damaged, but the simulator didn’t stop. “Drive it back on the runway,” Patrick said. “Time for takeoff.”
I managed two great landings after and another good one in the grass.
Jeremy here. I concur that the controls were touchier than I remembered, but I cannot agree with my esteemed colleague’s description of her first landing as “good.”
She and poor Patrick likely would have suffered some bumps, bruises and hairline fractures. The landing gear would have crumpled under them, and that right wing was toast.
Yes, we learned from a wise pilot that all landings you can walk away from are “good,” but I wouldn’t use that word to describe one where the plane’s lateral axis came down at a 45-degree angle.
Still, I have to admit that in this situation — flying a small plane with an expert pilot in her ear — Destiny triumphed in the “land without killing anyone” part of the brief. I believe she and Patrick would have lived to crash another day.
And now, dear reader, you can judge for yourself. Click the video below to see Destiny’s first landing attempt.
There’s one fact of our simulation session that I cannot dispute: Destiny’s landings were far smoother than mine.
My attempts all fell somewhere between airfield lawnjob and Hindenburgian disaster.
On the first try, I flew into a sign next to the runway, but in my defense, it was totally in the way. I landed safely in the grass on my second go but ran through a chain-link fence while attempting to do a donut. My third one was solid enough, though the groundskeeper might have had a bit of cleanup work.
I decided after leaving the simulator that a mantra we learned in class explains why Destiny outperformed me and won our original argument.
Power + Attitude = Performance
In aviation, it means the amount of throttle you use and where you point the airplane determines what it does. But taken a different way, it’s a life truth: Having confidence in yourself leads to success.
Destiny believed in herself. I didn’t.
I still don’t think either of us should be called upon to land a plane in real life, but if I find myself in that nightmare, I’ll stick out my chest and say, “I got this.”
This concludes our “Learning to Fly” series. Thanks for reading along! If you’d like to see the rest of the series, click here.
We owe a huge debt of gratitude to the University of Nebraska at Omaha and its mustachioed media relations boss Sam Peshek for allowing us to go on this adventure. Special shoutouts to the Aviation Institute’s Larry Morgan, Patrick Ryan, Skip Bailey, Scott Vlasek, Tyler Thieman and Thomas Reid. Fly on, Mavs!
— Jeremy Turley, Flatwater Free Press
When you’re a kid, there’s no greater thrill than waking up on Christmas morning and finding presents from Santa. But growing up means caring more about the goodies left for the fat man than the Labubu under the tree.
Days ago, our newsroom transformed into a Christmas cookie wonderland when the elves of Nebraska Journalism Trust brought in their favorite holiday treats to share.
The Flatwater reporters came with bold flavors and beloved classics.
Destiny Herbers delivered a pyramid of brown sugar chai spice cookies, while newcomer Anila Yoganathan offered up chocolate chip cookies stuffed with raspberry compote.
Sara Gentzler stretched the definition of cookie with chocolate-oatmeal cookie bars, an old family recipe calling for a sleighful of butter. Editor Bob “Sweet Tooth” Glissmann baked traditional tree-shaped sugar cookies topped with green, red and blue sugar crystals.
Emily Wolf and development boss Barbara Soderlin both made peanut butter blossoms, overcoming the challenge of unwrapping Hershey’s kisses without eating them on the spot. Noted overachiever Barbara also contributed Mexican wedding cakes to the cause.
A few shameless reporters and editors went the store-bought route. Josh Shimkus came with Meyer lemon cookie thins from Trader Joe’s, while Matthew Hansen banked on Sweet Magnolia’s thick mega-cookies.
Scrooge-in-chief Ryan Hoffman arrived from Lincoln with Oreos and Pillsbury Monster cookies “because they were the cheapest thing at the grocery store and child care is financially devastating.” Hopefully, Chris Kringle will leave a robot babysitter in his stocking.
From all of us at NJT, we wish you a very happy holiday season however you celebrate. May your canes be candied and your eggs be nogged. We’ll be back in the new year — see you in ’26!
— The NJT family, Flatwater Free Press
Douglas County Health Director Lindsay Huse sent a letter to OPPD opposing the utility’s continued burning of coal at its North Omaha plant, The World-Herald’s Julie Anderson reported. Burning coal has a clear negative impact on health, especially in North O, Huse said. After years of delay, OPPD was supposed to stop burning coal at the plant next year, but utility leaders proposed a continuation of the practice amid rising energy demand. (You may need a subscription to read this story.)
Graduation rates at Omaha Public Schools have declined in the last five years with more than 1,000 students failing to complete the necessary coursework in four years, a new report revealed. Overall, about 72% of students graduated, but that number dropped to 40% for students in an ESL program, KETV’s Pete Cuddihy reported.
Omaha’s own Terence “Bud” Crawford announced his retirement from boxing after an illustrious career that saw him at the sport’s pinnacle, CBS Sports reported. Crawford finished with a 42-0 record and won championships in five weight divisions over the years, earning him a reputation as boxing’s “pound-for-pound king.”
With court decisions now allowing colleges to pay athletes directly, the University of Nebraska at Omaha announced it will compensate Maverick athletes starting next school year, Nebraska Public Radio reported. Creighton University began paying athletes in “revenue-generating sports,” particularly men’s basketball, earlier this year.
A California real estate company is suing the City of Omaha over the planned demolition of an abandoned hotel in southwest Omaha, WOWT reported. The company, Newport Blue, claims the property’s value would plummet if the Westmont Inn and Suites is torn down as the city intends.
The Flatwater Free Press is published by the Nebraska Journalism Trust, a 501(c)(3) public charity