The Heartland Cafe is a restaurant in the Rogers Park neighborhood of Chicago

Chicago

Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...

. Originally opened in 1976 by two activists as the "Sweet Home Chicago Heartland Café," it has become a cultural icon for the diverse neighborhood, known as much for its hippie

Hippie

The hippie subculture was originally a youth movement that arose in the United States during the mid-1960s and spread to other countries around the world. The etymology of the term 'hippie' is from hipster, and was initially used to describe beatniks who had moved into San Francisco's...

 ambience and left-leaning politics as for its largely (but not exclusively) vegetarian food.

Part of a complex of buildings that also contains a theatre studio, an adjoining music venue, and a newsstand and general store within the restaurant itself, the restaurant is routinely referred to as an "institution" and a social and political center of the neighborhood. Politicians ranging from local candidates to Barack Obama

Barack Obama

Barack Hussein Obama II is the 44th and current President of the United States. He is the first African American to hold the office. Obama previously served as a United States Senator from Illinois, from January 2005 until he resigned following his victory in the 2008 presidential election.Born in...

have held rallies and events at the Heartland. On Saturdays, radio station WLUW broadcasts a show called "Live from the Heartland".