Every great place has a great dining establishment.

Los Angeles has Spago.

Paris has Chez Maxim’s.

Manhattan has 21.

And Enterprise has … the dining room at Wallowa Memorial Hospital?

Well, okay, perhaps it hasn’t quite gained worldwide renown. And Michelin’s international restaurant guide has yet to award the establishment a single star. Nevertheless, among locals, Wallowa County’s only hospital is catching on fast as one of the area’s best -and most sanitary – dining destinations for breakfast and lunch.

What’s that? You’re among the uninitiated who still thinks of hospital food as the blandest, next-worse thing to (sorry for bringing back the memory) airplane food?

Obviously, you haven’t eaten lunch with Joseph Fire Chief Kevin Warnock lately. He likes the hospital dining room’s menu so much he keeps a copy of it in his desk, for easy access whenever midday hunger strikes.

Warnock loves the daily grill specials (“There’s grilled ham, grilled ham and cheese, grilled turkey and cheese, hamburgers, cheeseburgers, tuna melts …). He loves the soup (“There’s two kinds every day”). He loves the breakfast specials (“Monday is French toast, Tuesday is a huge breakfast burrito …”).

But variety and quality of the food selections aren’t all Warnock likes.

“The prices are very reasonable,” he said. “And during the summer, you can sit out on the open-air patio under an umbrella and enjoy that spectacular view of the Wallowa Mountains.”

Of course, you can enjoy the view inside, too, thanks to the giant floor-to-ceiling windows that surround the dining room.

Of the food, the only negative thing Warnock has to say is, “It hasn’t made me skinny. But on a scale of one to 10, I’d put it at a seven, eight or nine. It’s that good.”

Wallowa County District Attorney Mona K. Williams is another enthusiastic patron:

“I like the salad bar …it’s really nice, and there are a lot of choices. And the prices are terrific. I was there yesterday and had a bowl of really good corn chowder and a Diet Pepsi, and I paid $2.75.”

Louise Miller, executive assistant for an Enterprise attorney, proffers yet another rave review: “The food is good, it’s fresh, it’s well seasoned, and everything is very clean. That makes you want to eat there. You know, you go into some places and … well,” she said with a laugh, “you just aren’t sure.”

In the face of such wildly positive responses and increasing popularity, most restaurant proprietors would be overjoyed. That is not the case here. In fact, Dave Harman, the hospital’s administrator and CEO, would really prefer to keep Wallowa County’s best-kept dining secret a secret.

“Though we don’t limit our food service to just patients and staff, we also don’t promote or advertise it as we do not want to take business away from local restaurants,” he emphasized. “These local businesses have and continue to support the hospital and we want to support them.”

That’s not to say that Harman doesn’t recognize what so many others are discovering.

“I’ve been impressed with the hospital’s dietary department and the exceptional job they do with meal service for both patients and staff,” he said. “When you add the new dining facility with its great view, it is a pleasant place to have a meal.”

Under normal circumstances, that wouldn’t sound like muted praise. But it does when you corner someone like Lostine’s Kate Loftus at her hospital dining-room table.

Kate and her husband, Larry, enjoy lunch in the hospital dining room “every time we come to Enterprise, which is at least once a week,” she said. “If we have an appointment here, or have to run an errand, we come and have lunch here. Why? Because it’s great food. It’s better than a lot of places.”

In the name of full disclosure, Kate confessed that she just so happens to be on the hospital’s board of directors.

“But that’s not why I’m saying all these nice things,” she promises. “I mean, you found me actually eating here, didn’t you?”

Excellent point.

But keep it under your hat.