Do you like Bicycles, Portland, Good Food, and Midtown....then this is for you!

Reno is getting in on a little Portland food action!  Look for the Laughing Planet Cafe to open this May.  More below from the Reno Rebirth Blog.

Reno Rebirth: Healion readies new restaurant in Midtown Reno

"Midtown's on fire": Tim Healion talks about busin...: Tim Healion is aiming for a spring opening for Laughing Planet Cafe in Reno's Midtown district. Here, he talks about the location.

Written by

Yvonne Beasley

Tim Healion is turning this former law office on Tahoe Street into a Laughing Planet Cafe, with a planned opening of May 1. With Healion are Fenway, front, and Omar Little. / Tim Dunn / RGJ

When Portland's Laughing Planet Café opens a Midtown Reno location this spring, a seasoned Reno restaurateur and organizer will be at the helm.  Tim Healion aims to open the eatery in May at 650 Tahoe Street, in the same neighborhood as Sup and the Reno Public House.

The onetime owner of the Deux Gros Nez café, which closed in 2006, also ran the Tour de Nez bicycle race for 20 years.  The café menu includes burritos, salads, soups and smoothies with a focus on locally sourced ingredients whenever possible.

"The stuff they're doing is the stuff we did years ago at the Deux, as much as we could. Locally sourced food was carrots and potatoes back then but now there's all kinds of stuff being grown," Healion said Tuesday.

Interior construction is starting nearly from scratch in the small brick building, which once housed legal offices.

“Today we busted concrete to bring new electrical service to the building,” Healion said.
Word-of-mouth momentum ramped up just hours after Healion changed his Facebook employment status Monday to “Started working at Laughing Planet Café.”

Facebook commenters cheered "yahooooooooooo- finally!!!!!" and "Back in the saddle!" at his announcement.  Healion isn't worried about joining a busy restaurant district in Midtown.

"What's cool about this neighborhood is there's a lot of stuff that's already going on," he said. "The more you have, the more people come here and the more there's opportunities."

The Laughing Planet chain is owned by Franz Spielvogel, who once worked for Healion at Deux Gros Nez.

"I was Tim's employee for three and a half years and a customer for almost eight," Spielvogel said from Portland on Tuesday.

Both Healion and Spielvogel say they're happy to get together again.

"It's kind of like a homecoming to me," Spielvogel, a UNR graduate, said.

Laughing Planet touts its community involvement, with active participation in a composting program for Portland restaurants.

"Hopefully we can influence the waste management system in Reno, increasing recycling and composting," Spielvogel said.

The chain also won a 2013 "favorite green restaurants" contest run by The Nature Conservancy, which described Laughing Planet as "a quick-service restaurant that offers fresh, healthy and affordable food, using locally sourced organic ingredients and globally inspired flavors."
The Reno location will be one of six new spots planned for Laughing Planet this year. Others are Salt Lake City and, possibly, Boise according to a Portland Business Journal report.
Spielvogel said his eventual goal is for two to four Laughing Planet locations in Reno.