Reno’s most distinctive food tradition is Basque. Sheepherders from the Pyrenees settled across northern Nevada in the late 1800s, and the boarding houses that fed them still serve the same way: long communal tables, a fixed menu, course after course arriving unasked, with a picon punch to start.
The city’s casino buffets are the other stereotype, and less interesting. The real change has been along the Truckee River downtown and in the Midtown district, where independent restaurants, breweries and coffee roasters have concentrated over the last decade.
Lake Tahoe and the Sierra are forty minutes away, and the agricultural valleys north and east supply a good summer farmers’ market.