hook me up with a good pan roast.

I spent a chunk of years working for the Las Vegas Review-Journal, which is located on the northwest edge of what is considered to be downtown. For some of those same years, I lived in the northwest part of the valley. Much of my time then was commuting on Rancho Drive, back and forth, passing Texas Station a few times every day. So I've eaten a lot of meals there, in one of Station Casinos' most humble properties. Lots of Fatburgers and Rubio's fish tacos, and not so much cafe and buffet food. (It should be noted, however, that Texas' steakhouse, Austin's, is pretty decent. Recently, it began serving a fun little happy hour menu from its A-5 bar, stuff like sliders and salads and fried shishito peppers.)


But most of my Texas Station lunches were at the Texas Star Oyster Bar, murdering many bowls of blisfully orange, seafood-laden pan roast. It had been a long time, years maybe, since I ate this lunch here. It's still pretty good, but it could have been fired up a bit. A pan roast is a weird, semi-Cajun seafood bisque, full of spices (paprika makes it orange), a little sherry and a lot of cream prepared in a steam cooker. At Texas, you can order it with shrimp, crab or oysters, or a combination of all of the above. Definitely get the combination. There is some white fish in there, too, and you have the option of white rice or pasta to soak up this rich, thick, fishy, totally-overdoing-it broth. It's also best to order it spicy, like I did, although it won't come hot enough. The thing about this dish is that it's huge. There's a reason you only ever get lobster bisque in a tiny little cup. This is a mighty big bowl of creamy, savory warmth, and yet I always eat at all. I love pan roast. What can I say?


There's other more pedestrian food at this oyster bar besides the raw stuff: fried seafood, sandwiches, salads. What kept me coming back, besides proximity and convenience, was the fact that there just aren't many oyster bars or seafood houses of this type anymore. It's kind of a played-out, throwback restaurant concept. There's only one southern seafood house I can think of in town -- Lola's downtown at the Holsum Lofts. Buzio's restaurant in the Rio used to serve a good pan roast, but that place has seen many menu changes and is more of a New England seafood spot now. In fact, most of the seafood restaurants in Vegas are closer to steakhouses with some fish on the menu. In fact, I can't think of an oyster bar anywhere in this town that's not inside a casino. I guess that makes me a tourist. Huh.

INTERVIEW: Anthony Meidenbauer

Anthony Meidenbauer is executive chef and partner with Block 16, which operates Holsteins at The Cosmopolitan, LBS Burger at the Red Rock Resort and Pink's at Planet Hollywood.

Most recently you've opened Holsteins at The Cosmopolitan. Going through this menu, there is a ton of stuff beyond burgers and a lot of fun snacks.
A lot of stuff we do, there's a lot of work that goes into what you put on the table. With the pork belly bun, you think it's just pork in a bun, but it's so flavorful and it takes some time to do it right. It's a Niman Ranch all-natural pork belly and we cure it in Asian flavors, ginger and citrus zest, braise it for four hours, press it, chill it, cut it in pieces and fry it crispy and serve it in a little steamed bun. Super simple, great flavor. We always start the meal out with every table getting popcorn. For example, one has truffle oil and white truffle salt to season as it's popped, and it comes out to every table so you get a little snack. We're trying to be playful and fun.

We do a Philly cheesesteak in a spring roll. It's something everyone knows about, but we take eggroll wrappers, fill them with skirt steak that we char-grill, pepper jack cheese, and then the classic Philly is always served with ketchup - our house ketchup, which we call udder sauce. Another one is the lobster corndog. Again, something everyone knows, but we're using slipper tail lobsters from New Zealand, with a nice sweet flavor, and a roasted jalapeno dijonaise underneath. Who doesn't love fried stuff on a stick? One of our biggest selling appetizers is also something super simple. We call it artichoke guac. It looks like guacamole but it's basically a Middle Eastern version of tortillla chips and guacamole. So we take pita chips toasted with zatari spice, and then serve with hummus fortified with piquillo peppers, three kinds of olives, capers, and a whole bunch of artichokes, puree it and fold it so it looks like guacamole. When you cruise through the menu, you see a lot of familiar things that we've made fun.

You're doing so much more than burgers.
For us, the burger joint moniker doesn't fit. We're a burger joint on steroids. It really doesn't fit. It's more like a gastropub, a burger-centric gastropub. We make our own foie gras, we make our own pâté, and we do our vegetables special for that dish. For the duck tacos, we make confit. The idea is to come in with a group, four to six people, to order a few snacks and share, maybe get a burger, and we have desserts made for sharing, too. It's a fun atmosphere. No matter what you order, you have some ideas of stuff you want to order next time you come in. We want people to try everything.

Is Holsteins the natural progression from LBS Burger?
LBS, originally, we wanted to be more expansive with the menu, but where we are at dictated our menu and clientele. Out in the suburbs in Vegas people aren't as exploratory with food as they can be when they come to the Strip. So we stuck with what works best there. When people want to have fun and try different stuff, they come here. If you live here, you don't come to the Strip often. A lot of the stuff is similar, sauces and things like that, because we make them all fresh every day. It definitely was a progression moving forward here at Holsteins, and we are definitely able to explore and do some more fun stuff. The kitchen is three times the size, too, and that's great, so it makes our execution a little easier. An example of something different we're doing here is housemade sausage. We make five different sausages right here. The Greek is a lamb sausage with feta and a bunch of herbs and spices, served in a little hot dog bun with olive relish, some feta cheese and a little chickpea harissa on the side.

As a chef, is it rewarding to have that progression where you are a little more free to experiment?
I think any chef has a surplus of ideas. Every time you go out to eat or read a magazine or see something, you're always thinking how you can take that idea and spin it. Our company has been working on a lot of different little projects for the past three years, but the economy hasn't always allowed everything to happen. Plus we have a great group of chefs that we work with back there, and everything is very collaborative. Everyone comes up with ideas and plans to make things work so we can put great food on the table.

How has it been working at The Cosmopolitan so far, and working with the other restaurant partners?
We all work as partners throughout the property, we have meetings, discuss issues and even though obviously we're not involved in others' menus, we all work together and share constructive criticism to help each other out. It works really well. Everyone in the property has been great. We're all here for the success of the whole property, and everyone needs to be successful for it to work.

The Cosmopolitan has some terrific qualities that set it apart. It feels more intimate because it is small, the way it's laid out. They took a weird plot of land and got real creative with it. One of the most successful things is how the parking is subterranean. Some of these huge casino-resorts, you have to walk 10 or 15 minutes to get to the casino floor or get to anywhere. Here, you can come for the first time and be in the casino or at your restaurant in a minute, and I think that's huge, especially for locals. Locals don't like to walk through the entire casino. And the look and feel of the place is definitely different from anything else, and the technology is really cool.

It seems as if your company and staff have a heads-up on opening in this brand new property, since you already work on the Strip at Planet Hollywood and at a completely different resort company at Red Rock. Does that give you a different perspective on operating?
We definitely have a strategic advantage, hands down. During the opening, a lot of the restaurant partners here that are from out of state had no idea what to expect. We have done as much work as we can to help them out. When you're working in a resort with an odd size and a lot going on, there are a lot of issues, logistically, things like getting products here. But I can just get it from my other properties and bring it over. So that's definitely an advantage.

Where were you before you got together with Block 16?
We've been together for three years. I was at Wynn for three years in room service, and I'm still good friends with a lot of people over there. I've been in town almost 10 years now, and it's still a small town. You see the same people over and over again.

How did your team manage to bring the iconic Pink's hot dogs to Vegas?
Billy Richardson, one of our principals, has been here for many years and has a lot of great relationships with influential people. That gives us opportunities to meet with people and talk about projects. Planet Hollywood was trying to get to Pink's, because for its theme, what could be better than to have a 70-year-old, classic L.A. spot like Pink's right here in Vegas? We got involved, the Pink's family really liked us, and we got to learn all about their culture, where they came from and what they've done, and see their operation. And they wanted that badly. They weren't going to just hand over that brand to anybody. They are starting to expand now that they have a feel for it, but staying mainly in California. So they gave us the greenlight and it's been open for about a year and a half. It's such a great location, and it's the exact same stuff as in L.A. There are people who will say, "Awe, this isn't the same," but the Pink's people have been very, very serious about it so they could share that it's the exact same product. Of course, it's not 70 years old, it's not going to have the same charm and celebrity following as the original, but that's what we are shooting for. But it's absolutely the same food, even if the experience has a Vegas spin on it.

Before Pink's, you opened LBS, which as you said, is a little more of a straight-ahead burger concept. How is LBS different from so many other burger joints?
LBS was our first, our baby. What we do at Holsteins is different, but not any better or worse, just different. But there are a lot of burger places, and they're all the same. They have the same few appetizers, some sort of smothered fries or chips, and a bunch of burgers. We didn't want to be that. We called it a Burger Joint to give you the idea that we're concentrating on the burgers. I try not to say "gourmet" because that word is stuffy, and the place is anything but stuffy. Holsteins is the same way. We get people coming in a suit, and people coming in a jogging suit. Old, young, everybody. Yeah, "gourmet" is kind of a four-letter word to us.

How do you see Holsteins changing and evolving?
We're going to start moving into spring and summer, so some lighter fare. As it gets warmer, people want to eat fresher and lighter, so we're working on those changes. It won't be a complete change. We also plan to roll out a few large plates so people that don't want a burger and don't want just snacks can go with a steak or fried chicken, something like that, which will still fit our theme. I don't think anyone will think of this place as just a burger joint.

In March, there will be a new sportsbook opening in The Cosmopolitan, right next to the entrance to Marquee on the second level. We're going to be serving our food in the sportsbook, so it will continue to get busier and busier. Our lunch crowd keeps coming, it's doing well. The late night is doing well. We stay open until 2 a.m. in the lounge area, and that works well when the club is open. As the club grows, especially in the summertime when the poolclub and dayclub operation gets rolling, it's going to really contribute to what we're doing.

the red rock resort belongs to me.

Food is important to most everyone, but we all create our own connections to the experience of eating. Few of the most memorable meals of my life have been break-the-bank, once-in-a-lifetime gourmet adventures. Those are usually enjoyable. But the combination of the right environment, the right food and the right company makes for a powerful memory, and in my experience it’s been near impossible to engineer such a situation.

But I’ve done it, at least once. It was a Friday night in December. After a day of drinking and grazing on snacks at home, it was time for a late supper at T-bones Chophouse, a swanky if unfortunately named steakhouse at the Red Rock Resort. We began at the bar, slurping martinis and chewing on pretzel bread as friends began to arrive. I ordered dinner: the signature chopped salad, a shrimp cocktail, a petite filet mignon and garlic mashed potatoes. More friends arrived, and we slid from the shiny bar top to a group of high tables in the restaurant’s lounge area, setting up between the long double-sided bar and tall glass doors that lead to a beautiful patio overlooking the resort’s pool.

More arrived, soon we were all drunk, and our group had officially taken over T-bones. This was a gathering of our closest people, siblings, friends from out of town, friends stretching beyond a decade. It was the night before we got married. Drinks were flowing freely and there was an easy happiness floating around, and I seemed to be the only one eating. Somehow that made everything taste better. I took down the chopped salad after my almost-wife munched a couple bites before deciding to focus on liquid nourishment. The shrimp cocktail was quite fine and delivered in a block of oddly shaped ice; my brother examined it after stealing a shrimp and ended up breaking the thing. I continued to share, forking a tender bite of beef into the mouth of almost-wife’s best friend from back home in Colorado. She requested another, this time with a little more of the peppery red wine reduction sauce. I was happy to help. I was happy to be surrounded by my favorite people in one of my favorite places, and enjoy a simple, classic steakhouse meal. That doesn’t mean this restaurant is average, and definitely not mediocre. T-bones is one of the better steak joints in Vegas, which may be hard to believe considering there are so many, and so many expensive ones on the Strip. But know the food is almost always the same at these places, and a little extra luxury, creativity and convenience goes a long way. I’ve also had a terrific Scottish salmon at T-bones, and we returned for an anniversary dinner and feasted on a supreme foie gras appetizer, another steak with a gorgonzola crust, au gratin potatoes and some of the best short ribs I’ve ever had.

The Red Rock Resort is my favorite hotel-casino in Las Vegas, and I’m not alone on this one. A great steakhouse is just the beginning of a solid, occasionally spectacular restaurant lineup. The hotel rooms, casino design, bars, pools and lounge spaces are equal to or greater than what we see at the big properties on Las Vegas Boulevard, and the whole place has a casual, easy-access feel that creates exactly the kind of comfort I desire. It feels like it’s too nice, yet welcoming. When I check in at the Red Rock for a completely unnecessary fake vacation weekend, when I waddle into the fancy, central, rose-red Lucky Bar in tacky green-and-white swimming shorts and order a gin-and-soda, when I cap off the night before my wedding with a 3 a.m. stroll to the food court for a Fatburger with my almost-wife and two best friends from high school, I feel like I’m a bum who hit Megabucks. I feel like some bozo who lucked into some really sweet surroundings. And really, feeling like that is my objective. I don’t know if that’s the exact vibe the guys at Station Casinos were going for when they spent a billion dollars building this place, but that’s what they got. And I’m happy about it, and grateful.

Red Rock opened in the spring of 2006. It cost around $925 million. It resides in the heart of Summerlin, one of the country’s biggest master-planned communities and, up until this whole shitty economy stuff, the fastest growing suburban neighborhood anywhere. Red Rock marked Station Casinos’ next step up from the Green Valley Ranch Resort, another upscale neighborhood casino in another suburban community on the east side, in the city of Henderson. GVR opened with much excitement at the end of 2001, considered as the evolution of the neighborhood or off-Strip casino. (George Maloof’s Palms, famous for attracting celebrities, also opened that year and also was considered part of this new wave of hip joints beyond our most famous street.) Before the Green Valley resort, Station Casinos had upgraded and expanded its brand with the Texas Station (1995 in North Las Vegas), Sunset Station (1997 in Henderson) and Santa Fe Station (acquired in 2000 in northwest Vegas), all shiny, fancy casino-hotels with family-friendly amenities such as bowling lanes, food courts and movie theaters. These places became one-stop entertainment destinations for the thousands of families who had flooded the valley since the mid-1980s, places where the younger set could have fun while the adults would gamble. Their huge success built Station into a dynasty, a gaming company that would spar with and eventually overtake the other locals, Boyd and Coast, and join the conversation with the heavy hitters on the Strip. And when things were going great, brothers Frank and Lorenzo Fertitta, leaders of the Station family, decided to do something kinda crazy and build a new flagship, something that would rival those big dogs, only it would be way out west, in the shadows of the brilliant Red Rock Canyon. It would have a much more modern design, with rich colors borrowed from those vaulted desert mountains, chandeliers with millions of crystals, miles of onyx lining the walls, gold-leafed ceilings, and a shitload of other fancy stuff. It would have a giant casino with plenty of machines and tables, a massive sportsbook, and an intimidatingly cool high limit room. It would have awesome accommodations, unique penthouse suites, convention spaces, swimming pools, nightclubs, a movie theater and the nicest bowling lanes in Vegas. It would be the kind of place the Fertittas themselves would hang at, and so it was.

I’d like to write there will never be another place like the Red Rock Resort, that because of the recession that will forever change the way Las Vegas works, no one will ever spend many millions of dollars to build a supercasino in our neighborhoods. But it has happened. The $600 million Aliante Station opened in 2008 in an even more distant community, and at the southernmost tip of town, the billion-dollar M Resort came to life in 2009. In my world, those places don’t matter, because the Red Rock is mine. I grew up on the west side of the valley, I ran around the suburbs of Summerlin, and when I made my post-college return to Vegas in 1999, my ‘hood was still without a truly great place to play tourist, eat, drink and party. There were casinos: the Suncoast, and what is now the JW Marriott resort, living uneasily next to each other just off Summerlin Parkway. Both are an ill fit, a little low-rent. Then Red Rock came along and blew everything else away.

When the Station guys started thinking this over, design came first and food came second, and that’s right on the money. All those little (expensive) touches add up to create that too-nice vibe, and the details are everywhere. These are nicest movie theaters around. This is the nicest spa. These are the nicest bathrooms. This is the nicest hotel lobby around, especially because they don’t build hotel lobbies like this anymore, with grand circling staircases and a 30-foot-tall crystal chandelier hanging above the tiny lobby bar.

I’ve seen every type of hotel room and suite in the building, and I’m perfectly fine with the standard. It’s pretty badass: 42-inch plasma, Bose soundsystem with iPod dock, 15-inch LCD screens in the bathroom, one of the greatest beds of all time, and of course, robes and slippers. The colors are chocolate with some greens, oranges and reds, and your view is either the breathtaking canyon or the distant, shimmering Strip. But the suites get ridiculous, easily setting a new standard away from that Strip. Take a step up and you’ve got a couple 65-inch plasmas, big party-ready bars, private bedrooms, marble bathrooms with huge soaking tubs, all spread over about 2,500 square feet. If you manage to score one of the seven penthouse suites, you are a special person. Private elevator. The black, brown and blue one is called the One 80, because the view affords both the canyon and the Strip. The TV is only 103 inches. The sofa rotates. The green one is called the Canyon. It’s a bit smaller at 4,000 square feet. It has a private massage room. The white one has a pool table and two bedrooms, one of which has its own balcony and jacuzzi. The red one is Cherry, and it has survived the vomiting heathens of Rock of Love with Bret Michaels, season one. The shower is in the middle of the master bedroom, which seems about right. The TVs are not that big, but there is a 20-foot projection screen. The purple one is Lucky. There are more. Why are they here? So the Station guys can throw awesome parties up on the top floor? Unnecessary awesomeness is how you set new standards in Vegas. The centerpiece of it all is the “backyard” area. There is a large round swimming pool with a playful fountain in the middle, several smaller, rectangular pools branching away and a large shaded bar with blackjack tables and sexy cocktail servers. How can I describe a day at the Red Rock pool? It’s like you went to one of the hip hotels on the Strip and they didn’t let any assholes in. Even though marketing has tried to make money and douche it up out here, things have stayed relatively peaceful. Evidence: the Cherry nightclub closed down to make way for the more easygoing cabana club. Good move.

Food may have been ranked second in the grand scheme of things, but Red Rock’s restaurant offerings are definitely first among neighborhood casinos. Besides the exemplary T-bones, you have other standards that are quite serviceable (the Grand Cafe coffee shop, Cabo Mexican restaurant, Terra Rossa Italian restaurant, LBS burger joint, Yard House beer and food depot, and the Feast buffet), you have a miniaturized version of one of Vegas’ best deli-style restaurants right next to the sportsbook (the Bagel Cafe), and you have quite possibly the best casino food court of all time. Here’s the lineup: Fatburger, one of the best hamburger chains of all time; Capriotti’s, Vegas’ favorite sandwich shop gone global; the respectable fish tacos of Rubio’s; and then, you can’t win them all, so Villa Pizza, Panda Express, Ben & Jerry’s, Tropical Smoothie and Starbucks. Very formidable, all next door to the movies, bowling and bingo.

The best restaurant here is Hachi, billed as modern Japanese. It is criminally under looked in the local dining scene, reliably pitch-perfect and therefore more than deserving of my constant affectionate raves. The chef, who was recruited from New York specifically to open an off-Strip pan-Asian concept in Vegas (this is something that has never happened before) is Linda Rodriguez, a very nice lady from the Philippines who just happens to be the first woman to train under Nobu Matsuhisa. She has cooked in Brooklyn, Mexico City, London and Louisiana, and we are lucky to have her, and her partner/husband, Martin Swift. Their restaurant is edgy and awesome. Its main dining room is walled by a Murakami eyeball piece opposite a wispy, peaceful image of cherry blossom trees, and it feels good to eat sushi here. But the menu boasts so much more. Most people know Hachi for its LSD roll, with spicy shrimp and crab, tempura flakes and avocado, or its incredible 38 for Under $8 menu, which offers great small plates like veggie fried rice, spicy kabocha coconut soup, barbecued ribs and kushiyaki meat skewers for low prices. I love the four varieties in the sashimi sampler, especially the fluke tiradito, the perfect little square of braised short ribs on top of roasted apple puree, the kobe beef potstickers, the light, sweet crab salad with cilantro vinaigrette, and the tempura’d pumpkin. Everything is good here, creative, refreshing and delicious.

Hachi is my favorite place to eat at Red Rock, and my favorite place to drink is … still up for grabs. It might be that quiet, throwback lobby bar. Just upstairs, the amber Onyx Bar is a nice little nook, too. It’s exactly the kind of casino bar that is lacking in the other spots in our neighborhood, a comfortable place to sit and pay a few dollars too many for a good stiff drink while trying to talk your way into something you probably shouldn’t do. Maybe the best spot is back at T-bones, out on that nifty patio, sitting on a big circular couch swigging Hendricks muddled with cucumber and lime and making fun of the Summerlin cougars and their shiny-shirted husbands/male mistresses. It’s very nice out here, when things cool down at night and they’ve closed the pool for the day, and you could drink a little too much and start thinking about how nice it’d be to have a room tonight. It’s happened. When I visit the Red Rock now, and do stuff like this, I start thinking about living here. Permanent room service in my Presidential Suite … yeah, I don’t need the penthouse, I’ll stick to the one with his-and-hers bathrooms and just a 42-inch plasma behind the bar. That’s where I’ll have my final nightcap each evening, after my penultimate whisky in the lobby. Bagel Cafe for breakfast, then I’ll hit the pool. On a Tuesday. Fantasies are fun, but the reality is: this joint is 6 miles from my house, it’s one of the biggest and beautifullest resorts in Vegas, and it’s far more accessible than anything on the Strip. These are the reasons why it’s mine.

mrkt.

As Aliante Station is the "little sister" in the Station Casinos family, more compact and less luxurious than Summerlin's Red Rock Resort, so MRKT will be the lesser known and appreciated sibling in Station's steakhouse roster. And this is not a surprise.

The decor in MRKT is stylish and sophisticated, with its oval glass bar, subtle colors and 5,000-bottle wine list. The service is just fine. The meat is just fine. But the menu and overall experience is missing the small touches that make a meal memorable and force you to come back. You can find those touches at Red Rock's T-Bones steakhouse, and I've had great experiences, if somewhat surprising, at Santa Fe Station's Charcoal Room. But it's just not meant to be at MRKT, the epitome of good-not-great. Where's the soul in this food? Drop the price on your $37 porterhouse, I say, and you may have a winner.

The two bar-top meals we've had here were good. Not great. The jumbo crab cake was pretty jumbo and full of meat, but under-seasoned and without any oomph. Butternut squash soup is terrific and served in a rather large bowl. Spinach salad with pancetta is a little overpowered by sharp dressing, and not as good as the chopped salad, that new steakhouse staple. The side dishes here are flat out boring and I don't want to order any of them. Bone-in New York, ribeye and grilled salmon, all okay. Everything here tastes good enough to tease. Maybe I'll go back to the Charcoal Room after all.

hachi.

If I was creating the website for the Japanese restaurant Hachi at Red Rock Resort, I would call it ilovehachi.com too, because I love it. And this is after one meal. Love.

I had heard the cuisine of chef Linda Rodriguez was outstanding from several sources, but I was skeptical as I entered the fancy, modern dining room. After all, this is a non-steakhouse in a Station Casino, a setting typically reserved for mediocrity. Still, I have been excited to try it here, especially after we took over the Red Rock for a weekend in December but were unable to pry ourselves away from Cabo Mexican restaurant, T-Bones Steakhouse and the LBS burger joint.

And now I have a new favorite.

It looks and feels cool enough to be in any Strip hotel. I particularly like the warm, soothing colors and wall of Murakami eyeballs in the back of the dining room, which is much larger and comfortable than it appears from the casino entrance. But the setting means nothing compared to the food, which set a new standard for neighborhood dining with each arriving dish. I began with an unnecessary order of edamame and miso and followed it with a signature appetizer, crispy spicy shrimp, which sounds like something you could get anywhere. And you can. But here it actually succeeds in being super crispy, thanks to an invisible layer of tempura, and spicy enough. And there's plenty of shrimp in this $15 dish. The spicy kabocha coconut soup, however, is not spicy, nor does it need to be. It's a perfectly smooth and balanced blend of coconut and the pumpkinish kabocha, punctuated by salty, toasted pumpkin seeds. Speaking of pumpkin, there was a piece of it in the vegetable tempura plate, along with asparagus, broccoli, avocado, zucchini and shiitake mushroom.

Wifey, being anti-fish, chose a special of medallions of beef, tender and largely portioned. I couldn't decide and I didn't want to get full on sushi rolls, so I split between two more small plates and couldn't have been more pleased. Braised short ribs with a roasted apple puree was everything you expect short ribs to be, so soft that the breeze from floating a fork over the top collapsed the dense square of meat into shredded deliciousness. And most impressive of all was the sashimi sampler, four types of fish, each of them reminding me what this is supposed to be about: paper-thin shards of fluke laced with yuzu and topped with a single cilantro leaf and a dot of the most intense sriracha ever; Barely seared salmon belly; yellowtail with jalapeno in chili ponzu; tuna in a warm bacon vinaigrette with actual bacon and onions floating about. Sublime is the word that comes to mind. And we closed it all out with crispy, chewy, green tea and chocolate beignets with a caramel sauce that tasted of strawberries. Wifey: "It tastes like what's left over in your dish after eating a banana split."

Now that I've discovered Hachi, I may help keep Station Casinos from declaring bankruptcy. Only thing is, the food here is a fraction of the cost of the big boys on the Strip. And so far, it's better.

INTERVIEW: Linda Rodriguez

Linda Rodriguez is executive chef at Hachi, the modern Japanese restaurant at the Red Rock Resort.


When the Red Rock Resort opened in 2006, Hachi was not part of the restaurant lineup. It took a little while longer to finish the restaurant up. How did that work?
Linda Rodriguez: Actually it was about a year before everything was set up, just a year. It was still dirt and sand when Red Rock was opened They just couldn’t find a chef to create a restaurant in time. But for me it was a good deal that it wasn’t opened by somebody else, that it was fresh and built right in front of our eyes. It gave us time to really prepare for training and staffing and menu development.


And this was your first adventure to Vegas from New York?
Yes, I came from New York. I had been living there almost 20 years. I was born in the Philippines and both my mom and dad are from there. I came to the States when I was seven years old. We traveled around, stayed in California a little while, and then my dad was stationed in Japan for three years. Then we came back to Florida, and from there I sort of headed out and worked in a lot of restaurants, from there to Louisiana. I was in New Orleans a little while, and it was there I started cooking. My experience before then was waiting tables, bartending. Not until Louisiana, where I worked for a classical French restaurant in Baton Rouge, did I get in the kitchen. There was a lady chef there who kinda inspired me. We got really close, she let me in her kitchen, and I started training there. She really pushed me to go to school, to go to CIA in New York. So drove all the way from the South up to New York and went to school. On weekends I would go to New York City since it was just a couple hours train ride away, and I really tried to knock on doors of really nice restaurants in New York and try to work for free. I saw a lot of exposure doing that. After school I had to go back to the city. I thought, why not stay? It was so vibrant, the food capital, and I moved in with a friend in the city and eventually found my place. I worked in a few places. My first paying job was at River Cafe in Brooklyn, under the Brooklyn Bridge. And after a couple years I heard about this Japanese restaurant coming called Nobu. Nobody knew it at the time. But I was able to get my foot in the door and I got a job at Nobu. Ever since that, I've been doing Japanese, ever since. And that gave me the opportunity travel to Europe and open Nobu in London in the Metropolitan Hotel. It was an awesome experience, and that’s where I met my husband. After London, I came back to New York and thought I'd stay with Nobu, but I ended up getting hunted down for my first executive chef job at BondSt. I was there for nine years. I also had the opportunity to go to Mexico City for two years and open a restaurant from the owners of Bond St.


You really have been all over, and worked in some of the most intense restaurant cities in the world. Has that experience made it easy or difficult to develop your own style?
It has helped me to cultivate my style a lot. With my classical French training and experience at a classical school, with working in Baton Rouge with a really great lady chef, and with my Asian background -- she was French Vietnamese, also, so she was cooking classical French in the restaurant but at lunchtime cooking Vietnamese, Chinese, Cajun, Indian -- it has given me this great base. Everything else came with that. I was very fortunate to have someone that really took me under her wing. A lot of what I do comes from her.


So how did you end up in Vegas at the Red Rock?
I was in New York. I was getting calls from Vegas all the time, headhunters. Usually I'd hang up. But I drew interest in this one because it's not on the Strip. We were thinking of doing our own place in Brooklyn. But it was really expensive. So we thought, let’s talk to Station Casinos. We had no idea what Station was. We talked to them, and they agreed to fly us over to check on the property in Summerlin and see Vegas. Last time I was in Vegas I was really young, and it was just desert. I didn’t remember much of what it was. It has grown so much, and it's especially beautiful over here. And it sure beats New York weather. We saw the property and talked to all the people, checked everything out, did research, and decided to take a chance.


What made you want to stay away from the Strip?
I'm just so used to local clientele. I've never been to the Strip, not since I was little. In my mind it was just a place for tourists. I never really knew how big it was over here right now. But, you know ... I wouldn’t work in Disneyland. I didn’t want to be stuck working in that kind of vibe. Finding out Station Casinos was more local, that seemed more attractive. And we have a lot of regulars.


Did Station always want a Japanese restaurant?
It was always going to be Japanese. I told them they were crazy. They wouldn’t listen to me.


Have you tried lots of Japanese and sushi restaurants around town and in your neighborhood?
We've hit them all, just to see how far sushi has gotten in Vegas. The difference is the East Coast is more traditional, while the West Coast is more...


California?
Yeah. and that did change our thoughts about what kind of sushi we were going to do. For a while, we were still feeling it out, but I think finally we're feeling it right now. Traditional is boring. It has to be fun.


So now that you're settled, what are your impressions of the restaurant and food scene in Vegas?
It’s definitely here. Maybe it's five years behind, especially with sushi. It’s weird. I never thought seaweed salad would sell here but it's selling like hotcakes. I didn’t think people would appreciate the different colors and textures, or the different kinds of textures in fish. I really didn't know if they would order it or not. Things are bit more exotic on the fish side at hachi, but we're introducing it slowly. It's not bad. We're trying to educate without being too pushy. In New York, you can put cod sperm in a martini glass and people would order it just to try it out. Here, you have to be more careful, ease it in a little bit, introduce it. Give it a try. It can be frustrating sometimes but I don’t mind it, because in a way we're kind of lifting up the community a little bit.


Where do you like to eat when you get a chance to try something new?
We mostly eat at Chinatown. It's pretty good. Thank god they have a Chinatown here. We found a couple cook places recently that we like in the neighborhood. Nora’s is pretty good. We wanna go back again. Marche Bacchus also is okay. Little by little we are finding places. We’re just simple people, too. We like to go somewhere the food is cooked properly. It doesn’t have to be foo-foo. I think Summerlin is missing a great bistro place. Most of time we eat Asian, Malaysian food, Thai food. Authentic Asian things are here, and for Indian food you can find a couple places that are pretty good.


What do you think is most unique about the Hachi menu right now?
The small plates are working out pretty good. We know we have to bend a little bit with the economy, so we really worked those plates out, the cost and the presentation. It gives people more tastes. You can order vive or six different things instead of just appetizer and entree. We don’t get to go out too much but when we do, when I find a good place, I know I want to try everything. So that's why we're doing the 38 under 8 menu. And we didn’t want to call it tapas. It's just 38 under 8 right now.



Is working in a big, beautiful casino resort everything you thought it would be?
I really had no idea. I was so green. I've never worked in a corporate or casino environment in my life. And I've learned a lot along the way. It's tough to get a light bulb changed. It’s corporate. You can’t just fire people like you used to. "I got to talk to who?" But I've learned a lot about that stuff, how to manage in the corporate world. My husband says I'm good at it but I just try to treat everyone right, go through the process. If I had to do it again I would really pinpoint everything so it wouldn’t be difficult. But so far I enjoy it. I really do. When we took this opportunity in a casino, we thought a lot about taking a risk, or what happens if don’t like it. Really, we are so lucky here because of the economy. If we tried doing it on our own in Brooklyn or New York, we'd be going through hardships like a lot of people. The casino draws people in, and they definitely help with advertising and PR. We are very fortunate to be in a beautiful casino like Red Rock.

walking through the new.

It may be amazing to consider Vegas is still opening billion dollar hotel casino resorts in the midst of this recession, but we are. And there may be no one in them, but they are really, really nice.

On the Strip, Steve Wynn opened Encore days ago. Like the Palazzo is the connected, sister property to Venetian, so is Encore to Wynn Las Vegas. The two towers are identical, and although Vegas architecture haters don't have many positives to expel about the exteriors ("A UPS truck turned on its side"), I kinda like the shiny bronze curves. They're simple and they stand out.

Inside, compared to Wynn, Encore is a little more alive and alert. Reds and golds dominate, but somehow things are more relaxed. Energizing instead of energized. Perhaps this is because a large portion of the casino is made to look, sound and feel like a secluded tropical garden, with the actual gaming areas and restaurants hiding under big white gazebos. I particularly like the crimson, spidery fixtures of the casino. The place might be overdone, but that's what Steve Wynn does best. And no one's walking in here and thinking, "Eh, it's just like Bellagio." Or any other Strip joint. It's fresh.

The hotel's restaurants look exciting. Grabbing the first headlines probably are Sinatra, helmed by L.A. chef Theo Schoenegger and featuring a swanky Italian menu the chairman would likely be proud of; and Switch, from chef Marc Poidevin, which plates lots of seafood and steak and has a dining room that allegedly changes its own atmosphere every 20 minutes. Not sure how that works. I'm more excited by Wazuzu, an Asian restaurant from chef Jet Tila, whose family owns L.A.'s Bangkok Market. His flavors come from all over, and he even stated that Thai food has been misrepresented and so he wants to bust that out. I noticed a few interesting dishes on the menu, Thai and otherwise, and this is probably the first Encore restaurant I'll try.

But you know what? This is Steve Wynn, and this is the Strip, so of course the place is amazing. Maybe more surprising is the niceness of Aliante Station, the newest Station Casino sprinkled around the valley's suburbs. And this one's way out, way way out in North Las Vegas. The Fertittas could have cut back and gone old-school neighborhood grind joint out here, and maybe they wish they had considering their company's current flirtations with bankruptcy. But they didn't. They set a new standard in off-Strip resorts with Red Rock in Summerlin, and Aliante is merely a smaller, slightly rectangular version of the big, round Red Rock. The modern desert decor serves the place well. The subdued pool area is lovely. Even the lobby is cool, although it lacks a bar like the dramatic one at Red Rock. The rooms are peerless, for miles, although also a bit smaller.

In addition to what is surely another great steakhouse concept from Station in MRKT, two outside operators bring Pip's, Italian, and Camacho's, Mexican, to the dining options. (For my first preview of Aliante's restaurants, look at this.) And the family friendly TGI Friday's and Original Pancake House should do well by the neighbors out here.

So how do we keep building big, beautiful casinos when no one's playing? Easy. These two joints were financed before things went poopy. (It should be noted that Wynn is doing much better than Station.) I need things in Vegas to pick up again, too, but I'm looking at the bright side. I'm happy to pillage Aliante and Encore while other locals and tourists stay away.

charcoal room.

EatingLV recently blogged about the impending closing of A.J.'s Steakhouse at the Hard Rock, even managing to get a little emotional in his farewell to one of the few remaining venues in the city to capture that cool, Old Vegas, Rat Pack vibe. Regrettably, I've never eaten at A.J.'s but always wanted to. I've hit the bar a few times for a martini and it's true about the vibe there.

But I've had to say goodbye to my own comfy steakhouse experience recently. Few people take my recommendation seriously when I tell them I really like the Charcoal Room at the Santa Fe Station, and I admit that a big part of why I like it is because it's a few miles from home. But the proximity and the urge to stray from the Station Casinos neighborhood entertainment center template don't change the facts: the menu is classic steakhouse, the food is outstanding, the room is cool, the bar is red (pictured) and has nice TVs, and the service has been great every time. I don't know how many perfect meals I've had at the bar here, how many icy martinis. Giant shrimp cocktails. Filet mignon-stuffed mushrooms. Caesar salads, or spinach salad with balsamic and a cake of goat cheese, or chopped salad with everything good in it. Ribeye burgers. Three peppercorn filets cooked perfectly. Lobster mac and cheese. Potatoes au gratin. I am fucking starving right now.

But the Charcoal Room is not closing, oh no. You can go there and have the same great experience. My Charcoal Room experience is over because our bartender, Christy, has relocated to the Texas Station and I don't think I could ever rebuild that kind of relationship. She knew to make the Sapphire martinis unless otherwise instructed. She knew to bring a bit of spicy mustard for the bread basket's soft, warm pretzel bread. She'd even change the TV to a shitty NBA game. We can't go back now. It's not the same.

change in the north.

When the $660 million Aliante Station resort and casino opens in North Las Vegas next Tuesday, it will redefine the idea of dining out in the northwest part of Vegas. Actually, it doesn't need to redefine, because I'm probably the only person who maintains there is worthwhile dining in the area.

Well, there is. The big Centennial Center shopping area boasts the formidable Sushi Loca and is about to get decent Mexican and Indian eateries. Vega's Cafe is a reliable family Mexican restaurant. The best experience in the area is the Charcoal Room, the steakhouse at the Santa Fe Station.

But Aliante Station, the newest from the Station Casinos company that also includes the posh Red Rock Resort in Summerlin, is officially in North Las Vegas, specifically in the master planned community of Aliante. It's sort of a mini-Red Rock in a mini-Summerlin. NLV folks are pretty excited about it, but the restaurants will be the biggest highlight. The lineup includes:

MRKT, a steak and seafood spot from Station. As they've done at Charcoal Room and Red Rock's T-Bones Chophouse, the Station guys will no doubt prove they know how to operate a steakhouse.

TGI Friday's. They can't all be winners.

Camacho's Cantina, a Mexican restaurant and tequila bar from a family of restaurateurs based in Southern California. The most popular location is at Universal Studios.

Original Pancake House, which serves great breakfast all over Vegas, including one at Green Valley Ranch, another Station Casino.

Pip's Cucina, an Italian restaurant and wine bar notable because it's the first restaurant endeavor from Rino Armeni, the former head of Southern Nevada Wine & Spirits and an ex-Caesars Palace food and bev honcho.

A food court with Capriotti's, Villa pizza, Rubio's, Panda Express, and Johnny Rockets burgers.

Trying out these restaurants -- particularly the non-Station ones -- and imbibing at the hopefully cool bars littered around the new casino will keep me busy for a while, and I'm not the only one. But even if Aliante Station doesn't find the success of a place like Red Rock (and it won't, not in this economy), it will definitely set a new standard for eating out in North Las Vegas. It already has, and it's not open yet.

t-bones chophouse.

Station Casinos has proven it is dedicated to the steakhouse. Starting with Austin's at the Texas Station and continuing with the Charcoal Room at Santa Fe Station and Hank's at the Green Valley Ranch Resort, these guys have clearly made the decision to upgrade the typical dining offerings at your friendly neighborhood casino. And with the Red Rock Resort, they broke the mold in off-the-Strip niceness, an endeavor that translates into the property's restaurants as well. The crowning achievement is T-Bones Chophouse.

Though unfortunately named, the restaurant would not be out of place in a luxury Strip resort. But that's pretty much the deal at Red Rock, the coolest joint in Vegas not on the Strip. Ultra-sleek in red, silver and black, the space is set off by a large oval bar boasting a fine selection of boozes. The dining room, divided by a large, glass covered fireplace, is upscale without losing warmth. The plush booths are cushy enough that you'll have a hard time sliding out after a satisfying meal. Out back, on the patio, another bar serves up plenty of patrons gathered around a fire pit eyeballing the decadent pool area and neighboring Cherry nightclub space. And this steakhouse serves our favorite vegetarian meal, blue cheese stuffed olives in your martini.

The menu offers traditional steak options; fish dishes of salmon, swordfish, scallops, lobster, dover sole, ahi tuna, and whatever is special that night; rotisserie chicken; a pork chop; a veal chop; and for couples, rack of lamb and Chateaubriand. The beef, aged 48 days, is done very well if not perfectly, a nice char outside and of course your choice of temp inside. The Scottish salmon on a recent visit was incredible and large.

Salads, starters and side dishes are equally delicious. The Caesar is fine but the trademark Steakhouse salad is T-Bones' version of the chop, with bacon and a smooth white French dressing. Potato options, one of our favorite things about the classic steakhouse, run the complete gamut from horseradish mash to fries, tots with truffles to a baked sweet potato. Yes to all.

T-Bones success is not altogether surprising. This is a billion dollar resort. But for the residents of the affluent Summerlin community enveloping it, and other people who live out in these burbs, it is something dreamt of for years: a great steakhouse close to home, a consistently awesome meal off the Strip.