the best restaurant in downtown las vegas.

Downtown is full of interesting developments these days, not the least of which is tonight's street food festival near the historic El Cortez hotel-casino. But sadly, there still are few outstanding places to eat in our city's original hot spot, particularly on the main drag of Fremont Street. The aging neon casinos are struggling in this still troubled economy, and cutting costs means cutting back on restaurants. (The most notable restaurant to open down here in quite some time, Firefly at the Plaza, may or may not re-open when the casino's renovations are complete. We'll see. Doesn't look good.)


There are still some classic gourmet rooms in the area, including Hugo's Cellar at Four Queens, the Flame at the El Cortez, and the under-appreciated Second Street Grill at the Fremont. And then there's Vic & Anthony's, which easily outpaces anything else downtown. It's not a surprise; the Nugget is by far the best and biggest resort in old Vegas, especially after the recent addition of a new tower of hotel rooms and another seafood-happy restaurant, the Chart House. When Landry's Restaurants honcho Tilman Fertitta bought the joint around six years ago, his first move was to change the existing, decent Nugget steakhouse right off the main lobby into an updated version of Houston's acclaimed Vic & Anthony's. It's a cool room, dark and comfy with a vintage vibe to it. You can call dibs on a live Maine lobster on the way to your table, if you like. Or you can stick to traditional cuts of beef expertly prepared; the filet mignon was one of the tastiest takes ever on this usually boring cut.


My favorite part of the menu here, as it is anytime I visit a great Vegas steakhouse, is the appetizer selection. Here, everything is a winner, but you cannot miss the maple glazed quail, a sticky-sweet-crispy mini-bird that will have you considering a double order, or the all new seared scallops with apple slaw and bacon tabasco vinaigrette. Scallops are another ordinarily dull dish, but the kitchen brings some serious kick here. I'd have been happy with this pretty plate of three large bivalves, the sweet, fruity salad, a bottle of wine, and a healthy slab of badass bread pudding with dulce de leche ice cream. Didn't even need the steak, or the lobster tail. Or the crabcake. Damn, that crabcake was really good, too.


Vic & Anthony's isn't much of a secret. It's hard to hide in the Nugget. But the food here sets the downtown standard and wouldn't be out of place in a hotel on that other famous Vegas boulevard.

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.

when life gives you leftovers.

We don't like Thanksgiving dinner as much as we pretend. If dry turkey, weird stuffing, lumpy mashed potatoes and canned cranberry is so good, why do we only eat it once a year? Why aren't there crowded, expensive restaurants that specialize in turkey dinners? Because it's not that good. Because it's tradition to eat this stuff, but no one really enjoys it that much. Your own personal experiences with the holiday, with your family and this food will determine how true this harsh statement is. But you have to admit it's a valid point, which is why the friend who offered this enlightenment days before the big weekend roasted a prime rib for his family this year. I hope it turned out tasty.

In my world, Thanksgiving is an odd occasion. Yes, there is food, too much of it, some delicious. Turkey is quite dry and bland by nature, which is why I prefer the moist, fatty dark meat of the bird. Never been a fan of stuffing/dressing, which presented an interesting challenge when I was assigned to make it for this year's rather large family gathering. It was okay; I found a pretty standard recipe and twisted it to include garlic-rosemary bread, slab bacon and apples. The texture was very un-stuffing like, light and approachable instead of the congealed slop people inexplicably rave about. And it tasted like bacon. So it deserved to be universally loved. Also never enjoyed the strange green bean casserole that involves crispy onions and cream of mushroom soup, yet there it was, on the table again, once per year. Mom says she has to make it, people want it, but I'm not convinced. So there is good and bad. Thanksgiving also is the gateway to the wildly emotional, unnecessarily stressful holiday season, and peering into a long December with a tryptophan hangover is not the most pleasant thing.

Perhaps that's why, in my family, we have another Thanksgiving tradition, and it's called turkitos. Years ago, my father decided the best thing to do with the leftover bird is to tear it apart, roll it up in corn tortillas and deep fry to your heart's content, serving up refried beans, grated cheese, fresh salsa and guacamole alongside. It's simple. Anyone can do it. I can't think of anything that provides a more satisfying bite after minimal effort than a fried tortilla. In my world, Turkito Day has replaced Thanksgiving in the pantheon of food holidays. (I have more: The New Year's Meatdown, Borracho Day, the annual Fall-B-Que, etc. Trademarks are pending so think up your own stupid names, please.) This year's event was long in crunchy goodness but short in attendance. Final output: approximately 75 turkey taquitos on Friday, none left standing by Monday. The backyard barbecue was transformed into a factory. You've got your shredded meat station, your cast iron skillet warming tortillas, your rolling station, your deep-fry station of vegetable and canola oil bubbling away on the grill's sideburner, and finally the paper towel-covered paydirt, the last stop for turkitos before munchdown. Freshly mixed guacamole with a jalapeno influence was waiting. A huge block of colby jack was shredded and resting in an orange bowl. We bought the good, drizzly Mexican sour cream. Several salsas, refrieds spiced with habanero hot sauce, and a head of shredded iceberg upon which to rest your bounty. I raced the clock of booze, speeding to roll and fry the last one before many early cocktails would have made me unfit to handle hot oil. I made it. All was good.

A successful Turkito Day, less than 24 hours after one of the better tasting Thanksgiving meals I can remember, will stand out in a long weekend of good eating. (Saturday, there was pizza, and Sunday, a visit to a solid Vegas steakhouse, Envy.) Definitely got the food part down. Then there's the family. These are the two splitting branches of the holiday stress tree. Both can be great fun, both can make you insane. One of them, you can always order takeout. Me, I spent an hour tearing apart turkey meat in my kitchen Friday morning, hand shredding it piece by piece, my dog begging uncontrollably just inches away. Grab a drumstick, rip it up, good meat in the bowl, bones and yuck in the garbage. Hands shiny with fat, tiny bits of bird clinging to fingers, just like I watched my dad do years back. I remember trips home from college for Thanksgiving, waking up on the couch, seeing him sitting at the dining room table doing this. Getting ready for the fry. This is our collective holiday experience, traditions we carry out whether we love them or not because they are laced with memories. We take the bitter for the sweet.

INTERVIEW: Carlos Guia

Carlos Guia is executive chef at The Country Club at Wynn Las Vegas, and also known as the chef of the former Commander's Palace restaurant in the former Aladdin.

How did your path lead to Wynn Las Vegas in 2008?
Carlos Guia: I ran Commander’s Palace for seven years, opened it and closed it, and then I had the opportunity to open Louis’ Las Vegas and Louis’ Fish Camp (at Town Square). We had issues with the economy then, with opening on time. We paid a lot of money for overtime construction to make sure Louis’ would open on time, and it did, and then we sat there for five or six months until the mall picked up business. We had good reviews, good feedback from locals, but it was just time to move on. With everything going on, I knew I wanted to find a great property that appreciates food, backs their people, and just a good culinary environment where everyone appreciates what we do for a living. I was lucky to land a spot at SW Steakhouse with David Walzog, where I was chef de cuisine for eight months, and then I was very happy to move on to the Country Club.

How do the two steakhouses, Country Club and SW, coexist or work together within the same resort?
They offer very different environments, even if the cuisine is similar. David Walzog has his own style and I have my own style. The steaks may be similar and the method of cooking them, but when it comes down to appetizers, seafood and the rest of the menu, we both kind of put our own spin on things. SW is a little hipper, a little more upbeat, while we are more relaxed. Country Club has a very serene environment overlooking the golf course and the waterfall. When you walk into the room, you don’t feel like you’re in Las Vegas. It feels like some other place, just a different feeling. To have that on the Strip is something new. It’s completely relaxed.

How do you go about setting Country Club apart from so many other steakhouses on and off the Strip?
I just try to take all my past experiences, growing up in Venezuela, living in New Orleans, traveling in Europe and working in New York City, and let those experiences shine through. I have a pretty diverse background in cuisine. I have classical French training but I like to do my Southern American and Caribbean flavors. Of course, those Southern roots come through, and there are people who expect to see shrimp and grits or gumbo, so I like to work that stuff in when I can. In the summer we put a watermelon gazpacho on the menu to cool off, with the jumbo lump crab. And I think the foie gras gumbo is pretty special.

How does your experience working at Wynn compare to New York, New Orleans and other places in your background?
We all really care about what we do, and there is a good amount of freedom here to express ourselves through food. It's kind of like, here is the restaurant, what can we do with it? The mold was already here: it's a new American steakhouse. Luckily I have a diverse American cuisine background, and it's so varied and such a great palate to work with. I just came in and -- I don't want to say, did my greatest hits -- but looked at the menu to see how I could really make it my own, being nice and diverse, offering a great variety.

Commander's Palace was truly a great restaurant and a lot of people were sad to see it close. What happened, and was there a plan to re-open in Las Vegas?
I was in New Orleans working with the Brennans for about three years, I left for two, and they asked me back to open Commander's Las Vegas. This was in 1999, and I thought, I'm not sure about Las Vegas. The second or third time they asked, I looked into it more seriously. It was still very up-and-coming then. Bellagio had opened, and the Venetian was on the way in. It was developing a lot more. So how could I say no to a world class restaurant with so much trust in me? I took the opportunity. Then the whole situation with (closing) and the Aladdin's bankruptcy ... there were a lot changes in management, and it was pretty early on, about three years in, that we decided as a group to see if there was a better place to be. But it took too long, about four years, to get out of the lease. There was a plan to re-open in early 2007, but at the time a lot of the rents were astronomical. We're talking $130 per square foot. It's really hard to make money at those levels. So I have to give it to the Brennans for knowing what they could do. They eventually opened Commander's in Destin, Florida. But they had been looking for a management contract, a hotel or restaurant group that wanted to use them as a flagship restaurant and let them run it. It didn't happen. But I still talk to Brad Brennan all the time, he still lives in Las Vegas, and he's still looking. Things are not the same as when we first opened. We had a great following, but it was a 350-seat restaurant and the plans were to scale that back so we'd be packed every night. It's hard to say now. But you never know.

How has the restaurant landscape changed in your time in Vegas? Do you think the poor economy will leave a lasting effect on Vegas' dining reputation?
It's definitely a place that’s growing every day, and there are still a lot of great chefs coming in. I've always enjoyed Las Vegas. After living in New York City for eight years, there are things I miss about that. But when I came here I learned there is a lot to do if you want to do it. But if you want to live in the suburbs, that's good here, too. I probably do a little bit of both. I like to do charity events, throw some support to local students and schools. I try to get out sometimes, but I also like my peace and quiet. As for the economy, that's a topic my friends and I have talked about a lot. There are a lot of different issues and expectations. But what we've decided is to keep pushing ourselves and make sure that when our guests come in, they are fully satisfied. People may not be spending as much but we still need to make them happy and make them want to come back. I don't know if the economy can ruin the city's reputation.

What do you think Las Vegas needs to continue to grow into a great restaurant city?
It's actually been growing a lot throughout the years, and I don't want to say it has slowed with the economy. I like the way neighborhood restaurants are coming up more, and it's a little more spread out instead of being concentrated just on the Strip. It's great to have different ethnic cuisines popping up instead of just French, Italian, and the steakhouse. Honestly, I don't get out to try restaurants as much as I should. When I get some time I like to spend it at home and do a little cooking with the kids. But the way I feel about food is definitely a passion, and I like to show that on a menu. I was just doing an interview the other day and talking about signature dishes, and I was saying you can call it a signature dish if you like but if it doesn't sell, it's not truly a signature. At Country Club, we'll bend over backwards to make a guest happy. If people are in the mood for something new, this is the place to be because we'll do whatever we can. As long as we have the capability, anything's possible.

joe's in the forum shops.

It's been ten years since I came back home to Vegas, and I've been thinking a lot about things (and restaurants) that have shaped my experience here. For better or worse, Joe's Seafood, Prime Steak and Stone Crab fits into that category.

When MenuVegas went up in the summer of '06, Joe's was the very first featured restaurant on the site. It was chosen not just because the food was good, but because it seemed like the epitome of what I then thought of as the Vegas restaurant experience. It's expensive. It's inside the Forum Shops at Caesars Palace. It's not really ours; it's an extension of an iconic Miami restaurant and operated by the Lettuce Entertain You company, which opened Joe's Chicago in 2000 and Joe's Vegas in 2004. So, like so much of this Vegas Experience, this restaurant is meant to re-create an entirely different, faraway destination. Also, it's nice. It's a classic dining room, all dark wood and white tablecloth. And the menu: seafood and steak, simple and timeless.

And still, five years later, pretty damn good. In my early visits to Joe's I was impressed with the sweetness of the namesake stone crab claws and the creamy crab bisque, and quite surprised by the steady steaks. The perfectly charred, bone-in, 16-ounce filet mignon I had on my first visit years ago remains one of the best steaks I've ever tasted. And maybe I was just in the right mood, sitting by myself at the bar, the first person in the restaurant, but today might have been the perfect lunch:
1. Hendrick's and tonic.
2. A wealthy bread basket.
3. A lot of chilled king crab legs. (The menu said 12 ounces but it had to be closer to 16.)
4. Potatoes lyonnaise, crispy and good.5. Sweet corn, pan-roasted.6. Strawberry pie and strong coffee.It was about $40 before the tip. Typically, I feel remorse after dropping this kinda money on lunch for one. Not today. The esteemed Max Jacobson recently reviewed the lunchtime offerings at RM Seafood, naming it one of the best places on the Strip for your mid-day meal. I wouldn't put Joe's at the level of Rick Moonen's place, but the lunch specials are very reasonable and, as you have just read, quite a bit of tasty food for twenty to thirty bucks.

Joe's is the type of restaurant I don't want to like. It's for tourists, sure, but so is everything else on the Strip. It's make-believe, yes. There is fresher seafood and richer beef to be found in this town. It isn't even close to being the best restaurant in Caesars. My skeptical side wants to slam this place, find something absolutely wrong with it. But I don't think that part of my brain got the message when I was fork-shoveling chunks of tender, butter-drenched king crab into my face at 11:30 this morning. I can't deny you, Joe's Stone Crab. You are good.

craftsteak.

On TV, Tom Colicchio comes off stern, maybe a little mean, but always very serious as the head judge on the popular Top Chef competition reality show. In the restaurant world, he’s known as a serious chef and a champion of pure simplicity. You will understand that approach when dining at his Las Vegas outpost, Craftsteak, one of the premier steakhouses in the city.

Craftsteak opened in the MGM Grand in 2002, and although every resort on the Strip is doing and re-doing its version of the classic steakhouse, Colicchio’s remains among the best and most busy. From the entrance, it appears subdued, stuck in the middle of the long stretch of restaurants toward the back of the casino. But inside you’ll find warm, dark surroundings, everything you imagine a traditional steakhouse should be. The bar is comfortable and cool and offers one of the best whisky selections around. The dining room is much bigger than you think, done in shades of brown and gold with slight leather and metal accents. The Craft restaurant empire was born in New York and this restaurant maintains that metropolitan feel.

The service at Craftsteak is exquisite, among the very best we’ve ever encountered, and it really raised the experience to another level. Of course, beef is the thing here. Your best bet is to utilize one of the chef’s Wagyu sampling menus, choosing domestic or Japanese A5 and allowing the kitchen to thrill you. Wagyu is known for its intense marbling and the taste of this cow cannot be compared to the typical domestic restaurant steak you may be used to. We recently tried a 12-ounce Kobe-style Wagyu skirt steak, and when it arrived, cooked perfectly, it seemed like a lot more than 12 ounces. The rich, buttery taste – less beefy – was mind blowing, especially since there was no strange texture. It was hard to believe there was no butter involved in the preparation, but it’s true; remember, at Craftsteak, simplicity is the key.

You don’t have to go exotic here. Two sizes of filet, T-bone, porterhouse, flat iron, ribeye, sirloin strip … they’re all here, roasted or grilled, foreign or domestic. Deliciously salty braised shortribs, prime rib, and seafood options like lobster, prawns or diver sea scallops round out the entrée selection. Consistency is a given on this menu. The Caesar salad has anchovies. Charcuterie or fresh shellfish are first course options. The side dishes really impress, particularly the garlic and leek potato gratin.

There will never be a shortage of swanky steakhouses competing for your dollar on the Las Vegas Strip; it should be the official cuisine of Sin City. But no matter who lasts the longest or opens the newest joint, remember you’ll never be let down at Craftsteak.

texas de brazil.

A birthday dinner for Chi at Texas de Brazil was my first experience at a Brazilian steakhouse-churrascaria-rodizio pit, despite the fact that Yolie's on Paradise Road has been doing it in Vegas for years and similar restaurants have popped up recently on the Strip and in the 'burbs. Somehow it didn't sound all that appealing: loads of grilled meat piled on your plate as you fight to keep up. More specifically, I was worried that in Vegas, this concept would assdrop into a glorified buffet, with quality falling behind on the priority list. But, Chi said this shit was good, so off we went to Town Square just south of the Strip.

Texas de Brazil has locations in eight states, but the decor and service of this restaurant doesn't scream franchise. It was much more finely appointed than I assumed; I guess I just thought it'd be a warehouse with giant tables and guys running around with great slabs of beef to distribute. Not really like that. It's warm, appropriately communal, a little loud/rowdy, but it fits. And the service was very good, particularly from our guy who offered sound advice on ordering a mid-range Malbec to wash down these meats.

The salad bar offered a colorful array of vegetables in various preparations, cheeses, grains, lobster bisque, smoked salmon squares and other little tasties. In fact, everything was good enough to take up more plate space than salad should. But I had barely started and not had a sip of wine before those meats started coming, carried on huge skewers fresh from the pit and carved by dudes in funny pants. Filet mignon. Garlic sirloin. Parmesan-crusted pork loin and chicken legs. Chicken wrapped in bacon. Brazilian sausages, whatever those are. Lamb chops. Leg of lamb (which will now forever be known as Dinosaur Leg). More beef. Lots of beef.

The best bits were the sirloin and the Dinosaur Leg. A huge chunk of slow roasted meat on a fuckin' sword allows for you to get a perfectly tender, rare chunk alongside a crispy-grilled piece from the outside of the beast all in one serving. It's a good way to be.

It's hard to believe there might be a churrascaria in Vegas better than this, but after allowing a few months to go by for proper digestion, we'll see for ourselves.

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.

cut. (but mainly, super delicious piggy.)

I've developed an obsession with the piggy lately.

I've been incorporating pork into my order every place I go. I bought uncured back bacon one night at Fresh & Easy, brought it home and cooked some up for no reason. This developing addiction culminated with my recent David Chang-inspired creation of the Chinese Taco. (A five-pound pork shoulder was seared in sesame oil, then slow cooked overnight in Asahi beer, char siu sauce, garlic and onions. The meat was fork shredded and then simmered again in the reduced cooking sauce. I didn't make it this way officially yet, but the taco is a fried flour tortilla stuffed with this super piggy, a generous squirt of sriracha, and a crispy Asian cabbage salad in a sesame dressing. Seriously. Somebody finance me.)

I don't know if this constant porkature is going to have lasting effects, but I'm glad to still be in the throes of swinyness because it helped me to make a delicious decision last night. Having dinner at CUT in Palazzo, knowing I'm obligated to have a steak there, my first course was up in the air. So many amazing options here: bone marrow flan, warm veal tongue with marinated artichokes, crab and lobster cocktail, or oxtail bouillon with bone marrow dumplings (Does Wolfgang Puck love marrow as much as I love piggy?). I sighed and ordered maple glazed pork belly in an orange, Asiany dressing, followed by a bone-in New York sirloin. The wifey started with a butter lettuce salad with avocado, bleu cheese and a subtle champagne vinaigrette, and on the back, Indian-spiced Kobe shortribs.

This piggy was so good. Crispy, salty perfection in one bite, buttery melting fattiness in the next, kissed sweetly by the maple glaze. It was the super food version of getting a little syrup on your bacon at IHOP. A tiny toss of greens in the middle and a slight spice in the orange sauce brought it all together. It could have been dinner by itself.

Overall, dinner at CUT was great. The salad was good, but not better than the crispy parmesan-dusted breadsticks, warm Gruyere mini-biscuits and selection of tasty breads that started us off. Dinner in the bar has its privileges, and here it apparently results in unordered, awesome snacks. The steak was just fine, 20 ounces for $54 described as Illinois corn fed and aged 21 days. Great char on the outside, perfectly cooked medium rare, served with a selection of mustards. Best steak ever? No. But maybe that would be the 8-ounce, $160 of true Japanese Wagyu ribeye on the menu. Maybe when I get my tax return. The shortribs, however, were outstanding, tender and strongly spiced and served atop some smooth puree of spicy pumpkin and gram masala. At any other restaurant, one that hasn't quickly become one of Vegas' most esteemed beef joints, this would be the standout.

But for now, even at one of the best steakhouses on the steak-crazy Strip, the piggy is the star of the show.

another try at ti.

It's easy to shit talk a joint on the Strip and say there's no reason to go, especially if it's older and less hip and not overflowing with exciting restaurants or clubs. But when you want a mini-vacation and you don't want to pay $300 a night (or when the economy sucks and every hotel is reducing room rates, and you want to find the best value), you might find yourself doing a weekend in a place just like that. A place you just shit talked.


But even though we had a lot of fun with our two-night stay at Treasure Island, the original assessment still holds true. Most of that fun was spent roaming, drinking, shopping and eating at Encore, Wynn, Palazzo and Venetian, TI's superior neighbors. Although it was beautifully sunny and probably warm enough, the TI pool was closed. A Friday night dinner at Isla was once again reliably good, but outdone by a Saturday night dinner at Palazzo's Dos Caminos Mexican restaurant. The standard king bed hotel room was nice enough (the bed was great), but obviously an old room with a few modern touches (flatscreen TV) and not really a room renovated. Skipped room service, didn't do the spa ... because we were too busy enjoying the amenities of better hotels within a short walking distance.


There is something to be said for TI's steakhouse offering, however. Boringly named The Steak House, we paid it a visit for a late snack Friday night, crashed the bar and received superior service from our barman. He let us sample wine, speedily brought more plus martinis plus a shrimp cocktail, garlic whipped potatoes and a delicious endive salad with slab bacon, and capped it off by advising that the best dessert in the house was actually served at the coffee shop next door. Then he sent somebody to grab one. (It was chocolate cake, not that special. But it's the effort that counts.) Let this be a lesson: When in doubt, head to the hotel steakhouse bar.


Perhaps the best example of TI's stature is its respected but now sleepy sushi restaurant, Social House. Buzzed about for months when it opened in 2006, the place seems to be a shell of its former fast-paced self. (Full disclaimer: I've never eaten there. I'm sure it's great. But it looks like it's been forgotten completely.) Last year you couldn't squeeze your way in to get a drink in the lounge downstairs. That lounge was crickets Friday night, and the staff was slow, too.

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.

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.

INTERVIEW: Tom Colicchio

Tom Colicchio's Vegas presence can be felt at MGM Grand's Craftsteak and 'Wichcraft restaurants.

Your presence on "Top Chef" has brought an amazing amount of exposure for you and your restaurants. What has that experience been like? And what can the audience expect from the upcoming season?
Tom Colicchio: It's definitely, clearly brought our restaurants to a new customer base outside of those that knew about me or the restaurants before, and you can see how TV has done that for everybody, Emeril, Mario, Bobby Flay. It's just such a wide exposure, and that's probably the only argument I could make for doing it. I wasn't so keen on it from the start, but I knew at the time that I was expanding out of New York City and it would be important to figure out a way to get the name out there. As for the new season, all I can say is it was shot in Chicago. That's really all I can tell you.


Do you feel like the experience portrayed on the show is indicative of just being in the industry, being a chef, or is it too glamorized?
Well, it is entertainment. It is a show. But any person who has been on the show who has lasted a few weeks will tell you it's one of the hardest things they've ever done. Some of the challenges are very much like what you'll find in a kitchen and some aren't meant to be. Not everything on the show has a bearing on real life but it is a competition, everyone has the same limitations, and it really does test one's skills.


You were certainly known before "Top Chef." How do you feel about the label of celebrity chef?
I hate it. I hate that label. You don't say "celebrity actor," or "celebrity rock star." I mean, yes, I had some experience with that before the show. I had been going on the Today Show a couple times a year. But I really don't know what the qualifications are for that title. I got into this business probably 30 years ago because I love food and I love to cook. I tell young chefs -- in fact I said this at a commencement speech I gave well before "Top Chef" -- I said if you are getting into this because you want to be the next Emeril, then apologize to your parents right now for wasting their money because it's not going to happen. It has to be for the love of food. I think a really good question we need to ask is what is a chef, because it doesn't mean you're on TV and it doesn't mean you're a cook. Chef means boss. If you're running a kitchen, you're a chef. If you're a TV cook or you're a cooking instructor on TV, that is completely different. There are a lot of great chefs that want to be guest judges on the show, and they are great chefs, but for one reason or another they're not right for TV. I don't really know why. I don't know why I'm on the show, I just know they picked me because they thought I was telegenic for some reason. I don't know why. So that's why I'm always kind of cynical about it. But that being said, I love what we do on the show, I think we choose the best contestant every year, and there is no pressure from the producers or anyone else to pick a certain someone despite what everybody believes. The day they tell us we have to pick someone for any reason other than our judgement is the day I do my last show. But I think it's fun and entertaining, and I think it does illuminate what happens in a kitchen to people who otherwise wouldn't get to see. I've had a lot of people come up to me and say they never looked at food that way before seeing the show. But I also have people come up to me with other comments. When we opened in L.A. I had a woman come up to me and say "You're really a chef?" Yeah! Or when you send a person off the show, eliminate someone people really like, they say, "Who is this guy? Who is this guy we've never heard of before?" What can you say, you know? Go home and google me. But I get a kick out of it most of the time.


With all you have going on, how much time do you get to visit Vegas and check in on things at Craftsteak at MGM Grand?
Actually I was there for four days last week. But I spend all my time at the restaurant. In the six years I've had a restaurant in Vegas, I've been to maybe 10 restaurants there. This time we spent some time at (Wynn Las Vegas) so I got to try a couple there, Bartolotta and another one.


What did you think of Bartolotta?
I loved it. Paul (Bartolotta) is just a fabulous cook. I've known him for a while, and I love what he's doing there because it's a true Italian experience. He's bringing in all his fish from the Mediterranean. It's amazing.


What is your general impression of the Vegas dining scene and its development?
Well, again, I travel so much and when I do, it's all about spending time in the restaurant so I don't really get out much. But Las Vegas is amazing. I say it's the second best city for eating because I'm still kind of partial to New York since I'm from there. But Vegas is absolutely deserving of that reputation. When I first was going about opening a restaurant at MGM Grand, I told Gamal Aziz (then MGM president) -- and he's about the best person to work with because he came up in food and beverage -- that I can't open a restaurant somewhere unless there's a real community. I want to cook for regulars. And the idea was that you can't have that in Vegas, because of the tourists, it doesn't exist. And he said that's not the case. That's why from day one things have worked there and we've been able to move forward and it's still doing well. You can build that in Vegas. You know, I want the guys who come in for conventions for a week to eat on Monday and then say "I want to come back to Craftsteak" a day later. That's why it's still busy, because we treat it like a real market. And there are so many professionals in that town, going out, checking things out. I wish I could spend more time there. It's all there, and it's real.