Vegas Redux

This blog is a little late. Apparently since I got a boyfriend, I’ve had less time on my hands. :-) So the law school girls and I went to Vegas this winter break again. Ok, it wasn’t all law school girls. Tracie and Sapna joined me from last time, and my friend Laura. We had SUCH a great time. We were all kind of frazzled from the holidays, but our excellent meals kind of made up for it.

We stayed at the MGM Grand because I got this amazing deal there. I wish I could have afforded to go to craftsteak. I admit, I’m a fan of Top Chef , and I’d love to see Colicchio’s place in action. Plus, Irene Verbila of the LA Times raved over his new LA place, Craft. Which is now on the list of places I REALLY want to go but can ill afford. And unfortunately, I am not going to be the evil kind of lawyer who starts out at $160,000 as a first year associate. But I digress. The POINT is, we couldn’t afford craftsteak, but we COULD afford ‘wichcraft. Which is the low budget sandwich place. It was just what we needed after having our obligatory shot of Patron upon landing (it’s Tracie’s fault! :-)). They had all this amazing stuff on the menu. BUT they had a prosciutto and sweet butter sandwich. This was my favorite sandwich when I was a kid. When we would go to the mountains, my mom would put butter and prosciutto on a French roll. It was amazing. I thought this was some weird Dutch Italian combo thing, but if Colicchio’s doing it, it can’t be THAT weird. Oh god, it was fantastic. I was transported to my childhood spent riding down flying saucers in Angeles Crest. Sapna and Tracie shared some fantastic panini which they let me nibble on. Kind of pricey for sandwiches, but my childhood memories are priceless, people.


Sapna at Penazzi showcasing a double magnum


Now while I myself can’t afford fancy restaurants, my dad is “connected.” Not in the mafia way people! (Sheesh, always thinking the worst of us eye-ties.) He sells wine to fine Italian restaurants all over Southern California, and many of those restaurants are opening spots in Vegas. Soo we go to Penazzi, which is owned by Gabriele Penazzi. He used to run the Harry’s Bar in Century City, and the Harry’s Bar in La Jolla. I used to visit him with my dad at both locations, and he remembered me. Plus, he was happy to host 4 lovely ladies on a slow Wednesday night right after Christmas. Penazzi is in Harrah’s, but don’t let that stop you from going there. Gabriele gave us the VIP treatment. We started with Bellinis, and then he brought out a white and a red wine since we couldn’t decide on which we wanted. We had a lovely appetizer with fresh mozzarella, prosciutto, and various tapenades. Then we had Penne alla Vodka, the only cream sauce I really crave. It was delicious and tasty. THEN, we had the most amazing scallops I have had in a long time. They were succulent, crispy seared, and fantastic. They didn’t even need the sauce they were laying on. They just melted in my mouth. Mmmm. The scallops were paired with a mild white fish, halibut I believe, which was passably good but paled next to those scallops. Then, Laura wanted a martini, so our waiter brought us ALL martinis. Just look how beautiful they are in the picture! My favorite was definitely the limoncello one—but I have a soft spot for the stuff. We had a nice dessert platter which we managed to make quite a dent in even though we were “stuffed.” Then Gabriele brought us some Rosa Regale, which is a sparking red dessert wine, which Sapna loved, and chocolate grappa. Now, I think grappa is the devil. However, flavored grappa is awesome. And this was like chocolate syrup with booze. So I finished off those for everyone. :-)



Tracie loves a good martini-- just like the next girl!


On our second night, Daddy worked his connection magic, and got us into Valentino. Now you all know from my previous posts, I adore Valentino, and I the one in Vegas is my favorite. Luciano Pellegrini is the chef, and James Beard award winner. AND he came to say hi to our table. But I’m getting ahead of myself! The ladies followed my lead on wine and apps (which I appreciate—because I know what I’m doing!) We ordered the Masi Campofiorin, which is an Amarone ripasso, and I just adore that wine. For appetizers we had the most amazing oysters I have ever had. And I have had a lot of amazing oysters. They were served raw with a delicate leek sauce and precious drops of tuna roe. Absolutely perfect… they tasted like I was taking a bite out of the sea. Then we also had a mozzarella buratta with culatello, which is one of the best cured meats, an excellent tuna sashimi, and very good scallops. For our main entrees, Tracie got lobster over homemade black fettuccine in an arrabiata sauce. It was so delicious. The lobster was tender and delicate, and the black fettuccine was PHENOMENAL. It was so clearly homemade, perfectly cooked, and had that faint nutty flavor from the squid ink (which makes it balck). Laura ordered pork loin in apple cider brine, which I almost ordered myself, and it was so good. Pork tenderloin is so difficult to cook because of its low fat content, which makes it try out very easily. This was perfectly tender and juicy. I ordered veal in demiglasse sauce with fresh polenta. I absolutely adore fresh polenta, and will order almost anything if it comes with it. This veal was just delicious little morsels which I could cut with my fork. Tracie and I kept trading lobster for veal, as we couldn’t decide which dish was better. Sapna ordered a nice white fish which I took a bite of. It was quite good, but not a brilliant star like the rest of our food. Then we ordered the soufflé, which rose perfectly and was everything you’d expect. That is when chef Pellegrini came to greet us. We had mentioned we were looking for a club to go to, so Carlo Cannuscio (the manager) got us VIP entrance to TAO, he walked us right in! He said he never walks people up there, but we were VIP. Hahahaha. I’m sure he says that to all the beautiful ladies. All in all, we had lots of fun, but the food was definitely the highlight of the trip.





Laura and I enjoying cocktails at Rouge in the MGM

Vegas, Baby!

At the Monte Carlo Cafe, where we became regulars



The day after fall semester finals, three of my friends from law school and I took off for Vegas. We show up at the Monte Carlo, put our stuff in the room, and head for the in-house brewery. Tracie has a tradition in Vegas, a shot of Patron Silver all around as you arrive. Naturally, we couldn’t break tradition. And we had a bunch of greasy food at the brewery. I got the chili con carne. We shared fried calamari. Tracie got mini burgers, Katherine got a Caesar Salad, Sapna got soup (I think it was creamy clam chowder which I avoid, something about clams and cream makes me rebel). For greasy bar food, it wasn’t that bad. Plus we were really hungry after getting off the plane.

That night, I could have gone to the steak house at the Bellagio with aunt, uncle and cousins. Apparently it was amazing and they sat next to George Clooney. But, I was in the mood to hang out with my girls. While Sapna and I were taking a nap, Tracie and Katherine snuck off and entered a poker tournament at the Paris. Tracie won 4th place! So we go over to the Paris to pick Tracie up, and it is FREEZING and we are STARVING, and since P.F. Chang’s was right there, we decide to go in. It’s packed so we decide to eat at the bar. Tracie used to work at the Chang’s in Sherman Oaks, so she’s chatting up the bartender. (Who told me his name was Superman.) We all share this AMAZING bottle of pinot noir, Estancia, and Tracie and Sapna get these weird cocktails (of which Chang’s has a lot) which were actually kinda good. We started off with the chicken lettuce wraps which are one of my favorites. They are greasy and yummy, but you can convince yourself they are healthy because of all the lettuce involved. We got the salt and pepper shrimp (I could have eaten 10 servings of this), garlic snap peas (you can never have too much garlic), brown rice, and I can’t remember what else. It was sooo yummy. Just what we needed before a night of gambling in Downtown Vegas. My cousins met up with us, and fun was had by all.

The gals at PF Chang's.








Sapna turned in early, but at about 4 a.m. I demanded that Tracie, Katherine and I get breakfast. We went to the café at the Monte Carlo and had a club sandwich and an egg/bacon/hashbrown plate. Katherine told me it was the best idea I ever had. Nothing like eggs at 4 a.m. I say!



High quality food at the Monte Carlo

So the next night, we decide we needed to actually go to a real restaurant and go dancing. We head over to the MGM, hoping to go to Studio 54. Unfortunately, it was closed for renovations for New Year’s. Boo! So we go to Centrifuge, this weird bar where the bartenders dance on the tables every 30 minutes, and we chat up our bartender asking where we can get some dancing action. Apparently the only game in town is Tao at the Venetian. We decide to get food at the MGM and head over.

What do we find at the MGM? Shibuya! We ordered this mushroom amazingness dish, it was mixed sautéed mushrooms, with I don’t know what, but it was oh-so good; the ahi tuna tartare tower, which was good, and some assorted sushi. The place is tres chic, a bit overpriced, but it was good. Then we proceeded to Tao where we jumped the line because we were so gorgeous. Then we ended up back at the café at 4 a.m.




Shibuya agreed with us. We really complemented the fabulous decor.

Now, every time I go to Vegas, I want to go to Burger Bar at the Mandalay Bay! So I convince the girls this is where we gotta go. I mean, they have burgers with truffles and fois gras! I got the Kobe beef burger with a fried egg (ever since I had this at Fatburger I’ve been addicted). Sweet potato fries. Pitcher of Newcastle. Unfortunately, none of us could afford the $60 fois gras truffle burger, but maybe next time if I have a winning streak. Ironically, this was our most expensive meal!

Mmm. YAY! Nothing like good food, good times, and good friends.




Me sleeping on the plane home. Soooo attractive. Ugh! Need to start that diet!

Valentino Las Vegas

Older review:

Okay, so last weekend I went to Vegas with my sister. It was awesome. We flew and stayed at the Luxor for $200 pp. :-) The best part though, was my Dad gave me the thumbs up to use the Amex at Valentino to treat ourselves to a delicious dinner sans parents. I was super excited to go, bc my parents said the food was even better than the Valentino in Santa Monica (as if that's even possible), and the chef won a James Beard Award. So, it was a bit of an adventure getting there. I thought it was at the Bellagio (all those WOP names sound the same) but it was in fact at the Venetian. So we had to huff it, and Sis was in hot shoes (I of course, was not) so her feet were on fire, and we were late, and apparently Daddy didn't make the reservation. Whatev, it was Monday night (albeit Memorial Day) and there was plenty of room. Now, I saved the menu (okay, STOLE the menu) but now I can't find it, so you'll all have to rely on my memory of this delicious meal.

It was surreal actually looking at the menu, since I've never seen one (Piero, the owner, just brings out lots of plates). Sis and I decided to get the tasting menu that didn't have escargot (gross!) and fois gras (Sis likes it, but I don't think it's worth the calories).

So, first course was 3 tastes of appetizers. One was this shrimp on top of shredded marinated asparagus. Ohmigod. It was the perfect shrimp. The outside was crispy, but the inside was plump and juicy. Then there was duck, which was OK, but Sis didn't like it. It had some demiglace sauce. Then there was a lobster morsel on some beet salad. Ohhhh... this lobster was tender succulent juciness. I wish I got to eat the whole thing, not just a morsel.

Next was pasta course. Sis liked this course the best. There was a lobster cannelloni. The filling was good, but the stripped (black and white fresh pasta) outer wrapping was a little too firm. Then there was fresh garganelli (weird homemade pasta things) with a fresh tomato sauce, and some delicious cheese which I can't remember the name of. Must have been French. ;-) Then, we had the best gnocchi EVER. (Even better than Trilussa back in the day). It was stuffed with quail sausage, and was AMAZING. Sis doesn't even dig sausage and she was slobbering over it. I love sausage, and I love gnocchi done right, so this was perfect. The gnocchi was tender, the sausage juicy... MMMM.

Then, the meat course. There was this nasy kobe beef roll with pinenuts and pancetta. It was gross. The kobe beef was tough and stringy, and kind of looked like shaved roast beef. The pancetta was overcooked, and with the pinenuts it was just gross. (And kobe is normally AMAZING!) But then there was this piece of pork in a simple demiglace, and I don't know what part of the pig this little slice of heaven came from, but it was delish. Kind of fatty, but tender, juicy, and flavorful. Then, we had the most delicious piece of squab I have ever had. In fact, it was one of the best peices of meat I've ever had (almost as good as the kobe beef I had at Rocca delle Macie in 96). The squab just melted in my mouth, and had the outside was perfectly seared so it was crispy but retained all the juices. It was topped with fois gras, and Sis refuses to eat squab, because it's really pigeon (and as I was eating mine, she was making cooing noises. Quite amusing acutally. It did not deter me from my pigeon feast. I told her if sewer rat tasted like lobster I'd eat it too.) So we did a little trade, squab for fois gras. I think I got the better deal. She of course made me take a bite of the fois gras. It just tasted like pureed liver. Oh yeah, that's what it is. And for $100 and 1000 calories, it's NOT WORTH IT. And don't you feel bad for the little force-fed goosies? Nah, me neither.

On to dessert. MMMM. I am a big dessert person. Unfortunately most places don't have a pastry chef, and just order their stuff from Bindi. Just bc something has a lot of sugar and fat in it doesn't mean it tastes good. Okay, it tastes GOOD, but it could be amazing with just a little more effort. So I love dessert, but I'm picky. I'm also a bit of a baker myself, so I am entitled to a bit of snobbery. So I was not dissappointed when we got our dessert course. There was this praline semifreddo croccante (which frankly I think was hazlenut, but whatev) which was amazing. It was ice-cream esque, flavorful, creamy without being too rich, crunchy... mmmm. Then there was this orange muffin thing which was kind of weird, but it rocked when I dipped it in some vanilla sauce. Then there was this panna cotta. O. M. G. I love panna cotta. (It's sort of like a custard, but it's made with gelatin so it's not as high in fat). Mmm.... it had shaved vanilla particles, and it was CREAMY, and cool melty goodness in my mouth. Then there was pricky pear sorbet (wtf?) which was good, but I'm not into sorbet. Not caloric enough probably.
Then I finished off our bottle of Masi Campofiorin, and proceeded to make bank playing Pai Gao.

LOL, there was this old white dude sitting next to me at the table, who said to me, "I think Pai Gao means screwed in Japanese." I said, "it's Chinese, asshole." Okay, I didn't call him an asshole. But still.