Sin City

It was actually hard to convince me to go to Vegas.  My last trip there was in college for a friend's 21st birthday.  Needless to say, all our group wanted to do was spend the whole time at the bar, and I didn't have the most memorable experience because we ended up not experiencing much of the city.  Second time's a charm because this weekend I had a FABULOUS time in Las Vegas!  We stayed at the MGM Grand, saw Cirque de Solei's Mystere, ate like kings and queens, got to visit with a good friend, and ended up winning a few hundred on roulette and craps!

The food:
We've all heard that Vegas has some of the world's greatest restaurants.  But I live in a city where we pride ourselves on eating locally; a true marker of a good restaurant to me is a sustainable restaurant.  I can't imagine how far Vegas restaurants have to ship their food in from daily.  Although it's the most environmentally sound city, we decided to let go and take part in a little sin ourselves by indulging a several fine dining establishments.

Bobby Flay's Mesa Grill
I loathe Bobby Flay.  If you've never heard of this celebrity chef, he has several shows on the Food Network.  One of them is called "Throwdown".  Throwdown follows Flay to different cities to challenge local chefs to a cooking competition.  What do they cook, you ask?  Well they cook the local chef's signature dish.  For example, Bobby will head to New Orleans and challenge the queen of Gumbo to a Gumbo throwdown.  HOW COCKY CAN YOU GET? These poor people have spent their entire career building a reputation as the best of the best and Bobby comes in and humiliates them by defeating them. Then they're supposed to act honored that Bobby showed up in the first place. RUDE.
Well, I had to do some investigating of my own to decide if I even liked the guy's cooking.  I didn't want to love it, but I did.

Cornmeal crusted chile relleno stuffed with roasted eggplant and manchego.  Sitting atop red pepper sauce and balsamic vinegar. Crunchy and cheesy, this was Zeph's favorite. 

Cremini mushroom quesadilla with fontina, ricotta, fried egg and salsa verde. This was my favorite! Absolutely the best quesadilla you will EVER HAVE! This was an explosion of flavors!

Tiger shrimp and roasted garlic corn tamale with cilantro sauce.  I saw this dish featured on the show "The Best Thing I Ever Ate" and while delicious, it was far from the best thing I've ever eaten. The tamale was a little dry but the shrimp was sweet and cooked perfectly. 

SushiSamba

SushiSamba is a Brazilian/Japanese fusion restaurant.  I sipped a caipirinha (which immediatly brought back fond memeories of imbibing the Brazilian cocktail on the streets of Salvador during Carnaval a few years ago) while noshing on spicy tuna rolls, and yellowtail ceviche.  They had great happy hour food prices, too!

Fiamma Trattoria

I had the best ravioli EVER here! It was stuffed with short rib, then finished with a black truffle creama and Barbera wine reduction.  Zeph ordered the Baked Garganelli with ridged pasta quills, roasted chicken, eggplant, and hot pepper sauce.  Is your mouth watering just looking at this?

STK

We had the most delicious dungeness crab salad served with melon at this steakhouse.  And of course ordered melt-in-your-mouth filet mignon with roasted asparagus afterwords.  Very expensive, but very delicious. 

Besides the amazing food, I got to meet up with my friend and old roommate Sabrina who lives in Vegas now.  It was great to see her and get a local's tour of the casinos!

Vegas= success!

Bobby Flay's Mesa Grill at Caesar's Palace

3570 Las Vegas Boulevard South
Las Vegas, NV 89109

SushiSamba at The Palazzo

3325 Las Vegas Boulevard South
Las Vegas, NV 89109

Fiamma Trattoria at MGM Grand

3799 South Las Vegas Boulevard
Las Vegas, NV 89109

STK at The Cosmopolitan

3708 Las Vegas Boulevard South
Las Vegas, NV 89109