Restaurant Week - MOZen

This week is Restaurant Week here in Las Vegas. This week several of the fancy restaurants sign up and serve special fixed price meals and make donations from the sales to our local food bank. The special meals are usually combinations of several standard items but in smaller portions and usually much less expensive than ordering from the regular menu. It is a good opportunity to try out new places and get a good sampling of what is available. Last year we went to Andre’s French Restaurant in the Monte Carlo, a place that I’ve wanted to try out ever since we moved here. Andre used to have a restaurant in an old building downtown and been there quite a while, but with the economy changes a few years ago he closed that location and moved to the MC.
Usually I don’t find out about these until afterwards, but fortunately this year I saw a web site that discussed the event. This year I got reservations for lunch at MOzen Bistro and dinner at Jean Georges . I’ve never heard of MOZen, but have been reading reviews about Jean Georges since it opened a few years ago. Both places are at City Center on the Strip, where there are quite a few new restaurants that are highly rated.

On Monday we went down to City Center. They have seven parking garages, six are valet parking and only one is self-parking. For some reason I don’t really like to use the valet, just something about strangers driving my car (and I’ve seen how the valets drive, speed seems to be the primary objective). The self-parking garage is only accessible from Las Vegas Boulevard, which is not a street that locals usually enjoy. I much rather like hitting the parking garages off of the back streets, and so park at the Monte Carlo garage when we hit that part of the Strip. It’s a fairly long walk through the Monte Carlo lobby and the shopping area to get to City Center, but since MGM owns that whole block it’s all indoors. From the end of the Monte Carlo area there is a tram to the middle of City Center and then to the Bellagio, which also has a garage only accessible from LV Boulevard, so going to that casino we also take the same route.

We’ve never been to the Mandarin Oriental hotel before. It is one of the few hotels that does not have a casino attached, so there is not much to see if you aren’t staying there. It’s located in the southwest corner of the City Center complex, supposedly on Las Vegas Boulevard itself but really behind a conference center wing and challenging to find. There are little signs with funny arrows placed around pointing to it, but it’s down there.


To the left of that picture is one of the art installations placed around City Center. It’s the Claes Oldenberg typewriter eraser, similar to the one located in Washington at the National Gallery of Art:


We were a little early for lunch (by design), the MOZen serves breakfast then closes between 11 and noon to set up for lunch. We went early so that we could walk around the hotel (lots of photos, coming in a later post). One of the locations we stopped at was a small area off of the main lobby which is located on the 23rd floor. This area has nice soft seating, good views of the Strip and also serves as a Tea Lounge


B and I sat and shared a nice pot of tea


and gazed out the windows for a while


They also serve a ‘High Tea’ from 2 to 5 in the afternoon with scones and sandwiches. We usually take out of town visitors up to the 40th floor of Mandalay Bay to get a view of the Strip, but after coming here we may add this location to our itinerary. After finishing our tea we went down to the third floor to MOZen, which faces the same direction but has a slightly different angle, looking out at Crystals shopping center instead of down on it


It is a rather small restaurant, with two rooms and lots of windows. At the back of one room is a sushi bar with specialized chef. You can sit there and munch on a variety of items or take a table and have sushi served


Seating is pleasant, with round tables for four, six or two. We sat right by the window


We both ordered the Restaurant Week special, a large Bento Box style meal with five different items: Soft Shell Crab, Avocado, Cucumber, Masago Hand Roll And Laab Gai Chicken, Thai Relish And Lettuce Wrap, Tandoori Salmon With Mint Sauce, Miso Mustard Angus Striploin And Truffle Butter Naan, dessert of Ginger Panna Cotta, Pepper Streusel, Pear Coulis And Pear Ginger Gelee (taken off of their menu). I didn’t take a photo, but I can say that each item was marvelous, it’s easy to taste why the French put so much effort into the sauces. It was really nice combination of things, all small portions of totally different tastes but that went well together to provide a full meal. Too bad it’s not on their regular menu, but it did provide a variety of tastes that indicate what everything else would be like.

We’ll probably go back, it is a central location with great food. We will definitely hit the tea room again, with the views and nice seating it is in the middle of what I call our ‘south Strip’ walking tour for visitors. So if you come out to Vegas we might end up there. Well, not end up more like middle pause. Tomorrow night, steak (unless I go for the salmon)!

Chocolate & Spice

We went and picked up our kitchen flooring from Lowe’s last night, going with a cork snap and click floating floor. There are some big cracks in our concrete slab in the kitchen, which prevents us from putting down tile. I know – there are isolation mats I could use to prevent cracking, but we also wanted something reasonably soft to walk on.
On the way to Lowe’s we stopped at a restaurant that I’ve wanted to try, the Chocolate & Spice Bakery on Sahara. There have been quite a few good write-ups on the place, it’s not far from our house and I just love pastries, but for some reason we just haven’t stopped there. They also serve soup and sandwiches, so feeling light a lighter meal we thought that would be a good start. Unfortunately my great anticipation turned into a not very exciting reality. That’s the way things go sometimes.

Our first indication of things came when we drove up to the place. It’s in a corner strip mall, the kind that has buildings all around in a large square facing towards a common parking area in the center. This mall is rather large, with a lot of storefronts. Unfortunately it is similar to many small malls in Vegas; a large number of the places are vacant with ‘space for lease’ signs in many windows. There is a good mix of businesses; a lawyer’s office, insurance agent, health spa, gold and coin store, big sushi restaurant in the corner with good street visibility and the bakery right next to it. Pulling up last night about 5:30 there were no cars at all parked in the rather large lot, which made me wonder if the food places were open. It was Tuesday, which is a rather slow night anyway, but no cars at all? Where do the employees park, all the spaces are visible in the middle there?


But the lights were on, and we saw somebody walking inside, so we went in. It was a rather large place with high backed soft seats clustered in the windows and lots of tables and chairs to eat at. Unfortunately there were no customers, just one girl behind the counter and somebody back in the kitchen area. Feeling like food before pastry I ordered a bowl of the season specialty corn chowder and a Panini, B selected a chicken pot pie along with some nice iced teas. There had a selection of different sandwiches, salads and soups on the board behind the counter. It took a few minutes to make but even though we were the only ones in the place the girl put them next to the register and called for us to pick them up rather than bringing the food out to us – I guess it might be a requirement of the type of food service license they had, being self-serve instead of a full service restaurant.


My soup was a rather watered down thin yellow broth with no thickness or corn apparent. It had very little taste, not even as good as those boxed corn soup things I’ve tried from the supermarket. The Panini was also rather dull. B didn’t comment on her pot pie, it looked to have a nice flaky top but was made in a small aluminum tin like frozen ones, she did say it tasted a bit stale, like it had been sitting for quite a while.

But we didn’t come for the dinner we came for the desserts, so after eating our main items we wandered back to the display case to select sweets.


There was a small selection of chocolate covered candy, but we wanted some of the pastries. B went for a small cheesecake covered with blueberries, and I picked a chocolate covered banana mouse thingie. Everything in the case looked lovely, but there was not as large a selection as I hoped, only about a dozen different items. We sat back down and proceeded to consume our desserts, and were rather disappointed again. Both items looked rather pretty but tasted rather dull. I was hoping for something dramatic but ended up with more of a flavored paste than a complex dessert.

While we were eating a group of girls came in, there ended up being five of them sitting over in the high back chairs by the window behind us. I didn’t hear what they ordered, but several had coffee which was served in paper cups. All of our food items came on china plates and bowls, but the iced tea was in plastic cups. The group looked very comfortable sitting over there, but I thought that things might have been a little better if the drinks were served in real cups instead of paper.

All in all, it was a disappointment. I’ve been reading grand reviews about this place for months and looking forward to a tasteful experience but everything was just plain and dull. Oh well, I hope others like it and they do well, I so wanted another regular place to go, but there are other places in town to try.

restaurant week

I list my favorite blogs over there on the right so that I can go read them. Most post once or twice a week, a few every day and one several times a day - that’s Vegas Chatter which a few days ago posted about Restaurant Week here in Las Vegas. This is a yearly event that quite a few restaurants participate in. Each restaurant creates a special fixed price menu for the event (in addition to their regular menu) and when you order from it they make a donation to our local organization Three Square which provides meals and a food bank. It’s been going on for several years, and I usually find out about it when it’s over.

Last year I found out early and was able to grab a reservation at Andre’s – a place I have wanted to try since we moved here. We had a great time, and the fixed price meal was about half the price of ordering full menu items, so it did get us into a fancy place to try it out for a lot less money. This year I found out ahead of time, and so made two reservations; one for lunch at MOzen Bistro in the Mandarin Oriental Hotel and later in the week for dinner at Jean Georges in Aria. We’ve heard about how good the restaurants at City Center are but have not taken the time to find out, so this motivated me to jump into two places.

Las Vegas probably has more fancy restaurants than almost any other city, and from what we hear it’s a lot less expensive to eat here than almost anywhere else. I didn’t realize that until I started hearing what it costs in other big cities. I did notice our hotel rates can be a lot cheaper than California hotels – when we recently visited San Francisco and San Diego the room rates for some not so very nice places were much more than we have paid for fancy suites at the big hotels here. Granted, here we can pick the slow times when rates are low and had specific stays laid out in California, but I don’t think most places have hotels that change their rates nightly based on occupancy or planned occupancy the way Vegas hotels do.

So I figured that perhaps it would be nice to try some of these places that we live near, and pretend we are tourists at least for a couple of hours. Now that we’re getting older I find the fun things my wife and I enjoy doing are more like a quiet evening in a nice restaurant than getting drunk at a noisy club. (well, never liked doing that anyway).

5 Guys

We have a lot of hamburger restaurants around Vegas. I’ve talked about two of my favorites; The Burger Bar in Mandalay Place is probably first, followed by Bacci Burger for an oriental slant. I have noticed that a number of the big chain places have closed; a Carl’s Junior near my house is no more, as is a Wendy’s near work.

We recently started going to a new chain, one that I hadn’t noticed before – 5 Guys Burgers . Either it wasn’t around or we just flashed by them. The burgers are pretty good, not the small frozen patties like the big chains do, but more fresh hand smashed things. The fries are also good – when you walk in the place there are bags of potatoes along the ordering line, which are washed and sliced fresh with skin, a single order is about four times the size of a Mackie’s large fry. When you order burgers or hot dogs you also select what toppings you want from a dozen options.

There is one near work that the guys go to regularly which is always filled with Air Force guys in khaki, and several reasonably close to our house. They all look the same, the size of two spaces in small strip malls with white and red walls and open seating.


One of the fun things is the soda machines – large refrigerator sized devices with touch screens. You can get hundreds of drink variations with flavorings. I usually get Coke, and you can add vanilla, cherry, orange, lime, raspberry and a few other syrups to the mix. Pretty cool.

The only drawback is the noise – none of the ones I’ve been to put in a drop ceiling, and with all of the hard surfaces it gets really loud when crowded. Don’t bring anyone with peanut allergies as the fries are all cooked in peanut oil and you get free peanuts while waiting – there are boxes of peanuts along the waiting line, you just scoop yourself a tray full and munch. All of the places we’ve been to are very clean, with a lot of employees; there are usually five or six in the open kitchen cooking and prepping away, and a few wandering around sweeping up and wiping tables. Very nice compared to the standard chain fast burger places which have been decreasing staff.

I would recommend them; they are all around the country with over 1500 outlets. Besides burgers and fries you can get hot dogs, cheese sandwiches and veggie burgers. Burgers, fries and drinks for two usually run us around $18, a lot different than Honey Salt, but then the food isn’t the same. I think I’d rather hit 5 Guys five or six times that HS once though.

I like to compete with Frankie G (over there on the right) for restaurant reviews around town. He’s a bartender and usually does after work cheap places on or near the Strip. I assume he gets off around 2am from his shift and hits places then from the way he writes. I don’t see any 5 Guys on the Strip, so it’s more of a locals place to go than a tourist destination.

Honey Salt restaurant

There are a lot of good restaurants in Las Vegas. I usually break them into several groupings, the first being the division between off-Strip and on-Strip, the second being price. Both groupings kind of fit together, as no matter where you eat on Strip you will probably be spending at least twice what you will off. And on Strip dining is an adventure in that all of the restaurants are in casinos, so you have the added experience of the traffic, the big parking garage, wandering through the casinos, entertainment that might be showing off as you pass and the large crowds whenever you go. But then it is an evening of diverse entertainment rather than going out for dinner.

We live on the west side of town, which means that most of the restaurants and stores we go to are also out west. The Strip and Interstate 15 just behind is a kind of dividing line running north/south, with people usually staying on their side. A new restaurant that just replaced an old one that didn’t make it is Honey Salt , which from the write-ups sounded like a family restaurant with reasonable prices. Vegas has about a half dozen weekly magazine style publications that all have restaurant reviews, in addition to our daily paper and a few monthly magazines. You can read their publicity blurb on the front of their web site, making it “a restaurant devoted to family, friends and community”, “farm-to-table inspired menu that balances the reality of living in the desert with amazing ingredients regionally available”. OK, thought we’d try.

It’s in the corner of a strip mall, not a majestic setting.


But on entering we found it to not be as budget friendly as I supposed. It looked nice, with an open kitchen in the back, and lots of smaller tables.


We started out with one of their salads – it was rather pretty, and tasty


I had the salmon for the main course, the flavor was great, but as with most ‘high end’ restaurants the portion size (for Americans) was rather small.


Overall the meal was enjoyable, the atmosphere a little ‘hard’ and fairly noisy, the food very good. Unfortunately the cost was a lot more than we anticipated – bill for the two of us ended up being slightly over $100. That is a little high for an off-Strip place, and not great enough for us to warrant a return visit. We’ll see how long they last.

THE hotel entrance

We stayed at THE hotel at Mandalay Bay
for Christmas. This place follows a trend in Vegas, where a large company builds the main resort then leases out different spaces to other firms. The newest is Nobu at Caesar’s Palace (by Robert DiNiro and chef Nobu), just opened this week, and other resorts have different companies as well. Mandalay Bay is part of the MGM family; the main building is run by them, THE hotel (that’s the way they capitalize it) has a 43 story tower and the Four Seasons having the top floors of the main tower. I picked THE Hotel just to see what a specialized place was like, plus I was always impressed by the coffee shop whenever we walked by.

The entrance is not very impressive – just a small sign and a door off of the parking garage – no grand entrance here!


Walking to this tower from the Mandalay Bay casino is a little better. You first walk down a small hall past the sports book, then past the theater entrance (changing from the Lion King over to Michael Jackson right now) and the lobby up to Mix on top, then through a more interesting passage


To the side of that walkway is THE coffee shop. As I said, it always looked interesting but is only open for breakfast and lunch while we kept walking by in the evening.



We did get down to have breakfast there twice, and I would highly recommend it. Like most pretty coffee shops it is not inexpensive, I think it was around $50 for breakfast for the two of us, but being a short vacation out I wanted to do fancy a little bit.

Local places: HK Star vs Lazy Joe

A few weeks ago I overheard someone at work discussing the meal he had the night before – it was clams in a black bean sauce, and I was much impressed by his descriptions of the ‘Scent of the sea’ and the delicate sauce and how dramatically he described his sensations while eating. I later asked him where the restaurant was, and was surprised to find it was a Chinese seafood place very close to my house: HK Star Seafood Restaurant at 3400 South Jones, near Spring Mountain.

I don’t really like seafood, but my wife does, and figured a Chinese place would most likely have additional items that I might enjoy, so that night we went down there. The restaurant is in a strip mall full of other Asian places, and takes up four normal storefront places. It looks like a typical low cost Chinese place, with simple tables and chairs and bright signs for an assortment of Asian beers. At the back were several fish tanks filled with live fish, shrimp and lobsters. We were the only Caucasian faces in the place, and when they sat us (the tables were pre set with teacups, plates, small rice bowls and chopsticks) we were immediately given forks, a sign that they knew how adept we probably were. The menu is quite large, running at over thirty pages. There were sections for chicken, beef, fish, vegetables, noodles, lobster, shrimp, sparrow, duck, frogs and a number of other items.

At my suggestion she did try the clams in black bean sauce, while I had a chicken noodle dish. The food was served in the typical family style, a large pot of hot tea was brought out, then a big rice pot, and the two dishes on large platters that we both could serve ourselves from. When served like this we usually end up taking half of each dish home, and thus get two meals out of one order. However, the clam dish evidently lived up to Bob’s description and B ended up finishing the entire plate. I did take half of my noodles home. Total cost for the two dishes, the free rice and hot tea and our drinks was $23. B evidently liked the black bean sauce, we’ve been back two times since and she ordered the chicken in black bean sauce and last week the beef in black bean sauce. Next time she says she’ll try the oyster sauce, her usual very favorite style that she enjoyed in San Diego but hasn’t found a Vegas place yet that makes it well.

So we’ve been to HK Star three times, and the last two times have each brought half of the order home for next day meals. Once when we were there half the place was screened off for a group that came on three tour busses. Usually there are about 200 people in the place, a lot of family groups with grandparents and kids, but service is fast and the food also comes out quite quickly. We haven’t tried any of the lobster dishes yet, but they do bring out a live lobster for you to approve prior to cooking. One meal the table next to us had a soup that was filled with chicken parts – the woman was really enjoying the chicken feet, munching on four or five before complaining about not enough feet in the soup and being brought more. I can see us going back quite a few more times (but not for the chicken foot soup).

Last week we felt like something lighter before Thanksgiving and ended up at a fish and chips place I read about: Lazy Joe’s Fish and Chips at 7835 South Rainbow. We usually hit one of the many Irish pubs for fish and chips, but since I read a good review thought this might differ. Like HK this place is in a strip mall, but only took up one narrow spot. There were about a dozen people eating there, and Joe himself sat us down. We both ordered the typical cod and chips, opting for two pieces of fish and the seasoned chips, and two drinks. Total order: $26. There is a counter down the center of the place, with deep fryers behind so we could see our food being prepared.

When delivered the fish pieces looked rather small (compared to what we usually had at the pubs) in nice rectangular shapes. The breading looked good, but the first bite was a challenge: the fish was so hard and rubbery that I couldn’t bit off any. We used the supplied plastic knives to cut off small pieces, but chewing was reminiscent of those hard yellow pencil erasers with a fishy taste. After one bite, and a try at the overcooked fries, my wife asked why, and rather than complain in front of the happy crowd we asked for to-go boxes, loaded up and took off for HK. My wife suggested giving the fish to some homeless people, but I thought having it would be worse than having nothing (yes, that bad) and we deposited the boxes in the first dumpster we came across. Back at HK Star it was the beef in black bean sauce for her and Kung Pao chicken for me, total bill $23, with enough for another meal taken home.

End result: Skip Lazy Joe’s and go right to HK Star. Cheaper, more food, and MUCH better.

Bachi Burger

A while ago Daly discussed her trip to Bachi Burger, a local restaurant in the area just south of the airport. Her descriptions made the place sound interesting, so we made a trip out there and were so pleased we’ve been back again. It’s a local burger place that offers this American staple in an Asian style. They also have steamed buns, interesting drinks and other items.

Located in the corner building of a strip mall, with a Subway shop on the other side, parking is easy and it’s convenient to most of the south valley. Not very thrilling from the outside, and rather bare on the inside


It still is a friendly place to enter. The staff members are all smiles and helpful, eager to explain the menu to new visitors. We started off with the assorted Asian pickle appetizer, an interesting combination of tastes and textures


B had one of their burgers and I opted for some tasty meat on the steamed buns along with a cone of interesting fries


Bachi Burger has a full assortment of boba teas, shakes and beers for liquid refreshment, and a few sweet desserts (which we have been too full to try). An interesting place, a good alternative to regular burgers, and a relatively inexpensive evening out. We’ll be back, and I’d recommend it.

Thanks for the referral Daly.

Aria buffet

A few weekends ago we were wandering around City Center and the new Cosmopolitan and got a little hungry. Most of the fancy restaurants aren’t open for lunch; we didn’t want a $18 sandwich, so we thought we’d try out the Aria buffet. We aren’t too big on buffets, don’t eat enough to make all of that feasting worthwhile, but since there were several with us we thought it would be worth a try, after all, City Center is a fancy place, the food should be good.

City Center and Aria from the fountain courtyard.


The Sunday Brunch was running, cost around $26 per person, with a few bucks extra if you wanted champagne. It looked OK, and was one of the few buffets that actually had windows. Most of the time the buffets are located in the middle of a casino, under hotel towers with slots on one or two sides. A place to stock up and get back to gambling. But this one looked OK.


We were initially seated in the middle, but then pushed for a place by the windows. We ended up next to the dessert line.


My favorite part of the meal.


Food surrounded the main area on three sides, with cold crab legs and oysters over on one side. The ladies immediately headed for that, while I tried the meats and salads.


Unfortunately it was the Sunday Brunch, which meant a combination of breakfast and lunch, so a lot of space was taken up by breakfast stuff, such as eggs and meats and eggs Benedict and sweet rolls and cereals. I tried some eggs and bacon, but mostly hit the carved roast beef and ham. Not many salads were out, but that left more room for dessert.
Overall I wasn’t too impressed. Perhaps because it was the breakfast combination, but the variety wasn’t that great, and what was out there was not very impressively good. I want to be wowed by the food, and I wasn’t. Have to get back to the Rio and see if it’s still as good as I remember. My suggestion: skip the Aria Buffet. We had tried the Bellagio one a while back, and that was small, expensive, and not very good either. So if you are in the middle of the Strip and want a lot of food, I hear the Paris buffet is pretty good.

But there were windows. It was cold, but the big hot tub was just outside our table. No tiny bikinis, just a bunch of younger guys getting drunk, so the ladies had something to look at.

Fall on the Strip

We thought that we’d play tourist last Saturday, and enjoy one of the last warm weekends before the colder holiday season starts. We just did half the Strip, parking in the Fashion Show mall (and doing some shopping) then walking down the west side to the Bellagio, crossing the street and back up on the east side. We left the house around 10 and got back a little after 6, visiting several countries around the world.

Starting out, there was a Veteran’s Day sale at most of the stores, but we hit the cookware sale at Bloomingdale’s in the Fashion Show mall. I’ve been wanting a large cast iron skillet for a while, not for the weight but there are several recipes I wanted to try that start out on the stove and move to the oven. I didn’t want just a big black skillet but a pretty one, and there they were for half price. The place was crowded for the sale, and B talked me into getting a big pot in addition to the skillet. See - pretty multi tone ‘cherry’ color. I hope they cook as good as they look. (sorry you can’t see the color on the skillet, but it’s the same red as the bigger pot). And for as much as they weigh I better start building up my arm muscles in order to lift those suckers.


We put them back in the car and hit the coffee shop on the way out of the mall onto the Strip. The weather was our usual gorgeous sunshine with high temps in the mid 70’s. We headed south, crossing on the pedestrian bridge to TI. A few years ago they started adding pedestrian bridges across the Strip and side streets, without them the cars didn’t have a chance. There are only a few places left where you can actually cross at street level, the casinos have installed fencing and low walls to keep you off of the street. TI (formerly Treasure Island) was recently sold, and the new owner hasn’t made any major visible changes. The pirate ships are still out front, there was new carpet inside but it still looked about the same. The TI used to be a pirate themed casino, with skeletons and pirate booty, chests, jewels and gold coins all over the place. That was removed a few years ago in a big remodel and rename to TI, but if you look close you can still see some remnants of those days. Christian Audigier now runs the big nightclub out front (Dress Code: Ed Hardy & Christian Audigier designs encouraged).

Then out on the street and down past the Mirage, with its volcano (only active at night) and waterfalls and into the Caesar's Palace Forum Shops. This was one of the first shopping malls on the Strip, with large fountains that come to life periodically, a big fish tank and the sky painted overhead. They used to run a one hour cycle from sunrise through daylight, sunset and night, but now it’s just generally gloomy twilight inside. It was rather crowded, with a fair number of people filling the halls. The Forum Shops mall was the first place I’ve seen circular escalators.


I’m still impressed with how they work. As you can see, the place is well decorated but rather echoy and noisy with all the hard surfaces. The main entrance is three stories high with a large vaulted ceiling, and is rather bright compared to the inside passageways. You have to go up to the third floor in order to cross over to the main shopping area. Even up here it’s rather pleasant, with the standard inlaid marble floors and big statues.


Then through the casino and out to the street, past a long cab line and their entrance fountains and statues over to the corner bridge. This crosses over to the Bellagio. Their shopping center starts at the corner bridge and runs around a curve behind the fountains over to the casino. This is one of the nicer casinos, with large walkways to work your way through without dodging people at the tables and machines. We stop here periodically to see the conservatory, which is a large glass ceiling room that changes with the seasons. We caught the Fall harvest display, which revolved around pumpkins and fall blooming flowers.


There were some metal fountain trees down the center, which sparkled really nicely in the sunshine. Besides the pumpkins, miniature pepper plants, mums and other flowers they had some talking trees and ents.


We caught them a few years ago in the middle of changing over from Fall to Christmas. That seems to be quite a lot of work, swapping out thousands of live plants and trees, buildings, fountains and other hardscape and making it all so pretty. Last year it was snowing inside over a pine forest, the changeover usually takes place just after Thanksgiving weekend. Then outside and along their moving sidewalks back out to Las Vegas Boulevard. There were no cabs lined up here, we were surprised at the difference from Caesar’s where there were dozens of people in line and lots of yellow cabs waiting to pick them up. The end of the walkway deposits you onto the sidewalk where there is a crossing signal, so that you can walk across the Strip to get to Planet Hollywood and their shopping center; the Miracle Mile Shops. It was here, across ten lanes of traffic, that I caught sight of something I look for every time we hit the Strip.


Yes, the Las Vegas bride wandering the Strip and casinos in full white gown, waiting with her new husband and wedding party to cross the street. It’s a big joke to us, and kind of like a treasure hunt, to see who will be first to catch sight of the bride. I’ll have to create a web page of Strip brides, I think I have posted pictures of about a dozen so far. I have no idea why someone would wear a big fancy white gown out and about, dragging long trains on the dirty streets and sidewalks. Is it just to show off the fact that you are now married? This bride was a little different; she appeared to be in her late 50’s with a husband of similar age, rather than the young chickies we usually see. By the time the light changed there were a few hundred people on either side waiting to cross, and we and she were lost in the crowd when the light changed, so I couldn’t get a closer shot for you. Sorry. This is also a very unusual photo of Las Vegas Boulevard, with ten lanes and no cars. The pedestrian crossing lights had just turned red, and cars have not yet gotten the green to proceed. But it does let us see her across the street there.

Our destination however was not that mall but the place next door, Paris. Out front is my favorite outdoor Strip restaurant, Mon Ami Gabi


The weather was perfect, sunny and warm but not too hot. It was around 74f when we finally sat down; lunch on a Saturday here is popular, and there was an hour wait for a table. But they gave us a pager thingie and we wandered the casino, then sat at the bar and had a drink before getting called. The tables for two are right along the rail, just a few feet above sidewalk level so that you can look over the heads of everyone. We got the table at the very end, with a nice view of the Bellagio fountains across the street.


I don’t know how high that water shoots up, but it is impressive. There is a short show set to music every half hour, and the number of people walking and cars driving by was greatly reduced from summertime highs. There are heaters for winter, and misters for summer, but it is best right now when none of that is needed. The large umbrellas gave shade from the midday sun, but shortly after we sat down the sun moved behind the large new towers over at City Center.


That is the largest private construction project in the world, with quite a few large towers and over $7,000,000,000 US spent so far. Grand opening is scheduled for the middle of next month, it is impressive to see that site and realize it was bare ground jus three years ago. The ability to go from bare ground to a hole several hundred feet deep to a dozen towers fifty stories high in three years: wow. There is still a large crane or two, and not all the buildings will be open, but the main entrance, casino and hotel will be ready in a few short weeks, with the rest within a few months. Each tower is leased out to a major hotel chain or two, so not everything will be run by the MGM Mirage Corporation. Go click on the City Center link, they have a nice aerial video of the Strip at night and shots of the Center.

I was also able to get a shot of two other things we see quite often when out on the Strip.


The guy on the left carrying one of those big tourist drink things, this one an 18 inch high plastic Eifel Tower filled with some white drink, probably a pina colada. Most Strip casinos offer these things, with models of the Stratosphere or whatever the place is, or a giant beer bottle or just a plain tall tapered container with a very long straw. The biggest we saw that day while sitting there were some that were over a meter tall, which came with neck straps to help carry them. A large percentage of people walking the Strip are carrying drinks, ranging from beer cans and bottles up to those large mixed drink things. It is a lot of liquid, and having gotten some ourselves it is funny to realize there is only a shot or two of cheap booze mixed with all that shaved ice and sugary liquid. The bigger ones probably hold a gallon of ice and liquid, which is nice to have along when it’s 115f in the summer. But don’t plan on getting drunk on it.

The other thing in that photo is to the right; the big mobile billboard truck with the ‘hot babes direct to you’ advertisement, including a picture of three young women wearing not much. But doesn’t it look pleasant, out in the sunshine having a nice meal and watching the fountains across the street and all the people walking by? It is worth the wait. And no, we didn’t go back inside and get some of those drinks. You can also see our fall colors in that photograph: green, with people wearing long pants instead of shorts. The green leaves will drop soon, leaving a better view of the fountains, but the palm trees will stay the same.

After the meal it was back on the Strip heading north on this side of the street, past Bally’s next door and some of the older casinos. We didn’t see any of them across the street, but this side had dozens of the ‘card slappers’: people wearing ‘hot girls direct to you’ t shirts passing out business cards with photos of these hot girls wearing almost nothing. For a few hundred dollars one (or two or three) of these beautiful women will gladly come to your hotel room and entertain. Prostitution is illegal in Clark County (but legal in the rest of the state, kind of strange there) so I have no idea as to what form of entertainment is offered, never partaking of that form of entertainment here. In addition to the cards our phone book’s largest section is for ‘Escort and Outcall Services’. There are about two hundred pages of ads; the next largest section is for lawyers, almost as many pages.

We wandered through the Venetian and stopped for some gelato for dessert and to watch people inside. The adjoining Palazzo has a small central court with big waterfall and smaller fountains. This used to be a plain space, but in the past year they have started decorating it, probably trying to compete in a small way with the Bellagio conservatory. I had posted shots of their Spring umbrellas, now it was Fall pumpkins and some big stick cornucopia thing and lots of mums. Not as big as the competition, but still rather pleasant.


Then across the walkways to the Wynn and back to Fashion Show to pick up our car and head home. All in all a rather pleasant day, sunshine and lots of people and a walk of around 10 miles overall, including casino and shopping center wanderings.

Twin Creeks

Periodically we get out of the house and hit one of the casinos or nicer restaurants around town. Las Vegas is filled with fancy restaurants; unfortunately most of them are rather expensive. I am usually hesitant about spending that much money for something that I’ll just flush the next day, but every once in a while I really like going out. Our favorite place for steaks is Fleming’s, a national chain that has an outlet not far from my house. The atmosphere is nice and the food is pretty good and consistent, the staff is very friendly and we really like it.

But at times we do go elsewhere, and recently the Silverton Casino had a special offer - two for one meals at all their in house restaurants for locals with a players club card. We hadn’t been to the Twin Creeks steakhouse for a while and figured it was worth a return. It provides fair quality food at about the lowest prices in town; a full steak dinner with salad, desert and sides is usually under $25. At half price it was getting down pretty low.

The Silverton is not located on the Strip or downtown but far south on I-15. It was the first casino you drove past coming in from LA but now the new M resort has taken over the extreme southern position, not counting the casinos at Jean or Stateline which aren’t really Vegas. They recently had a makeover, with a realignment of some local roads and construction of a big parking garage. The Silverton used to be all country, with logs and wood and the Nevada site of the Bass Pro Shop full of boats and sporting stuff, but now they have gone a little more upscale.

There is a new food court with some of the ‘standard’ fast food places in addition to the in house restaurants. We’ve never tried their buffet, just hitting the steak house. They cater to locals, and it seems that every time we’ve been down there they were giving away a piece of crockery or some other home item (like Sham-Wows) for accumulating players club points to a lot of old people. It’s a lot different than the Strip casinos. They also have a huge salt water fish tank near the front of the Bass shop, and it is entertaining just to stand and watch the fish. They also periodically have mermaid shows, and the divers jump in to feed the fish by hand, insuring everybody gets the proper diet and amount.


The tank is about six meters high and probably twenty meters across, and just full of big fish, sharks and rays swimming around and around.

In addition to fancying up the casino the Twin Creeks steak house has changed from a country place with log furniture and wooden walls to a fairly upscale place. The lights were a little dim, but the décor had a full makeover, resulting in something that was nowhere similar to what it was before.



We spent a nice few hours, had a pleasant drive down, a nice time watching the fish and divers, wandered the new casino and had a great meal. All for joining the player’s club - our first in town, just to get the low prices, and ended up having steak dinners for two with wine and a resulting bill of under $30 total for the both of us. Not bad, and the food quality has not decreased at all. The steaks are a little dull, and are greatly enhanced by ordering one of their special sauces (only $2 or so) but are just fine, providing a nice night. A warning if you go - on weekends be sure to call for reservations, the wait can be up to two hours if you just drop in. During the week we have not had any problems, and with the lower tourist numbers in town the place was fairly empty when we sat down, and only rose to about 2/3 occupancy when we left.

M Resort breakfast

Last week we went out for breakfast - I love hitting a nice place for breakfast, it’s usually the cheapest meal of the day, and you can get some nice meals for a lot lower cost than diners. My favorite breakfast place is Bouchon at the Venetian, if you want a really nice atmosphere, great food and delicious baked goods give them a try, on the tenth floor of the old Venezzia tower, but it will probably run you $25 each for a full fresh OJ, coffee, baked basket and meal, but it’s worth it. My second favorite place is the coffee shop at the Palms; it’s an OK atmosphere, the coffee is good, and usually the place is fairly empty as the Palm caters to a younger crowd that stays out late and doesn’t come down to breakfast. It’s also the closest casino to our house.

Anyway, last week we thought that we’d try the new M Resort. It’s the latest place to open in Vegas, came on line just a month or so ago. It is located at the far south end of the Strip. By far south I mean it’s about the last building before you hit California. Well, perhaps a bit of an exaggeration there, but it is quite a few miles down before you hit the southern hills. It is the first big place visible when driving up from California, visible between the mountains before you turn into the Vegas valley. We took the drive down - it’s about twelve miles from our house - to check it out. From the news reports M was really crowded the first few weeks, it is the newest casino down south, where a lot of homes and developments were recently built, so locals in southern Henderson have a closer place to go away from the main Strip traffic. Green Valley Resort is another nice place that services the same area, but it is quite a few miles away from M.
The casino looks like all the others in the new style, same slots, but swirly carpets and lots of wood and rock.


The coffee shop is off the main casino floor, with views to the west and south, the two corner walls are all glass. It is not an intimate feel, the Palms coffee shop is in the middle of the casino with no windows, but a nice open style.


They have the same good O’Douls coffee that the Palms has. I ordered the French Toast with cherries and whipped cheese - it sounded much better than it looked. And the fresh cherries turned into jam.


But it tasted OK, the bacon was crisp, but it ended up costing about twice as much as a similar Palms meal. Almost up to the Bouchon price range without the excellent food.

Right outside is the M pool. You can look down at the swimmers while eating, and at the end is their outdoor stage. In cooler weather you can dine outside, and watch the setup. Probably see the concerts at night, though there may be a waiting line for that.


They were setting up for Crosby, Stills and Nash when we were there. This is taken from the same place but looking north. You can see the big Strip hotels off in the distance, with the farther northern mountains in the background.


Driving back we came up Las Vegas Boulevard instead of the parallel I-15, just to get a longer view of the ride. From here it still looks like desert, and the main Strip area is still seven or eight miles away, with the airport between.


End result? B liked the location and the views, said the food was ‘OK’. I would say the same thing, not worth going down just to eat, but perhaps to take tourists. For that price I would do Bouchon - especially for the pastries. I’ll still stick with the Palms breakfast for the price and quality. The menus posted outside the fancier restaurants seemed to match the good quality Strip high costs, we might try some but probably not.

Hush Puppy

Here is another in my ongoing series of local restaurant reviews. Most of these places are so far off Strip that tourists don’t usually find them, but are usually worth visiting. We’ve been driving on Charleston past this restaurant for quite a while, either the parking lot is empty (when the place is closed) or packed, but I usually notice the ‘all you can eat’ banner out front. It’s the Hush Puppy restaurant on Charleston just west of Rainbow.


It sits by itself on a big lot surrounded by lots of asphalt parking and looks kind of lonely right there. It has been open at this spot since 1975, and with the growth of Vegas that probably means it was out in the middle of nothing surrounded by brush filled fields on the street out to Red Rock. There is a second branch location out east by the Air Force base but this one is the original, and not far from our house. The inside is a little plain but colorful.


They specialize in southern style seafood, such as blackened catfish and peel shrimp and oysters, but what I see is the all you can eat ribs on Wednesday sign. There is a different item on the all you can eat menu each day of the week.


B went for the Cajun Fantasy; a combo plate of grilled instead of fried stuff, blackened catfish, shrimp and oysters. My favorite rib place used to be the Lone Star, which closed a while back, and I’ve been looking for a replacement. Most places have ribs that require a lot of work, I want one where the meat is falling off the bones with a tasty sauce. These seem to be about the best so far. As you can see I’ve been working on this plate for a while before thinking about the camera. And in that basket - yes, two kinds of hush puppies; one I’ve not seen before but supposedly more traditional and the other little corn fritters, but both very good.


The waitress says that the 73 year old owner comes in every morning to make the pecan pie, all I can say is that it’s the best I’ve had. (and only $2.50)


End result: a bill for $40 that covered both of us, with dessert and drinks. We didn’t do the peel and eat shrimp, but we will be back for more ribs. If you’re local and haven’t been yet go now, while she is still baking the pies.

Update: just came across Linda singing this from long ago, it seems appropriate


Oh, just noticed - post # 899 - wow, lots of words. Sorry