Yeah, I was thinking of this too. I know Terd and I think Leon said to go for the full experience, but being I'm not from Maryland, or an MD, I'm not sure I can afford a full experience ($$$ wise, anyway) especially if I'll need that money for my medical bills after I eat it...JK!

That's normal. Nothing wrong with not wanting to eat friggin' raw fish, squid, octopus, urchins, and whatever else they can find slithering around in the ocean. I'm half Japanese and I can't stand the thought, sight, or smell of raw fish, much less eat it. That stuff like shad and salmon eggs? That's literally bait that I used to use when I went fishing!

Really can't knock something until you've tried it, unless you have a political, religious, sexual, humanitarian, vegetarian, whatever, reason

Salmon roe is actually delicious. Why do you think the other fish like it so much! I use peanut butter and cheese in my mouse traps, does that mean they're gross? (Granted, they are live traps.)

I think you should try sushi/raw fish before you go to a really nice place. It'll give you a chance to develop a taste for it and let you appreciate nicer places since you'll have a base line to compare it to

Has poké made it's way around you? I think that'd be a pretty easy introduction to raw fish. They mix the protein in with sauce and put it on top of sushi rice. It'll let you get used to the raw fish texture and still have plenty of flavor

My "gateway" sushi was a nice sized piece of tuna given to my mother by a friend.

I was 16 and never even contemplated eating raw fish before.
Now I want it every chance I can get.

OP, your pics made me book Kabuto for the first time next week- and I can't wait. I was actually surprised at how reasonable your bill was for that kind of quality.

Thanks for sharing!

Great to hear. Looks like Kabuto is going to be getting some business after this TR.

BTW, there will be a lot more Kabuto pics coming next weekend since I have another reso with two new friends who have never been before.

And yes, the price is unbelievably good.

Great TR!

Love the Kabuto pics, I heard their reservation system is a bit much? They pre-charge or put a hold on your card? For a group of 6 with people splitting meals makes things difficult.

Reservations aren't bad IMO. Call, make one, they text/call day before to confirm. Have never had CC hold, maybe with bigger parties it's possible. For places with only 20 seats and all fresh product, no shows are a major hassle for them, so I could completely understand this.

Agreed splitting meals can be a pain if one person eats 20 pieces and the other just does the set menu and is done.

Hope that you go.

Day 3 should be up tonight, lots of Twist pics.

TF

Day 3

Wake up at 9 AM and wifey wants to hit the gym. Thanks for the offer, but I’m still a little drunk since I pounded a greyhound on the walk home at 4 AM. That one is just hitting me now I think. I crash for another hour while wifey goes to gym and by 1030, it’s time for breakfast.

Since Noodles gave us FU pandas yesterday, I think it’s time for some actual hot dim sum. BTW, the service at Noodles was about 8 notches below the level you’d expect at the Bellagio. Service is much better if someone just delivers it to you at the poker table.

Off to the Gold Coast and Ping Pang Pong. They renovated PPP the past year and now it has a ton more seating and is a lot nicer to look at. Not sure if the food quality changed much, but I definitely enjoyed everything on this visit. It may have been extra good given the circumstances of still being buzzed and the Noodles experience from the day before.


Har gow


BBQ pork buns


Siu mai


Pork dumplings - Very good


Taro cake - Good but not my favorite


Coconut buns - So delicious, I think I could just eat the dessert buns all day so I took some to go!


Rice noodle roll with shrimp - Great. See those Gai lan leaves. More than a whole plate yesterday!

Now that we are stuffed for a very reasonable $55 after tip, and also have some to go coconut buns, we head over on our mission to find Leon’s TDB machine at the Wynn. Normally all of our play is at Cosmo, but for Leon, we make exceptions.

We also happen to like they Wynncore and have stayed at both several times, but now are more center strip people and Cosmo gives us lots of free nights, so we’re consolidating the play a bit.

Walking around in circles outside Red 8, we come across a succession of less than full pay TDB machines. We actually had to pull up Leon’s thread to find the correct ones. Finally we find the two older machines with no sound (apparently it can be turned up).


Leon's babies

We decide to just put $100 into each machine and play some triple play TDB. Wifey plays first machine and...



I put $100 into the second machine and am down to the last hit when wifey starts saying that we're not gonna hit anything on Leon's machines.*

I realize then that the machines actually have no sound because the speakers are intake for nagging wife noises*




Back to back to back hands turn a pair into quads.

This is me


Not 4AWAK or a royal, just more funny than anything. I got 1 more quads the next hand and cashed out $700 from the $100. Thanks Leon!

Wifey hit a nice little bink on a 25 cent machine as well.



All non premium quads, but they'll do.

At this point we’ve had four old fashioneds each so it’s time to degen in the pit a little bit. We decide that 8 will be our lucky number of the day, so wifey goes to Roulette and I go to Craps. We just place the 8 in both games for a couple hundred each.



Well lubricated and having donked off a little profit, seems like we should go to the Westgate and make some sports bets.




I make a few $100 bets, all on props, except NE to cover (that one is actually a friend’s bet). Wifey makes some fun $10 bets, including on Amendola to have more receptions than the Barcelona/Esapanyol game that day (neither of us watch soccer) and on USA to win more golds at this year’s Olympics than total 1st quarter points. She also hates Timmy Brady, so she bets on him to throw a pick and a pick before a touchdown lol. Our friends who we watch the most football with are all Pats fans, so we just actively root against them just because it pisses them off. We don’t actually care who wins, just want a good game like last year. The best bet I won last year was an excellent bottle of 2008 Grange, when I bet the Pats would come back at halftime. That was a great bottle, now I want another Grange.

The day is flying by with all our moving around and it’s almost time for dinner. Time to go get dressed up since we’re headed to Twist by Pierre Gagnaire. Located in the Mandarin Oriental, Twist is one of the higher end Vegas restaurants, and one of the only ones I haven’t eaten at. Like Guy Savoy and Joel Robuchon, Pierre Gagnaire has a 3 michelin star restaurant in France, and has expanded globally, though not to the degree JR has. I’m sure if the Michelin guide still came to Las Vegas, this would be a starred restaurant.

As a side note, screw the Michelin guide. It’s a very pretentious and annoying guide and doesn’t visit many cities that have a lot of great restaurants (eg. Vegas). We eat a lot of fancy food and drink a lot of fancy booze. Wine is actually our main thing and wifey and I have been collecting for over 10 years despite being in our early 30s. After having gone to 90 Michelin stars worth of restaurants and driving/flying all over for it the past few years, it creates this sense of competition and your mind naturally starts ranking places and making one better than another. There are lots of great meals and not doing 15 stars a week makes them a lot more enjoyable IMO. Also, doing Per Se and Ko and EMP etc. etc. on successive days runs up a pretty decent tab which could be used to gamble Yup, mega FWP.

We still enjoy going to these places but by decreasing the frequency, they have become more enjoyable.


Twist room - a small room but very nice and intimate.

Link to menu (since people often say they want menu pics) https://photos.mandarinoriental.com/...509.1515194225

*Note that since we aren't hugely into foie gras, we subbed the sea bass course in for the foie course. It was a good decision.


Amuse bouches from left to right

Parsley flavored foam bread on cracker - decent

Tall butter crackers with sesame dipping sauce - sauce was very good

Martini glass contains cocktail components. Olive is marinated in Gin IIRC and was very good, especially with the Botanist gin martini made by the bartender. Best item was the Campari gelee, excellent. Celery was like a very good celery heart, not much more to say there.

On plate, pillow containing soft cheese (tasted like cheese in a can), parmesan crisp which was very good. Iberico ham on nori cracker, nothing special.

Butter salted and unsalted from France - I could eat them straight, so delicious.

Three types bread - Standard epi type (I know not real epi), fruit and nut and cranberry. All very good, esp with butter all over them.

Botanist gin martini was my starter - Excellent

For wine we went with a half bottle of NV Krug. Not quite 2003, but very good and great pairing with all food. BTW if you are ever pairing to any tasting menu ever in your life, choose Champagne. It will go with everything, including your meat courses. Most 15+ course tasting menus have less than 3 red meats, and you could grab a glass pour with those if you really want.



STELLAR BAY OYSTERS
Razor Clams, Alaskan King Crab Meat, Celery Brunoise, Citrus Beurre Blanc

These were simply outstanding a 9.5/10 course.



GRILLED FENNEL - Green Spinach Velouté, Brown Butter, Otti Sauce
and Black Olives Taggiasca Sorbet

7/10
I was a bigger fan of this than wifey, fennel likely sous vide given very good texture and quite neutral flavor for a typically strong ingredient. Seemed a bit round and neutral was the criticism.


MEDITERRANEAN LINE CAUGHT SEABASS
Endive and Grapefruit Fondue, Mixed Wild Mushrooms, Mussels, and Saffron Velouté

10/10 dish, brilliant intense flavors, saffron veloute is amazing, great depth and length. Complete dish. If I were to order a la carte, I'd get this for sure.


Intermezzo - Cinnamon, champagne foam with a bitter (?campari) flavor as well. This definitely was palate cleansing (like a brillo pad) but actually pretty terrible, probably a 4-5/10, many went back to kitchen full.


CANADIAN VENISON SADDLE WITH JUNIPER BERRY
Red Cabbage and Huckleberry Marmalade, Braised Turnips

8/10

This is with added truffle supplement which actually paired great with the venison. Wine wise we went with a Bouchard Pommard which was perfect. Venison is great, but there was an interesting assortment of sides to this with...




SIDE DISHES
Game Pie with Blackberry Jam
Autumn Salad
Red Beet and Tamarind Ice Cream

The game pie was meant for two but having a bunch of foie in it, I ate the whole thing myself. It was basically a super rich Wellington served as a side for venison. Super weird. The sauce was incredible and rich, but the salad and ice cream seemed strange and out of place.


Five desserts


The best of the five desserts - Coconut/passionfruit panna cotta, excellent


Hibiscus jelly below, wafer on top. Good not special.


This was very good but can't recall exact ingredients now. This is where we reach the problem of five tiny desserts with ice creams = melty ice creams.


Basically apple tarte tatin - very good


Chocolate ganache - decent, not special


Mignardise was meringue cake - super boozy and unbalanced


Mignardise - The raspberry tart was very good and refreshing

Overall the meal was about an 8/10, with two truly outstanding dishes. Some of the amuse bouche were weak and the venison main was very good, but a strange style of presentation with the game pie side. Also, the desserts don’t work great because they use ice creams on multiple and those melt while you’re taking your time savoring the previous ones.

Service was fantastic, particularly the wine service by Jenna. She allowed us to sample three different reds before picking one to pair with our main course, and one of these was $69 a glass, so that’s very generous. Also Juan Carlos was a great combination of friendly and professional, kind of like Tru in Chicago (before closing) and less like Alinea.

Price wise, for fancy prix fixe menus, this is a 2nd tier just below Guy Savoy and Joel Robuchon in Vegas and if you don’t drink, would come in at around $250 per person after tax and tip for the set menu. I think there are better values out there.

Alright time to get drinking and gambling since it’s the last night. We had thrown a bottle of 05 Dom in the wifey’s purse and Twist kept it chilled for us during dinner. We cracked that and headed over to the Cosmo for some VP.

When we get there, we encounter the dreaded machine hogging whale. There are only two 100 play machines in the high limit, and one has been pretty much occupied the last 36 hours by this same lady, while the other was locked up by some high roller who wasn’t even there. WTF!

Frustrated, we play some 10 cent hundred play and I manage to at least hit a couple of Royal after a ton of hands but forget to take pics because I am pretty drunk. We then just decide to play some 25 cent ten play Ultimate X which is super fun and actually just grind it for a few hours and overall break even on the night.


Putting on a grind sesh - Water, Hennessey XO, Red Bull, Dom

Overall we have a ton of fun as you can probably tell by wifey and the end of her champs.



Good news is that I’ve made Gold again so at least there will be those 4 comped weekend nights for the year in addition to the usual weekday offers. I’m thinking that we’ll actually just go for platinum this year, which shouldn’t be too hard, though not sure how much VP time I’ll have in my upcoming trips.

After dropping off wifey at home, I decide to take a stumbly walk to Bellagio to try to get one last bit of mix game in. Wifey is pretty sure I’m gonna lose all my money but I have drunken confidence and cannot be talked down.

En route to Bellagio I am actually drunk enough that I talk to one of the stripper guys and get some info about clubs from him, then record a voice memo on my phone lol. This is because I have to plan a 20-24 guy bachelor party in May and I know next to nothing about clubs/prices etc except what I’ve learned online. I give him the run around for a bit, the prices sound kinda high and I figure I’ll just end up going directly through the clubs. Also, he’s clearly promoting Hustler and Sophia’s. Some hooker shows up and starts talking to us and even drunk she is nasty AF.

I proceed on to the 20/40 mix and plop down just in time for the Badugi and 2-7 orbits. Perfect! I win one hand of each after raise/patting turn OOP with a 97532 in SB. Definitely suboptimal playing but BB breaks and draws two and I can easily check down and win. At this point it’s 4 AM and I’m gonna pass out at the table so I cash out up a quick $400 and head home. Halfway through the casino, I know that I must eat again so turn around and grab a burger from snacks which is actually really delicious when drunk.



In hindsight, I need to take more pics both at the VP and the pokers for my next TR. I take a ton of food pics, but will make the goal to get more other stuff. I’m headed back next Thursday with a friend who is really into food and maybe some very low stakes gambling. I’m thinking I’ll try to go about 6-8 times in 2018, and will try to just continue this thread rather than start separate ones each time. The content will sometimes be more gambling heavy, sometimes all food, and who knows what else. I know I’ll be in town for the bachelor party May 30-June 5 as well and the $2500 triple draw lowball mix WSOP event is that Saturday. If at all possible I would love to play that event.

Hope you enjoyed, if you did and are cool with a super food heavy report next week (with some low stakes degenning mixed in), let me know. Will be hitting Milos, Kabuto, Carnevino for riserva steak, Chada and a few other places I’m sure.

TF

Nice TR. I’m in for more!

Thanks, more to come after next week's trip.

TF

Nice, you do a way better job taking and posting food pics than I do. I really want to hit some other restaurants outside of the Wynn but when I bring the kids and with my dad's condition it becomes pretty tough.

Yep loving it

Ferg,

More for sure! Especially interested in your take on the riserva.

I can give you my take on the riserva now if you like. I'm guessing you may know all this but the riserva steak at Carnevino is a steak that is not on the menu and not always available. It is dry aged a minimum of 6 months and usually between 9 and 12. We have had it 5 times I think, with the oldest being over 12 months. This is completely absurd and results in an incredible amount of waste because of the mold. In general there could be up to three choices, T-bone/porterhouse, strip loin and rib eye. The price will vary between about $95 for 1 inch of thickness for the strip loin and $110 for the rib eye. I generally go for the rib eye, but all three are great. Outside of Carnevino, the oldest dry aged steak I've had was 120 days at Eleven Madison Park in NYC. It was very good but I prefer Carnevino.

IMO the riserva steak is the best steak I have ever had AINEC. Steak is a matter of personal preference and I'll keep this pretty short, but in general, it is impossible to replicate the umami, grassiness and slightly blue quality of a 6+ month aged steak. It's just a completely different flavor than a wet aged or less aged steak provides. Some people will definitely not enjoy it and prefer a more traditionally beefy flavor to their steak. Everyone's palate is different and I understand that, but for me there is no comparison to the intensity and depth of flavor provided by this level of dry aging.

Eating steaks like Cut or Stripsteak or other places is very good, but they are comparable to a steak that you could purchase at home if you can access high quality beef. Living in Alberta, we are beef country, so I find non-dry aged steaks too close to home grilled. Also, buying Wagyu steaks is total insanity IMO, as cooking Wagyu in complete steak form is totally counterintuitive to its traditional roots in Kobe where it is cooked on a teppan. When we were in Kobe this year, Wagyu took on a new level for me because it was cooked in the teppan style which maximizes surface area to volume cooking, as opposed to a full steak which does not render the central fat well enough. Kobe is all about texture and butteriness/melting, whereas riserva steak is about intensity and depth of flavor but texturally is still very dense.

Oh, and grinding Wagyu into a hamburger is probably ultimate stupidity. Just add extra good quality fat and you will make a proper burger.

Here are some pics from one Carnevino visit. I've also put in some from this year's trip to Kobe as a comparison. These are both excellent steaks, but for entirely different reasons.


Carnevino - Foreground T-bone, back Rib steak


Wagyu at Ishida in Kobe - BMS grade 8-12


Wagyu cooked in small pieces teppan style

Have you tried the riserva? Thoughts?

TF

Ferg,

I’ve tried teppan Wagyu in Japan, but haven’t had the Riserva a couple hours away in Vegas. I’m often in Vegas with people who insist on a trip to either cut or delmonico, and it’s hard to rationalize another nice meal on steak then. But I’ve been wanting to try the riserva, and now I’m definitely going to make it happen in the next trip or two.

Now you also have me wanting to pick up a 365 day Cote de Boeuf from my favorite local butcher. I’ve gotten their 120 before, but never gotten the super long aged ones... YET: http://oliviersbutchery.com/beef-2/d...cote-de-boeuf/

Great TR. thanks


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Great TR!

This is awesome!

Hey,

I agree with you 100% about the rationalizing of steak trips. Carnevino riserva is something unique so I make a special trip. Others are just a very good version of something I can do at home. As an FYI though I do not think the regular menu steaks at carnevino are worth it. They are 90 day aged but not transcendent and I would not go just for those.

That site looks super amazing btw. Let me know if you pick up a 365 Day aged one. I bought a half cow 2 years back but already too much fat trimmed off to age to any significant degree.

TF


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Wow did not know about Kabuto, great read so far. enjoy

Great TR

You make me miss Kabuto so much. Really enjoy the detailed food descriptions in general.

I would enjoy description of games.

Terrific TR!

One question about Cosmo comps...what do you mean by 4 guaranteed weekend night for gold? All the materials I've seen say 1 night for sterling, 2 nights for gold. I'm sterling now, and would consider trying to get gold if it was actually 4 comped nights.

Gold gets 2 nights and 2 companion nights. Since wifey generally uses these it works out to 4 nights.