Salad Is Slaughter

I’ve wanted to go to Joel Robuchon at The Mansion in the MGM Grand (Las Vegas) ever since I heard it was opened. Joel Robuchon is mentioned quite frequently on the Japanese version of Iron Chef as one of the greatest French chefs ever. He’s known around the world as the “Chef of the Century” and was the first chef to win three consecutive Michelin stars. That translates to “impressive as hell.”

During dinner I struck up a conversation with the waiters and found out that Chef Robuchon flies to Las Vegas every two months two tweak the menu, and comes out with quarterly seasonal menus. You’ll notice the menu (below the fold) is labled Le Printemps. That’s French for spring.

There are actually two Joel Robuchon establishments at MGM, the second being L’Atelier de Joel Robuchon.  We walked up to the latter because we didn’t know it existed, it had Robuchon’s name on it, and we weren’t sure where we were going. It turned out that the two restaurants are next to each other and the nice woman at L’Atelier escorted us over.

The Mansion is impressive. It’s rather small, able to hold maybe 12 to 15 people inside, and maybe another half dozen on the patio. A huge crystal chandelier dominates the center of the room. The majority of the chairs aren’t chairs at all, but large comfortable purple couches. We were seated at a very nice corner table where we could look over the room.

We were handed menus and had to decide between the smaller tasting menu containing about 6 or 8 courses, or the full-blown 16 course menu. I got sticker shock when I saw the prices, and since my menu had prices and Janet’s didn’t, I wondered if the cost was for both of us. It wasn’t. Undaunted by the cost, and totally unaware that my gambling losses would exceed my meager winnings, I selected the 16 course tasting menu, since that’s what we had planned on since we made the reservation. We did notice during dinner that a couple sat down, looked at the menu, then fled when they saw the prices.

The waiter wheeled out a cart containing at least a dozen different kinds of bread. Some were made with gruyere cheese, others had bacon, there were traditional baguettes, and just a host of other breads. We tried several throughout the evening, always aware that we didn’t want to fill up on bread because we had another food course on the way. It was tough, because that was good bread.

Food presentation was an important component of each course. There were a variety of plate shapes, colors, and decorations. Small seashells decorated several plates. It’s hard to remember all of the details, but each dish was meant to please both the eyes and the palette.

If I had a complaint about anything, it’s that they didn’t have wine pairings. We had to order our wines by the glass. I would have preferred having the sommelier choose a wine that would go with three or four courses and have maybe four different wines with dinner. Since they don’t do that, I’d recommend calling about their corkage fee and maybe bringing in a couple of different wines (mostly white).

We started off with the Apple pearl, vodka granite. The waiter described this as an amuse, but the serving size was of a regular dinner course. I liked the tart apple flavor and it was a nice way to get ready for the coming meal. I really didn’t notice the vodka because the apple was so powerful.

Second up was one of our favorite dishes of the evening: Oscetra caviar topped with a delicate gelee and a smooth cauliflower cream. This was essentially a caviar soup and the saltiness of the fish eggs went perfectly with the champagne we ordered. But, everyone knows that champagne and caviar were made for each other. When I saw the amount of caviar in the bowl, I got an inkling of why dinner was so expensive.

Following the caviar course, we had Foie gras, mille-feuille of smoked eel with oriental flavors. The foie gras was served cold, and both Janet and I prefer it grilled. But that being said, this was a phenomenal dish. I like eel, and the smoked eel on this dish was really good. It matched well with the foie gras.

The Tuna tartar, cold red bell pepper confit with bergamot and dry cured ham could almost have been served in a Japanese restaurant as sashimi. It was raw, sushi-grade tuna and it was deliciouis. With my first bite I thought that the red bell pepper was too overpowering, but as I continued I changed my mind. It worked with the raw tuna and gave it more dimensions. I really didn’t notice the dry cured ham very much.

The Truffled langoustine ravioli with steamed green cabbage was our first lobster dish of the night and it was really, really good. The delicate lobster flavor matched well with the sauce. Normally I’m leery of cooked cabbage of any kind because it can smell like garbage, but this steamed green cabbage tasted nice. It was a good accompaniment to the ravioli.

Our first real soup of the night was the Light lettuce cream on top of a delicate sweet onion custard. It had a variety of subtle flavors and was one of the best soups I’ve ever had.

You’d think that Cannelloni of scallops and zucchini, parmesan emulsion would have noodles of some kind, but you’d be wrong. Raw (or possibly barely cooked) scallop slices made up the “noodles” in this cannelloni. If you need to get someone to eat zucchini, this is the way to do it.

I thought that the Brittany lobster, pissenlit coulis, capuchin leaves and sea urchin vinaigrette was actually one of the weaker dishes of the evening, although Janet disagrees with me. This was basically a lobster salad. The sea urchin was not overpowering at all, and if you hadn’t told me it was used, I probably wouldn’t have been able to identify it.

How many times can I say I loved the food here? Well, add another one. The Kobe beef bone marrow, spring vegetables was amazing. I’ve never had bone marrow before, and I’m sure this dish will ruin it for me any place else. This dish was flat out great.

Our second real soup of the evening (I’m not really counting the caviar from the second course, although I could) was the Medley of aromates in a mild spicy broth. The herb flavors in this soup were very strong and a nice contrast to some of the more delicate flavors we experienced earlier. I could see using the broth as a base then using other aromatic herbs besides what was used. I liked this one a lot.

The Pan-fried sea bass with a lemon grass foam and stewed baby leeks was good, but to be honest, I’ve had similar dishes at other gourmet restaurants so it didn’t really knock my socks off with originality or flavor. It was delicious, but not extraordinary.

The Amadai in a lily bulb broth was probably our least favorite of the evening. The fish flavor was pretty strong (which is fine) but neither of us cared for the crunchy skin.  The broth was very nice.

The Sautéed veal chop with natural jus and vegetable taglierinis flavored with pesto brought us back to amazing. The veal was tender, perfectly cooked, and had a wonderful flavor. By this point in the evening we were wondering if we would explode, but this is a dish you’ll always make room for.

The Sault wild oatmeal, gold leaf reminded us of a risotto. I liked both the texture and the flavor and I could have eaten more. This was the first time I’ve ever eaten gold.

Desserts were listed as Goyave and papaya granite, cream of cassis and orange macaroon and Poppy sorbet, carmelized popcorns, cachaca syrup but there seemed to be much more than that going on. I remember picking a vanilla ice cream as well. There was also a dessert cart that had a dozen or so different tidbits. I just had the waiter pile a variety of different things on the plate. Every dessert was delicious.

At the end of the meal they gave us a round of bread to have for breakfast. We polished that off on Saturday and Sunday, and it was a nice reminder of what we experienced.

If you go to Joel Robuchon at The Mansion in the MGM Grand, it will be one of the best meals of your life. It will also be the most expensive. And that makes sense when you consider that you might get a caviar dish, a kobe beef (the most expensive in the world) offering, two lobster dishes, and so on. I would love to go back some day, but the cost might be prohibitive. Joel Robuchon at The Mansion is a once in a lifetime experience, and I’m glad we went.

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We arrived in Las Vegas on Thursday and prepared for our gourmet meal at Joel Robuchon at The Mansion.  More on that later when I’ve had a chance to scan in the menu and write a separate review. I will say that it was one of the finest meals I’ve ever had, and it definitely was the most expensive.

Friday we grabbed brother Richard and headed out to Death Valley. On our last Death Valley excursion we didn’t hit the northern end of the park, so this time we started up there. People kept telling us that Scotty’s Castle was worth seeing but I wasn’t that impressed. But then, we avoided the official tour because we didn’t care to see some guide acting like it was 1930 something. I find those kinds of “period” tours very annoying.

After Scotty’s Castle we headed out to the volcanic crater. It was really impressive with the black ejecta surrounding the crater dome, and the deep volcanic crater. It was really windy at the top of the crater, but luckily nothing like hats blew off.

After we stopped for gas we hiked up a canyon (I think it’s Mosaic Canyon, or something like that). It was beautiful, and had some pieces of granite that would have made great counter tops. The canyon is full of interesting geology, and I’m tempted to take an intro geology class at one of the local universities to get a better idea about what I’ve seen.

Our next stop was the sand dunes. It seems like most impressions of deserts are end to end sand dunes, but that’s not the case for all deserts. In Death Valley a lot of the desert floor is gravel and hard-packed sand and soil. We walked a little way out in to the dune field, but didn’t go too far. For one thing, it gets tiring pretty quickly. For another, dunes are a lot further apart then they appear.

We also stopped at the Devil’s Cornfield, which is really a series of plants that look like mutated corn stalks that had been tied together.  It’s fascinating.

We continued our trip through Death Valley by dragging Rick to various places we’d been before like Devil’s Golf Course, Artist’s Palette, and so on. It ended up being a long day, and Rick’s dogs probably got fed a little later than they normally would. I don’t know how Rick enjoyed the excursion, but Janet and I enjoyed it immensely.

After we dropped of Rick so he could go home and feed Tahoe and Sierra, we headed for dinner at the burger place in Desert Passage. The burgers were good, my beer was fine, Janet’s Mai Tai was below average, and the onion rings were decent.

On Saturday Janet and I headed out to Red Rock park. Normally this is the kind of place we would enjoy, but it was so F’ing crowded, we hated it. The scenery was nice, but I’ve had an easier time finding parking in downtown San Francisco. Red Rock park was a zoo. We never went on any of the hikes we wanted to take simply because there were too many people.  In a word, we hated Red Rock.

We headed back to town and had lunch at the Mexican place in the Venetian. As usual the food was great. The service seemed to be a bit lacking this time, but the food made up for it. We ate so late that we just snacked on some crepes from the crepe place in Paris.

We spent the rest of Saturday and all day Sunday wandering around town, seeing the sites, and burning calories by walking around. Lunch was at Il Fornio in New York New York. The food was good – we each had pizza – but nothing super spectacular. Our waiter was nothing to write home about either.

Dinner for our last night in Vegas was at Les Artistes Steakhouse in Paris. The food was really good and the service excellent. The woman sitting at the next table bore a remarkable resemblance to Doris Roberts (Everybody Loves Raymond’s mom) but it wasn’t her.

Monday we flew home and tried to unwind. All in all, a great trip, but I couldn’t win at Blackjack this past week to save my life. That’s how it goes some times.

I’ve been a Dr. Who fan for years. Like many Americans, my “first” Doctor was Tom Baker. I met him at a science fiction convention in San Jose many years ago, and he’s a pleasant fellow, and really tall. Over the years I’ve seen a lot (maybe most) of the episodes featuring all of the various “Doctors.”

Last Saturday I was flipping through the DirecTV listings and saw that the Science Fiction channel was showing a two-hour Dr. Who movie staring a Doctor and an assistant I had never heard of. I immediately thought that maybe the Science Fiction channel was showing the new series out of Britain. I was right.

The first thing I noticed was that the music was essentially the same as it’s always been; it hasn’t changed in nearly 50 years. The second thing I noticed was that the TARDIS still makes the same sound as it always has. Again, no change in nearly 50 years. That’s a real positive in my book and hearing the TARDIS materialize after all these years sent chills down my spine.

The TARDIS has also returned to its tradition blue police box shape. I recall in one of the later episodes the chameleon circuit had been repaired, but it looks like it’s broken again. I’m glad. What was really funny was when the Doctor had to explain to his new assistant what a police box was, since they don’t exist anymore.

Other positives: I like the new Doctor and his assistant Rose. The new Doctor has a sense of humor, but that seems to be covering some deep psychological pain, like someone who has seen far too much bad in the universe. Rose is interesting and not just a cardboard cutout that needs to be rescued.

I didn’t like the changes to the interior of the TARDIS. I prefer the traditional bright white interior. But perhaps the disheveled look will be explained in a later episode. The Doctor did imply that Gallifrey was destroyed in a war, so maybe the TARDIS was damaged then.

As far as the movie, it wasn’t one. They took the pilot episode and the second show and showed them back to back. I liked the pilot episode a lot, although I didn’t care for the way the mannequins moved. Cheesy special effects were part of the show’s charm in the past, but I think they need to improve them for a generation used to CGI-type movies. The plot made up for the special effects, which has always been a strength of the show.

In the second episode the Doctor and Rose travel 5,000,000,000 years in to the future to watch the expanding sun devoir the Earth. I thought the plot in this show was a lot weaker, but there was some good background information provided, like the war against Gallifrey, and the Doctor being the only remaining Time Lord.

The new Dr. Who has a lot of positives going for it, and I will definitely watch it again.

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I guess I’m not shocked that I came out the same as Jim, but I would have thought I’d be something a bit more exotic:

You Are Samuel Adams

You’re fairly easy to please when it comes to beer - as long as it’s not too cheap. You tend to change favorite beers frequently, and you’re the type most likely to take a “beers of the world” tour. When you get drunk, you’re fearless. You lose all your inhibitions. You’re just as likely to party with a group of strangers as you are to wake up in a very foreign place.

I’ve seen two episodes of The Unit and I’m not that impressed. It’s like they don’t know what kind of show they want to be: soap opera, action show, or what. I’m not that enamored with some of the characters, either. The premise is okay, but the execution just isn’t working that well for me.

Last week’s CSI (the Las Vegas version) was the worst episode they’ve ever done. It was the one where one of the reality shows followed them around with a camera. There just wasn’t anything interesting about it. I hope that last week’s CSI was just an anomaly.

In contrast to CSI, last week’s Criminal Minds was one of the best shows ever. They really need to find a way to get the Apache cop as regular part of the show. He played a great character and had some good chemistry with the rest of the cast.

Normally good Numb3rs was disappointing last Friday. They had a chance to really skewer the frauds and swindlers known as psychics, and they did a piss-poor job of it. A Columbo episode from many years ago (I think it was called Columbo Loses His Head) did a far better job of exposing those clowns. I suspect that CBS toned down Numb3rs because they’ve got Medium in the lineup.

The Sunday Fox lineup of The Simpsons, The War at Home, and Family Guy continues to be strong.

The new season of South Park starts next week.  As Homer Simpson would say, “Whoo-hoo!”

Technorati Tags: television