Your New Las Vegas Dining Guide: The Best Places to Eat Right Now

When was the last time you were in Las Vegas? I visit about half a dozen times a year. When people find out this about me, they assume that I like to gamble or go to clubs. I'm not a big fan of either of them.

I go to the Pizza Expo (yes, there's an entire convention dedicated to all things pizza) and the Winter Fancy Food Show (an exhibition of food products from around the world). I'm going to stay in a hotel room that's fancier than my dorm, enjoy a trip to a spa, and get dressed and eat, eat, eat again. I would like to see a show at the Sphere.

There are outposts of restaurants from around the world and a high density of celebrity-endorsed spots. That doesn't necessarily make them good, but it usually makes for an eventful and entertaining evening. Some are better than others. Some depend heavily on the celebrity of the celebrity involved.

My favorite celebrity restaurant in Las Vegas right now isn't really a restaurant. It's a truck on the side of a walkway that leads to the casino at the Park MGM hotel. And it's something that one of the celebrities involved, Jon Favreau, has wanted to do for almost a decade.

Favreau and Roy Choi worked together on the 2014 film “Chef.” The two became friends as Choi consulted on the film and taught Favreau how to cook for his role as chef Carl Casper. They started doing pop-ups together, selling the Cuban sandwiches featured in the film to promote the film.

“I always wished we could do something more permanent,” Favreau says during a recent call with him and Choi. “I would tell Roy, 'Hey, we should open a restaurant.'”

“It took so long to open something because you know the restaurant business, and especially the celebrity restaurant never ends up being how the actors or producers want because they end up being brought into reality with the daily routine of a restaurant. ”says Choi. “Also, for me and Jon, the most important thing was our friendship.”

After Cubano's pop-up, Favreau was looking for spaces and hinted at opening a restaurant, but Choi refused. After 8 years, he stopped asking.

In 2018, Choi opened Best Friend, a restaurant that pays homage to his Kogi BBQ trucks and his distinctive Los Angeles style of Korean food, at the Park MGM hotel. He and Favreau continued to find ways to collaborate and work together. In 2019, Favreau and Choi launched “The Chef Show” on Netflix, a travel and cooking show in which the two cooked with various friends across the country. They filmed two seasons.

“I'm in Las Vegas like four times a month and people come to Best Friend and stop me and explain how much the Chef Show meant to them,” Choi says. He noticed that the show had a second life during the COVID shutdowns, and many streamed the series during quarantine.

“It melted my heart,” Choi says. “Over the years, it has happened hundreds of times. So when this opportunity came up I thought, let's do this for the fans.”

Favreau finally got his restaurant with Choi. The two opened Chef Truck at the hotel in November, with a replica of the food truck from the 2014 film, a short menu serving favorites from the film, and a small seating area nearby.

Choi says the midnight recipe is practically the same as what you see in the movie and the series. The base of the sandwich is mojo, the pork marinade that sings with fresh garlic and cilantro, mint and bright citrus. He uses it to marinate pork shoulder that's already brined with orange juice, vinegar, spiced rum, and a handful of other spices and aromatics.

Sliced ​​pork is layered on a homemade roll that's a cross between a soft French roll and what you'd find in a really good cake roll. Then add ham, Swiss cheese and pickles. It is spread with a torrent of green sauce, prepared with the remains of the mojo pureed with plenty of garlic and cilantro. The top of the bun receives a touch of yellow mustard and the sandwich is grilled in an excessive but adequate amount of butter until it is glistening and pressed to a fraction of its previous size.

The Chef Truck Cubano from The Chef Truck at Park MGM by Roy Choi and Jon Favreau.

(Audrey mom)

It offers the flavors of the holy trinity of Cuban, with ham, cheese and mustard at the forefront. The pickles and salsa zigzag through everything. It is crunchy, juicy, rich and satisfying as only an excellent sandwich can be.

The Chef Truck Cubano, a vegetarian sandwich, achieves the same crunch and umami with mojo, tofu, portobello mushrooms, and eggplant instead of the traditional pork and ham.

“It's the one I like the most right now,” Favreau says. “Asked [Choi] “To find a plant-based one that could stand up to the traditional sandwich, Roy went to the lab.”

Your food at the truck won't be light, but find space on your table for the ham and cheese croquettes. Bite-sized golden nuggets are filled with creamy mashed potatoes, bits of salty ham, and mozzarella cheese.

You place your order at the truck and then find a seat at a table. While you wait for your food, you can study a small diorama of the food truck from the movie and series.

“I've been working on immersive experiences and I have a lot of experience in Marvel, Disney and Star Wars visual effects, and there are techniques you can use that are really fun, like Pepper's Ghost and forced perspective,” Favreau says. “Having a little chef truck diorama that uses simple technology is a little surprise for people and adds to the magic.”

Although the truck has only been open for a month, there is already the possibility of more.

“I think now that we have the template, we can start thinking about how to adapt it and do more,” Choi says.

He and Favreau are also thinking about expanding the menu with more dishes inspired by some of the cities the two visited on “The Chef Show.”

But even if you've never heard of the movie or the series, don't know who Jon Favreau is, and have never had a Roy Choi taco, you'll enjoy these sandwiches.

The Fontainebleau Las Vegas

The interior of the Mother Wolf restaurant at the Fontainebleau Las Vegas.

(Eric Wolfinger)

When the doors opened for the private party celebrating the launch of Fontainebleau Las Vegas on Wednesday night, champagne was flowing under a gigantic chandelier, the casino was awash with tuxedos and evening gowns, and Keith Urban was serenading the guests as they entered the lobby.

Later that night, Paul Anka opened for Justin Timberlake at the hotel's BleauLive theater. To say he was glamorous doesn't seem to adequately capture the sheer extravagance and excess of the evening. It was the closest thing to Las Vegas I've experienced in all my years traveling to the Strip.

And with a strong selection of acclaimed chefs from around the world, it's already one of the most sought-after places to dine in the city. Evan Funke's Mother Wolf is as opulent as Hollywood, the negronis just as excellent, the fiori di zucca stuffed and fried to perfection and golden with dollops of caviar, and the rigatocini alla vaccinara just as al dente and fascinating.

Komodo, the hotel's Southeast Asian restaurant in Miami, offers a menu spanning dim sum, sushi and even Peking duck in a large, dimly lit, moody dining room with lush green velvet tables. The A-5 wagyu square I tried was ridiculously tender.

The Promenade, the hotel's version of a food hall, is home to bagel, sandwich, taco, pizza and muffin restaurants. Miami Slice's pizza slices were top notch. The temaki at Bar Ito, the sister sushi bar to the hotel's 12-seat omakase restaurant, Ito, included perfectly seasoned and cooked rice on crispy seaweed alongside lobster meat.

Cantina Contramar, a version of Gabriela Cámara's Contramar restaurant in Mexico City, will open soon. There is not one, but two grills. And there's a Cantonese restaurant called Chyna Club by Hakkasan founder Alan Yau. I could spend a week at the hotel and not experience it all, but I'd like to try it anyway.

Hotel Durango

The Summer House Apple Oatmeal Cookie at the Durango Casino and Resort in Las Vegas.

(Jenn Harris / Los Angeles Times)

Located about 15 minutes southwest of the Strip is Durango, a casino and resort that opened in early December. As with many new hotel openings, the signature dining option is a food hall. This one is called Eat Your Heart.

It's a spacious, well-lit corner of the casino filled with Los Angeles and Las Vegas favorites. From Los Angeles, there are outposts of Irv's Burgers, Prince Street Pizza and Uncle Paulie's Deli. From Orange County, there's Gene Villiatora's 'Ai Pono Café'. Shang Artisan Noodle from Las Vegas, Yu-Or-Mi Sushi and Nielsen's Frozen Custard are represented. And you'll also find Fiorella pasta bar from Philadelphia's Marc Vetri.

My favorite bite to eat during a recent visit to the hotel was at the cookie bar at Summer House, one of the property's full-service restaurants. The Southern California vibe-themed restaurant, originally from Chicago, has a swoon-worthy bakery display right next to the host's booth. Brown butter crispy rice delights share space with colossal cookies, brownies and blondies.

The Apple Oatmeal Cookie is everything a good cookie should be. It's chewy all over, crispy on the edges, and soft enough that you need to be careful when handling it so it doesn't break. It's filled with sweet, buttery oats and generously sprinkled with apple pieces. It's the apple pie and oatmeal cookie that I love the little boy I didn't know he needed.