Throwback Thursdays is a new feature I’m doing to highlight some of my past adventures which had been missed out on the blog. To start the ball rolling, we will feature some prolific restaurants which I had visited during my trip to Las Vegas in 2013. I was thrilled to visit chef Thomas Keller’s Bouchon in Las Vegas, located in the Venetian on the northern end of the Las Vegas strip.
Like many other self-resepecting foodies, I have long heard of chef Thomas Keller’s fame from his legendary restaurant, The French Laundry. Naturally, his restaurant was on the top of my list to visit amongst the many other celebrity restaurants when I visited Vegas.
I made the mistake of walking from the southern end of the strip from Mandalay Bay to the Venetian on the northern end. Luckily we made it there at 12:30, just 30mins shy of breakfast closing. My wife and I were warmly welcomed by the two beautiful hostess by the entrance, and brought to a quiet table.
There were still a handful of diners at that time.
The decor resembled a very classical French bistro, and didn’t showed the restaurant’s age at all; Spotlessly clean.
Service was attentive and very much on a higher level than the average service there in the States, which was already miles better than the service in China.
Unfortunately, signature mains were very limited on the breakfast menu, so I settled for the steak and eggs, while the wife chose the rainbow trout dish. Halfway through, I asked if I could have a serving of the legendary fries that Anthony Bourdain raved about. Thankfully, our server smiled, and obliged. The kitchen fried us up a mountain of the best french fries I’ve ever had in my life.
The steak and eggs was simple looking, with a cheap cut of steak, but mind you, every component was expertly done. The way to judge the level of competance of the kitchen in this dish, is simply by looking at the sunny side up eggs; Perfectly cooked through, yolk still wobbly, and not a single bit of charred crust anywhere.
The pan-roasted potatoes were flavourful and nicely charred. The steak was tender, and perfectly done to medium done-ness, with a delightful crust.
This had set, and still is the bar for steak and eggs for me.
The trout was smaller than I had expected, but it fit the wife’s appetite nicely. Just a tinge of fishiness in the meat because it was cooked simply without much aromatics to mask the fish’s flavour.
The cauliflower, croutons and butter sauce went nicely with the tender flesh of the fish.
The fries. Oh .. my .. goodness. The epitomy of french fries. I was skeptical when I ordered it, even though Anthony Bourdain mentioned they were very good, almost suggesting that they were better than the fries he served at his restaurant in New York.
The fries at Bouchon, are the best, french fries I’ve ever eaten to date, across the globe.
Lightly salted, every shoestring fry was consistent in texture and taste — a light solid crispy crust, and velvety, soft potato flesh inside. Every fry had a crunch when you bite into it, and then your tongue is welcome by warm buttery potato flesh that almost instantly melted in the mouth.
We nearly finished the entire mound. If I could score this, it would be 12 out of 10. I would walk from Mandalay Bay to the Venetian for these fries.
The coffee was sadly, de rigeur, but I liked the classical coffee cups.
It was a magnificent dining memory, which still lives vividly in my mind to this day. We spent the rest of the day energized and toured the northern end of the strip before embarking on another epic venue, which shall be the basis of next week’s Throwback Thursday.