Having a chef for a brother-in-law, along with my own restaurant experience, has piqued my interest in food-related shows. One might argue that Gordon Ramsay's shows are more reality-t.v. than food shows, but if you have experience in the business you can look past the "show" and enjoy the actual cooking part. Of course we don't tune out the reality side completely, that is part of the fun. And we like to make fun of the Cupcake Wars contestants who bake with their long hair flying all over the place. As careful as I am cooking at home, hair pulled back and bobby-pinned in place, once in awhile my poor husband (for some reason it's always him) finds a hair in something. So I gotta ask, how many times do the poor judges find some of that flying hair in their cupcakes?
Back to Gordon Ramsay.
We live about 3.5 hours from his NYC restaurants but we had to travel to Las Vegas to sample some of the multiple Michelin-starred chef's offerings. Not because we never go to NYC, it's just never on the schedule to make a side trip when we're there. To be honest, we didn't know that Gordon Ramsay even had a restaurant in Vegas. We'd been there last November but there had been no inkling that one was coming, and we'd even stayed at the Paris where the restaurant is located.
Gordon Ramsay Steak opened about a month ago, and the Paris Vegas Arch is still adorned with the proclamation.
We didn't know at the time of discovery how long the restaurant had been open. We only knew that we wanted to eat there. On day two of our eight day trip we stopped by the hostess desk to see if we could get a reservation for that night. We were dressed for a hot day of hiking the Vegas streets, but we'd planned on getting gussied up for dinner. The average temp while we were there was about 101 degrees, so shorts and tanks were the typical attire during the day. We had some plans and wanted a late reservation so we had time to shower and change.
(On a side note, the winner of the current season of Hell's Kitchen will become the head chef at Gordon Ramsay Steak. He or she will be working under the current executive chef Kevin Hee.)
Two young ladies were stationed at the desk, dressed in the typical Vegas-restaurant-hostess attire (short/skimpy/see-through). One of them asked if she could help us, and we inquired about a reservation for later that evening. She looked us up and down and said that they were fully booked, but she would go and check for us. She turned and walked down the long chunnel-like entry way. We waited but she never returned.
In the meantime the other hostess was answering a phone call. The caller had theatre tickets that night and wanted to ensure they would make the show on time. The hostess cheerily reassured them that they would but the caller did not seem to be reassured as she responded equally cheerily that she could move their reservation up to 5 p.m. for them. That seemed to satisfy the caller as she said "See you soon!" in the same cheery voice and hung up.
Then she noticed us, still standing there, waiting for the other hostess to return. I swear she had a sniff of English butler distaste in her voice as she asked if she could help us. We replied that we were waiting for the other girl to come back to let us know if they had room for us that night. She immediately stated that they were fully booked that night and the next. Full stop. Attention went back to the desk in front of her.
We stood there awkwardly for a minute, feeling as if we had dared to beg for scraps from the Queen's table, then my bolder side piped up. "We're here until next week, do you have anything at the beginning of next week?"
She didn't roll her eyes but she didn't have to. Her body language said it all. She finally announced that she could fit us in next Tuesday at 6 p.m. We said thanks, gave our name, and walked away, feeling a little bit looked down upon by the I'm-think-I'm-better-than-you-because-I-am-a-hostess-for-Gordon-Ramsay-and-you-don't-look-like-you-can-afford-to-eat-his-food barely out of high school hostess. The rest of my bolder side came back. I made a beeline for the concierge desk, husband in tow.
The concierge cheerfully made us a reservation for 10:15 p.m. that night, right about the time we wanted. And she didn't give us one single judging look.
Being a good citizen I returned to the hostess desk to cancel our Tuesday reservation. The snobby girls had been replaced by a gentleman and an older hostess who was very nice and cancelled for us. I did tell her that we'd be coming in tonight instead. As we walked away we wondered if we'd made a bad decision and the initial treatment was a precursor of a bad evening. We decided to take our chances. Chef Ramsay may be known for his four-letter words and tasty food, but we hoped the young hostesses were not typical of the dining experience at one of his restaurants.
We were gussied up early and decided to take a chance on getting seated early. If we had to wait we had spare cash for one of the numerous slot machines guarding the entrance to the restaurant. As it turned out we arrived almost half an hour early, and wonder of wonders, they had a table for us. We walked through the chunnel entrance past the bar and looked out into an expansive room with two levels of seating. As luck would have it our table was on the second level against the rail which allowed us to look out over the entire restaurant.
The high ceiling was adorned with a large British Union Jack flag and a neat orange neon sculpture that was designed by Andrey Berezowsky, a of SWON Design. The space was full of happy chatting diners and all kinds of wait staff, some of which were wearing a modern train-conductor type uniform. They appeared to be the 'main' waiters. And the uniform was pretty cool, complete with watch chain. (See here for more about the uniforms. And yes, the two uppity young ladies aspiring to be hostesses are in the very first photo. The professional and polite hostess we encountered on our second visit to the podium is the only one I'll point out. She is second from right.) We were impressed when our waiter greeted us by name. No, he wasn't psychic, we gave our names when we made our reservation.
So far so good. We had one awkward moment to get through, not because it was a Gordon Ramsay restaurant but because we don't drink. We have this awkward moment at every higher-end place we visit. (We have yet to figure out how to handle this in higher-end places without feeling awkward but some day we will.) In spite of being teetotalers we found the wine list very interesting. It was presented on an iPad with SmartCellar technology. Being geeks ourselves we thought this was way cool. You could do a menu search, there was a 'my selections' tab, and you could sort by name, price, grape, vintage or region.
The regular menu was on paper. My husband's menu had oily fingerprints all over the cover, a bit unexpected in such a posh place. The other negative was the music. It was so loud we could barely hear our waiter. The ambiance was still good though, it reminded us of our favorite New Orleans restaurant Domenica. (If you ever get a chance to eat there leave room for dessert. The Gianduja Budino - chocolate & hazelnut pudding with candied hazelnuts - is amazing!)
As we studied the menu a selection of breads was delivered to our table. They were very good, and my husband especially enjoyed the ones that looked like cinnamon buns but were swirled with a mushroom filling and a pancetta filling.
While we were waiting to order our appetizers we watched a display of raw beef (cuts of meat served by RGS) go by. Hmm, we thought, interesting. When it was our turn we were impressed with the display and the waiter's knowledge and description of each cut, although to be brutally honest I was a bit turned off by it. Mainly because the meat was beginning to smell a little and it was inches from my face. We figured it was because it was the end of the evening and it had been sitting out for awhile. I have a pretty good sense of smell so maybe other people didn't notice. And if you are a meat lover you probably wouldn't care.
We each chose an appetizer, but first I had a question for our waiter. I love onion soup. I have it everywhere I see it on the menu. Some are awesome (like at Mon Ami Gabi, also in the Paris), some taste like dish water. This version was made with Boddington’s Pub Ale, caramelized onion broth, and Welsh rarebit. As I do not eat meat I asked the waiter what Welsh rarebit was just in case it was meat (hey, rarebit could have been some fancy type of rabbit for all I knew) but he didn't know for sure. My husband looked it up on his phone. I was good to go. And although I don't drink, I have no issue with alcohol used in cooking To his credit the waiter apologized when he returned. He said that there was a lot to learn about the menu and he sometimes forgot things. I can sympathize so it was no issue. My husband ordered the American Kobe beef sliders.
The appetizers arrived fairly quickly. We were anxious to have our first taste of Chef's Ramsay's culinary skills. We were a teensy bit disappointed. While the consistency and cheese and bread croutons were excellent, the soup had a harsh taste that did not appeal to me. I expect that it was because of the ale, something I've never tasted. I won't give it bad marks on that basis because other people might not have a problem with that. The sliders were good, especially the pickled topping, although a little undercooked for my husband's taste.
While we waited for our dinners we were entertained by the conversation of the table across from us. It was two older couples and a young couple. The male half of the young couple was discussing his future. He stated that he was not going to go to grad school because he was pretty sure he could get ahead through nepotism. Okay.
We were saved from additional words of career wisdom by the arrival of our entrees. Well, not exactly entrees on both sides. As the restaurant is a steakhouse my options were limited so I chose sides as my meal. The Loaded Baked Potato with smoked gouda béchamel, sour cream, bacon, and chives was humungous. And totally awesome. I ate every bite. I also ordered the Colcannon, potato-cabbage croquettes served over red wine braised cabbage. This was something I probably never would have ordered, but for some reason it just came out of my mouth when I spoke. It must have been a spirit guide directing me to the perfect dish. It was out of this world. I begged my husband to go back every day until we left for home so I could have it again but he gently reminded me that we had a full slate of restaurants to visit.
We took some pictures with my husband's phone, not the best quality but hopefully you'll get the idea.
My husband ordered the Beef Short Rib, a red wine braised short rib served with potato puree and wild mushrooms. His eyes were crossing with delight as he ate. Enough said.
Having dined in fairly expensive restaurants numerous times we expected to still be hungry when we finished. Not so. We were stuffed and happy. No room for dessert. Guess we'll have to go back next trip.
Our waiter was very good. The only glitch was the Welsh rarebit. He even shared with us the trepidation among the staff that the winner of Hell's Kitchen would be taking over from Chef Kevin Hee because they all liked him very much. He said that they were relieved when they were told the winner was not. He also shared with us that Chef Ramsay was expected any day for a visit. As we are big fans with a Chef relative we were excited to hear the news. On our way out we had checked out the selection of GR cookbooks as a potential present for the Chef relative and we decided to see if we could get one autographed for him.
So the next day we went back to GRS and the same nice (and professional) hostess was working. No sign of the uppity youngsters. We explained our mission and she graciously invited us to go in and take our chances. We smiled at each other, knowing that it meant Chef Ramsay was definitely on site. We sat at the bar and scoped out the restaurant, ordering sodas and explaining our mission to the bartender. He helped us pick out a cookbook and we waited at the bar for our opportunity.
And then he appeared, walking through the open kitchen, head and shoulders above most of the kitchen staff. He really was tall! We were excited, temporarily happy with just being in the same room as Chef Ramsay. But the mission was only temporarily derailed. We watched as he made his way towards us, and the bartender gently nudged me. I took the hint, cookbook clutched in trembling hands, and humbly approached Chef Ramsay. On the way I passed a familiar face. It was Chef Andi from Hell's Kitchen! I blurted out, "I know you!" and she smiled and nodded. Okay, not my best moment but she really rocks and it was cool to see her in person. I regained my composure and approached Chef Ramsay. I might have been shaking in my sandals a bit. I do watch Hell's Kitchen, remember.
Even though I interrupted (very politely) his conversation, he was totally nice. I mean, totally. Sweet, gracious, wow, what a nice guy. He was interested to hear about our Chef relative, and happily autographed the cookbook for our Chef relative. He was also very happy that we enjoyed our meal the night before. And when he learned that we were from a town close to where one of the new hotel-rescue show episodes was filmed, he passed along some thoughts about it that I will not share as the show has not aired yet. Don't laugh, but we had toyed with the idea of inviting him to our wedding because we were such big admirers but in the end we didn't because, well, you know why. Of course I blurted that out and he said, "Oh you should have, I love weddings." Maybe next time then. I introduced him to my husband and he posed for a picture with him. (I hate having my picture taken unless forced by family. The only exception so far has been Elton John. Twice.)
As we sat at the bar finishing our sodas we could not stop grinning. We'd met Chef Ramsay. And he is really really nice. As we sat Chef Andi walked past again and grinned at me. (Of course I grinned back.) Hopefully it was out of friendliness and not hey look at the star struck idiots.
Most of the pictures I took did not come out very well, so I will direct you to the Pulse of Las Vegas blog. They have some awesome shots of the place.
On our way out we passed Chef Ramsay and said thanks. He gave me a kiss on the cheek and told my husband to stay romantic.
I'll make sure he listens to Chef Ramsay's words of advice.
And P.S. to the judgmental young hostesses. Don't judge a book by its cover. I love to read so I should know.
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