Mian Sichuan Noodle is a small casual restaurant that specializes in serving Sichuan Noodles. They are located in the Las Vegas China Town in a two story strip mall next to the China Town Plaza.
This isn’t a fancy place.
The tables are set up with placemats that give you instructions on how to eat the food.
They start you off with sweetened mung bean water called soup that you drink after eating mouth numbing spicy food to cool you down.
We started out by sharing the Spicy Radish ($1.99) and a small bowl of complimentary sweet, sour slightly spicy cabbage was served almost instantly.
The radish is crunchy, interesting and also spicy. I’ve never tasted anything like this before. They transformed a radish into something completely different. It got me really excited to try Szechuan Cold Noodles!
My Szechuan Cold Noodles Arrives ($7.99).
I mix it up like I’m suppose to do. The noodles are silky, sturdy, smooth and long with nice chewy texture. The noodles are cooked to perfection. This dish too is not flavored like anything I ever had before. It has a slight sourness to it, some other flavors with slight amount sweetness. It is strange and unusual to me…….It’s not very spicy…..it’s actually almost not spicy….Maybe more like the cabbage. I am slightly disappointed because I was expecting fiery mouth numbing food.
My husband got Za Jiang with Peas (basically Pork Spicy Noodle $9.99).
This is a more detailed plate. I’m a little jealous and his plate is at least twice as spicy as mine. Although this plate is twice as spicy as mine it’s really only as spicy as the radishes. Spicy but not real spicy….like not even close to a jalapeño ……less than sweet/hot cherry peppers. (My husband asked for as spicy as you make)
Maybe the waiter thought he heard us say mild instead of spicy?
I haven’t found a website for Mian Sichuan Noodle but they are on Facebook.
That was my trip to Mian Sichuan Noodle in Las Vegas NV
Every THING is subject to change and your experience may or may not differ.
LOOK! It’s Elvis Crespo and Madonna…..Oh my! ……No it’s Elvis Costello and Blondie……..Only kidding… my bad! …………It’s Elvis Presley and Marilyn Monroe made out of FORKING JELLY BEANS! ………..Aren’t they great!
The It’Sugar Store sells so many silly things…….Some things are unique to the Las Vegas location.
Remember Bob Ross? I used to paint along with him and made “Happy Little Trees.” There is Bob Ross Energy Drinks and Happy Little Trees Mints.
Here’s one of my Bob Ross paint-a-longs with some happy trees.
There’s Candy Noodles and Candy Sushi.
WOW they look real…..Candy Tacos!
LOL Elvis PEZ-Ley Limited Edition Pez……lol!
Make a gummy wall out of gummy blocks made in China. Hope you don’t feel all blocked up after you eat them!
I never thought I’d come across pickle cotton candy……..
Frosted Donut Cotton Candy makes more sense…..I wonder if it really taste like a frosted donut?
They offered a bunch of unusual chocolates.
World’s best farter crossed out and made into father….lol
Hot salted Sriracha milk chocolate…ummmmmmm….???? might be tasty but not in pho……
On the left is marriage is sweeter the second time around….Great dessert for second weddings!
Second bar is the Mensch Bar. …..You’re as sweet as chocolate….This is a bar you hand out to someone more like Batman. Someone who is a person of integrity and honer.
Then there’s Rock’N Chocolate bar with popping candy….
They offer many gummy candies
A gummy breakfast with bacon, an egg and detailed buttered pancake. There are gummy donuts, gummy cupcakes, gummy burgers and even a gummy pickle.
What do you call a bear with no teeth?
A GUMMY BEAR! They got gummy bears in diabetic size and diabetic coma size.
They also milk chocolate cover the gummy bears and call them dingle bearies……..
The high fiber cereal Colon Blow and to the right are little yellow jars of Urine for a treat
Then they also offer Welcome to Sour then Sweet LAS VEGAS Nevada.
Those were some of the WEIRD Food, candy and snack I saw in Las Vegas at IT’Sugar.
Chica is a Latin Restaurant located in the Venetian Hotel Casino on the Las Vegas Strip. The restaurant is located just off the casino floor. The menu offers Chef Lorena Garcia’s spins on classic Latin Foods and flavors.
The atmosphere is on the dark side.
They have a ceviche bar in the middle of the restaurant and a rotisserie in the back. Our server suggested that we need about two plates a person so we ordered two appetizers and two dinners.
Both of our appetizers were brought out at once. We decided to start with a Peruvian Snapper Ceviche.
It was bright from citrus, spicy from chili, sweet from sweet potatoes and crunchy from Peruvian corn. It was served with crisp thin sliced plantains that were very tasty.
We almost got to the Trio of Picos we ordered…..At the time we were still in the middle of the ceviche and our dinners arrive.
We pushed our dinners to the side and tried the arepas because they were warm and fresh made. One was corn flavored, another was cilantro flavored, we had a beet root one and a purple corn arepa. We had the rest packed up but we didn’t get to eat it so this appetizer was just wasted.
It seemed like the waiter was trying to rush us out. I don’t know why because there were hardly any other customers at the time.
I had the Pacific Striped Bass. It came out with a crispy skin that turned soggy fast but the fish was tender and perfect. It rested over Peruvian Corn Succotash and a guajillo chili sauce and corn salsa that was delicious.
My husband had the Slow Roasted Suckling Pig Porchetta.
It sat in a pool of pork jus and was topped with spiced plantains, pickled onions and water crest. He enjoyed it very much. He said it was even better than the one he had last time here.
The manager did apologies to us for all our food coming out at mostly the same time. She did offer to re-make our dinners so we could enjoy the appetizers. I declined because I know what not all but what some cooks do to food when they have to re-make it. She also offered a complimentary dessert that I declined because I was full.
Last time I had the rotisserie chicken.
My husband had a different plating of the Porchetta.
All the food we tried was Worth a Fork!
I tell The Forking Truth and this is how it was.
Last time we received very good food and they treated us like VIPS here.
This time the food was still very good but the service was more like from a diner.
That was my trip to Chica in Las Vegas – Still very good food but service can be hit or miss.
www.ChicaLasVegas.com
Every thing is subject to change and your experience may or may not differ.
I recently went to an Indian Restaurant near me called Vaigai and I enjoyed a South Indian Beet Dish called Beet Poriyal. I never had beet poriyal before and didn’t know how to make it so I looked up a few recipes for it. I thought Dassana Amit’s recipe of www.VegRecipesofIndia.com sounded the most delicious of the recipes I found so I sort of followed along…but made just two changes. One I wanted another vegetable in it besides beets so I thought onion would be ok since the dish is savory. I didn’t have urad dal……so I looked it up and it was described as an Indian Lentil that is used for it’s earthy flavor so I substituted pink lentils but tripled the amount because I didn’t think the pink lentils would be as flavorful. Anyway it came out delicious…….This dish uses two hard to come by ingredients. One was called asafoetida. They sell it in tiny green boxes at Whole Foods and I bet you can find it at the Asiana Market. The other ingredient I happened to have was curry leaves…..I buy them and keep them in my freezer. I think if you leave out the asafetida out your dish it will NOT have the right flavor.
Ingredients for around 4 servings
2 Tablespoons coconut oil
1 lb beets – peeled – cubed
1/2 large sweet onion – cubed
1 hot pepper – (today I used a chili guero and it was just right) – chopped
12 curry leaves fine chopped (this herb is controversial and some people use it like bay leaves and remove when done….. I fine chopped because I felt the dish needed the flavor and the Indian Cook on Food Network chops and puts curry leaves in dishes so it’s ok!)
1 teaspoon black mustard seeds
1 Tablespoon lentils (or the real recipe calls for 1 teaspoon urad dal)
good pinch asafetida
salt to taste
1/3 cup water
4 Tablespoons grated coconut
Directions
Get a pot on medium heat with the coconut oil and the black mustard seeds. Heat till you hear the seeds popping and then add lentils, pepper and onion. Cook till onion is soft. Add curry leaves, asafetida, beets and water. Cover with foil and cook till beets are tender. Top with coconut. (add salt to taste)
Enjoy!
A special Thanks! to Dassana Amit of www.VegRecipesofIndia.com for sharing a delicious recipe!
******UPDATE NOW CLOSED FOR BUSINESS*****The Mesa Grill is celebrity chef Bobby Flay’s take on south west style cuisine. The restaurant is located at Caesar’s Palace Hotel/Casino on the Las Vegas strip in Nevada. The restaurant has pops of bright colors everywhere and lots of tequila bottles on the wall.
We came for an upscale lunch and they started us off with the most delicious bread basket.
Jalapeño bread, raisin bread, corn chile muffins………these are really delicious!
For my lunch I had the Ancho Chile Honey Glazed Salmon over spinach with black bean sauce, tomatillo and jalapeño crema. ($25.00 subject to change)
The salmon is a generous size and is tender and reasonably fresh tasting. It’s cooked to around medium. The sauces are all delicious and don’t miss that little dot of creama…..WOW it’s far more powerful than it looks…..It doesn’t look like much but it’s delicious and very spicy. It’s a bomb that kicks everything up.
My husband tried the Grilled Mahi Mahi with green chile rice, yellow pepper mole and pineapple salsa. ($25.00 subject to change)
This one is also delicious. The actual fish is milder but all the south west flavors are different and stronger here. They but have great flavors but for me the buttery salmon meat wins over the flaky Mahi Mahi.
Everything was so great that I saved room for dessert and we shared the Banana Cream Pie.
It’s a thin crisp of praline hazelnut brittle over sliced bananas and cream. To me it’s not bad but I would have enjoyed not saving room for dessert and eating more of the bread instead. Incase you didn’t hear…..The bread was just as good as the entrees.
***UPDATE NOW CLOSED FOR BUSINESS ****
I’d say the Mesa Grill was Worth a Fork!
Worth a Fork!
www.MesaGrill.com
Everything is subject to change and your experience may or may not differ.
The Creek Patio Grill is located in Cave Creek Arizona. This is a casual full service American Neighborhood-Type Restaurant. They offer TWO patios (one patio is dog friendly) and indoor seating with personality.
The dog friendly patioThis patio entrance is from the inside of the restaurant
The middle of the restaurant has seating around a pizza oven.
There’s curved bench seating that circles the pizza oven and bar seating is located behind the pizza oven.
There are multiple dining areas and levels. (not pictured)
Glowing rock decor
My husband started with a cup of chili.
It was meaty with lots of beans and a generous amount of cheese. My husband said It was a little spicy and could taste cinnamon in it.
I had the walleye.
It wasn’t the meatiest walleye but then again this whole dinner only cost $21.00. The last time I came across walleye at AJ’s Fine Foods if I’m not mistaking the walleye was going for $40.00 a pound. This isn’t the same but was prepared reasonably well. It was covered in a lemony bur blanc sauce. Blistered tomatoes, fresh sweet basil and rice pilaf completed the plate.
My husband had the shrimp Alexander.
The grilled lemon elevated the dish. My husband thought the dish was good but could have been seasoned a little more for his taste.
The menu that The Creek Patio Grill offers is large and has a lot of variety. They offer many appetizers such as multiple sliders, kung pao chicken, burgers, sandwiches, pizzas and entrees.
That was today’s trip to The Creek Patio Grill in Cave Creek. It’s a nice neighborhood type restaurant. You visit it if you are in the neighborhood and not from across town.
www.TheCreekPatioGrill.com
Everything is subject to change and your experience may or may not differ.
According to the Nashville Hot Chicken Coalition ( www.Hot-Chicken.com ) – Nashville Hot Chicken is only Authentic and is a specialty of Nashville Tennessee. Only 6 restaurants are certified to be authentic Nashville Hot Chicken. They are Prince’s Hot Chicken Shack, Bolton’s Spicy Chicken and Fish, Pepper Fire Hot Chicken, Hattie B’s Hot Chicken, 400 Degrees and Deezies in Murfreesboro.
Nashville Hot Chicken is marinated, floured and fried. It needs to be sauced either before or after flouring or breading with what they call a dry sauce or paste (wet sauces are NOT Nashville hot chicken). Nashville hot chicken is HOT because the paste is suppose to be 1/3 fat and 2/3 cayenne pepper that gets cooked and reduced till thick. A few other seasonings may be added. Nashville hot chicken is also about flavor. It should be flavorful as much as hot. Authentic places will serve the chicken with dill pickles and white bread to catch up the juices nd flavor.
Hattie B’s in Las Vegas is located in the Cosmopolitan Hotel Casino on the Las Vegas Strip in a food court area. You order at the register and you pick up your platter at the end of the counter when it’s ready.
I ordered a small dark HOT with pimento macaroni and cheese and cole slaw. I ordered HOT because that is the same I had from the Nashville location.
This Las Vegas chicken lacks the cayenne aroma that the Nashville one had. I take a bite. The chicken is tasty and moist but doesn’t start you off with a sting like the Nashville one did. This one is also sweeter. This one is much milder……I thought it seemed greasier…..I thought it had even less crunch to it…….It’s tasty and is GOOD chicken but it’s not the same.
My husband got the same platter and a side of the hottest chicken strips they offer called, Shut The Cluck Up. I taste one.
This chicken is dry and it’s not stingingly hot either…….It’s not mild but it’s not like what came from Nashville….Even the Shut The Cluck Up isn’t as hot or delicious as Hot from Hattie B’s in Nashville.
Here are some pictures from Nashville.
The Hattie B’s in Las Vegas is Worth a Try! but to me doesn’t seem the same as from Nashville. Could be an off day????
www.HattieB.com
www.CosmopolitianLasVegas.com
Every FORKING Thing is subject to change and your experience may or may not differ.
True Food Kitchen is a full service casual restaurant located in Phoenix at the Biltmore Fashion Plaza in Arizona. They have another location in Scottsdale Arizona and around forty locations in the United States with the largest amounts of restaurants in California and Texas. The foods offered at True Food are based on the science to maintain your best health by choosing foods that don’t contribute to chronic inflammation by celebrity doctor Dr. Weil. He is famous for his alternative medicine. True Food Kitchen offers vegetarian, vegan, gluten free and they are happy to customize meals for you. A few locations of True Food Kitchen also offer healthful yoga brunches.
The Phoenix location of True Food Kitchen offers a foliage accented front patio.
A side patio.
Indoor is bright, woody and accented with green. There are large modern light fixtures. They offer seating at traditional tables, bar seating, half bench tables –
and by food preparation tables. The restaurant is busy and noisy. Music also fills the air.
Today I tried the Limited Summer Red Fish with sweet corn, edamame, onion, scallion, achiote and cilantro. (480 calories, gluten free and $26.00)
The red fish is very soft and moist and seasoned in a delicious way with achiote and other spices. The corn just might be the most delicious corn I ever had in a restaurant. It’s like you bought it from a farm and just grilled it. The corn is so sweet and so flavorful. Everything they mixed into it is delicious….I mean it really delicious!!!!! I liked that it seemed like the perfect amount of food too and it’s really rare that a 480 calorie plate is so satisfying.
My husband tried the Limited Summer Spinach and Mushroom Pizza. (970 calories vegetarian and $15.00)
This pizza was made with mushrooms, organic spinach, garlic, onions, lemon almond ricotta and seasoned with Aleppo pepper. The mushrooms are very flavorful but the spinach is just wilted. The cheese has a really light but grainy texture. My husband is slightly grumpy now and scraps off the lemon almond ricotta cheese that he mistook for regular ricotta with added lemon and almond. I told him to leave a small amount of the cheese to use as glue to hold some of the delicious corn to help remedy the taste and the corn is so good it makes the pizza delicious. He said, FORK some more corn over.”
I thought our server was trained particularly well. She had a great attitude, was helpful about the food, checked on us at the perfect time, offered desert and when I declined she dropped the check. That is perfect service.
I thought the healthy Summer Special of Redfish with the Corn Mixture was Worth a Fork!
www.TrueFoodKitchen.com
That was my trip to True Food Kitchen in Phoenix.
Everything is subject to change and your experience may or may not differ.
Eataly is an Italian Food Court, Wine and Gastronomic Marketplace. They sell a variety of pastas, pesto, sauces, rice, grains, crackers, canned tomatoes, vinegar, olive oil, salt, spices, olives, sweets and coffee.
They also offer complimentary daily tastings.
They offer a world of Italian foods and wines to try.
You might want to start with some street foods.
They offer all kinds of sandwiches, fried snacks, chicken and more!
There’s Roman Style Pizza.
There’s focaccia and pizza by the slice.
There’s plenty of fresh baked breads too.
If you want fish they will make you a fish.
They’ll make you pasta.
They assorted meats and cheeses.
There are candies, chocolates, pastries, cakes and other sweets.
But all you really need is Gelato.
That was my trip to Eataly Las Vegas NV.
www.Eataly.com
Everything is subject to change and your experience may or may not differ.
My first stop was Hattie B’s for Hot Chicken in the Cosmopolitan on the Las Vegas Strip.
Hattie B’s is located in the new food court…….
It’s tasty but it’s not the same as what I tried from the Nashville location………..It doesn’t sting you when you bite it……..It’s like they cooled it down and sweetened it up for the masses. Or maybe it’s just an off batch? I don’t know?
Our next stop was Eataly.
It’s an Italian Food Court with wine and more food to purchase.
We tried fish.
We tried pasta.
We came back another day and tried more pasta.
Finished up with gelato.
Some things were better than other things and we purchased some things to try latter.
The next day we went to China Town and tried Mian Sichuan Noodle.
This is suppose to be a very authentic Sichuan Noodle Restaurant. It’s not a fancy place.
But where else have you been that offers placemats with instructions on how to eat the food?
Before we order they start us off with sweetened Mung Bean Soup. It is used to cool you down from fiery mouth numbing food.
Here we started with Spicy Radishes and a sweet and sour cabbage is served as a palette cleanser. The Spicy Radishes were indeed spicy but not like water boiled spicy……That means you didn’t need a fire hydrant. They were unlike anything I ever tasted before…….with an unusual crunchy texture. I might not have known that they were radishes because I could no longer taste radish in them.
We had-
Sichuan cold spicy noodles
and
Spicy Sichuan Pork Noodles called Za Jiang. Tune in and you can read that story soon.
Our next destination was Chica in the Venetian.
It’s a Latin Restaurant of chef Lorena Garcia’s takes of Latin cuisine.
We tried spicy Peruvian ceviche.
and dinners of pacific striped sea bass
and porchetta.
We stopped by Gordon Ramsay Burger. I asked about the beef the last time I was here and they told me that they ground the beef in a main kitchen that is in the Paris Hotel/Casino.
They changed the menu since my last visit and that amazing Tandoori Chicken sandwich is no longer available……so I ordered something else. I thought an interesting choice might be the Fish and Crisps Burger because This is the fourth Gordon Ramsay Fried Fish option that I know of in Las Vegas. They all differ slightly and they all are priced differently.
The a crisp beer batter lightly coated a thick big piece of cod and it was drowning in about a 1/4 cup of yuzu-dill mayo that got topped with salt and vinegar potato crisps on a big fluffy toasted seeded bun…….
We shared plain fries called “Just Fries.”
My husband tried the Hog Burger that’s Mangalitsa Pork, Bacon, BBQ Pork, white cheddar, pickle, crisp onion and slaw burger. (he requested the slaw on the side)
Oddly this burger was dry? All the food we tried last time was amazing……Well the truth is that most busy restaurants run hot and cold……but I prefer hitting them on hot days.
Another day we went to Bobby Flay’s Mesa Grill in the Caesar’s Palace. It’s a full service South West Style restaurant that’s very bright and lively inside with lots of bottles of tequila on the wall.
They started us off with a really delicious basket of assorted breads. (save room and eat the bread……the bread is worth eating)
For my main I had the Ancho Honey Glazed Salmon with black bean sauce, tomatillo and jalapeño crema over spinach (lunch $25.00 subject to change).
Gosh! It was delicious and flavorful. The salmon too! Not too spicy and not too sweet….just really good flavors!
My husband got the Grilled Mahi Mahi with green chile rice, yellow pepper mole and pineapple salsa (lunch $25.00 subject to change)
This one is delicious too! The flavors are different and stronger…..still south west. We both like the actual salmon more. I like the taste of both but my husband prefers the stronger flavors in this dish.
We go on to try the Deep Dish Banana Cream Pie.
It’s a thin praline hazelnut brittle with cream and fresh sliced bananas……..It’s ok to me. I really enjoyed the bread more and would have eaten more bread and skipped dessert…..We both really enjoyed the entrees and the bread basket at the Mesa Grill.
Then we got to try multi award winning and James Beard award winning chef Micheal Symon’s new bbq restaurant called Mabel’s in the Palm’s Hotel/Casino near the Las Vegas Strip.
We shared a big pan of Texas Style Brisket, Memphis dry rubbed Turkey breast, horseradish beets and macaroni and cheese.
Some things were great and some things weren’t as great………The pickles were DYN-NO-MITE! Like a crazy stinking great bread and butter pickle but better…..actually everything pickled was super crazy great! The turkey today had really terrific flavor but was served to us on the dry side today. The Texas style brisket might have been better at lunch time…..but when I got it the brisket was sort of dry and lacked much flavor but benefited from the house made sauces. The horseradish beets were pretty darn good! Macaroni and cheese didn’t have much flavor on my visit. I think they thinned down the sauce because our cup had lots of a milky liquid in the bottom.
The Splurge Night
L’ATELIER by Joel Robuchon
L’ATELIER by Joel Robuchon is located in the MGM Casino/Hotel on the Las Vegas Strip. This is a high end exhibition tapas restaurant by the late most stared chef in the world, also called chef of the century Joel Robuchon.
They made some menu changes since my last visit and the three course special ($85.00 subject to change) is only offered as an early bird now from 5pm-6pm.
You get a bread basket of the most delicious baked breads and French Butter.
You get an Amuse Bouche…that for the past several years has been a foie gras shooter with parmesan foam. If you ask you will get some sort of vegetarian Amuse Bouche.
My first course was an Eggplant – Avocado Fondant with pixie sized turmeric croutons.
My husband got polenta with egg and ham….(well not just any ham…..it was that ham that was kissed by Jesus…..has black feet ……eats nothing but acorns…….and cost like $25 or $30 a Forking ounce)
For my main I had Halibut Flakes in Lemongrass foam with Robuchon Potatoes.
My husband said he had the best short rib that he has ever tasted.
We both had the tarts – Les Tartes for dessert because there is a strong possibility that this dessert plate might be the very best most detailed dessert plate in the WHOLE FORKING COUNTRY.
It’s beyond knocking it out of the park……It’s more like knocking it out of the galaxy!
They surprised us with these FORKING INSANELY Crazy Great Amazing praline madeleines.
The master is gone but the magic remains.
That was a little taste of where the Fork I’ve been…….Las Vegas
Everything is subject to change and your experience may or may not differ.
