A.Y.C.E. Buffet

LVA Review

This buffet was reviewed in the February 2018 LVA; some of the information contained in this review may no longer be accurate.

After trying the Palms’ A.Y.C.E. buffet for breakfast and lunch and doing several walk-throughs, our opinion that this is easily the best buffet value in town hasn’t changed. It’s a Top Ten deal, even at its retail pricing of $21.99 for dinner and Sunday brunch, $15.99 for lunch, and $12.99 for breakfast. But the real prices are $19.99/$13.99/$10.99, because you get a $2 discount for showing the lowest level Boarding Pass players card (President), even if you sign up for it on the way to the buffet. Show the next level card (Gold) or higher and it’s $17.99/$11.99/$8.99. Compare with Bellagio at $38.99/$27.99/$24.99 or Caesars Palace at $54.99/$39.99 (brunch) and you can see the huge price disparity. We’re not saying the Palms is as good for quality as those, or the other super-luxe super buffets, but it’s not that far off. Even M Resort takes a back seat at $24.99 for dinner and $16.99 for brunch, and you can’t even get into M until 11 am, whereas breakfast at the Palms begins at 8. 

Breakfast is an egg-fest, with multiple versions of Benedicts and scrambles, plus an omelet station. Many dishes are in small-plate format, like a miniature serving of hash & egg or cauliflower grits. And this is the first time we’ve ever seen shakshouka, an African dish made of eggs poached in a sauce of tomatoes, chili peppers, onions, and cumin that by itself is worth the price of admission. Other highlights are the frittatas and the potstickers—the latter being part of a small Asian selection that includes bao, egg foo young, miso soup, and cold ramen noodles—plus pancakes, waffles, blintzes, bagels, croissants, quiche, small salads (good breakfast potato salad), and fresh fruit.

Dinner is also small-plates dominated with an amazing selection: walnut shrimp, Moroccan lamb, Singapore noodles, General Tso chicken, Mongolian beef, kalbi, coq au vin, salmon, duck, turkey leg, stromboli, vegan stuffed peppers, lots of veggies (including the big roasted cauliflower at the carving station), and all sorts of salads and soups, featuring individual servings of French onion. Chocolate mousse cake is the main attraction in the big dessert selection. As is typical, lunch and dinner are similar, with a few upgrades for dinner, e.g., beef at the carving station.

The only negative is a noticeable lack of seafood. There’s some fish and individual shrimp cocktails and ceviche, but no lox, crab legs, oysters, etc. The exception is Sunday brunch, which serves lox (as well as siu mai, salt and pepper chicken wings, and a few more additions that we didn’t see during the week). We checked on Friday and found green mussels and clam chowder. It seems like a conscious decision to dial it back on the seafood and probably a good one, allowing the buffet to offer high-quality items in the other areas (kind of like managing a salary cap in sports). 

A whole lot of thought went into this buffet, which is only fitting, considering that Station Casinos started the big move up in buffet quality when it debuted the Feast at Palace Station 30 years ago.