Wynn Las Vegas – The Buffet: Breakfast Buffet was removed completely. Brunch Buffet is daily instead of only Mon-Thurs. It starts one hour earlier at 8 a.m. and the price increased from $46.99 to $54.99.
Buffet Update – December 2023
Category: Dining
Rosati’s Pizza
For several years, we’ve had an MRB offer for $25 off at Rosati’s Pizza. It’s an excellent deal, but not one we sought out. Rather, it was brought to us by Rosati’s owner, a long-time LVA member. Though grateful, over all this time, we never went out to try the place, for two reasons. First is the location—Rosati’s Pizza Centennial Hills is located at 8001 N. Durango Drive, which is quite a ways from the Strip. Second is we keep hearing good reports from those who’ve tried it, so we didn’t feel the need to check it out. This month we did.
Rosati’s is another good pizza joint with Chicago roots. The pizzas are round, but the slices are cut in squares. There’s a choice of crusts—crispy thin, double dough, and Chicago-style—but what really stands out are the toppings, with a big selection of meats (pepperoni, sausage, Italian beef, Canadian bacon, meatballs) and fresh veggies. Large specialty pies come in at about $30.
We can easily recommend this pizza, but we were even more impressed with some of the other items we sampled, including excellent hot wings ($10.95/6), breaded mushrooms ($9.95), and a meatball parmigiana sandwich ($13.55) that’s one of the best we’ve had in town. There are lots of seats and an outdoor patio. The kitchen is open10 am to midnight. This is a terrific play with the MRB deal.
There are nearly 200 Rosati’s restaurants in the U.S., but as you’d expect, the Las Vegas version figures to be a bit different. Along with being a good place to eat, Rosati’s Pizza Centennial is also a 24-hour bar. And a good one. The TVs are all tuned to sports and there are specials on food and drinks during football and Vegas Golden Knights games (try a Petrifier if you dare). UFC PPV events are shown for free (call for a reservation).
Join the players club and get a play-$20-get-$10 sign-up bonus. The best game is 6/5 Bonus Poker (96.87%), but when we were there, every quad got a wheel spin. That’s something we haven’t seen before; it raises the return percentage above 98%.
Peter Luger Steakhouse (Caesars Palace)
We’ve been waiting for this one. Anthony Curtis has eaten at the original 136-year-old Luger Brooklyn several times and rates it as one of his favorite steakhouses. Naturally, he’s been waiting breathlessly for the Las Vegas version to arrive at Caesars Palace. There was a long delay following the original announcement, but Peter Luger Las Vegas has arrived, opening its doors in late October.
Two components make Luger Brooklyn such a treat: the food, of course, but also the ambience. The Brooklyn restaurant has been operating since 1887. It’s a red-brick standalone building located at the base of the Williamsburg Bridge in an old neighborhood with a whole lot of, let’s call it, “grit.” Inside are separate dining areas upstairs and down and wooden bars and tables. It’s simple, but people are dressed up and the vibe is something special. Sorry, but there’s just no way Caesars Palace could have replicated that. Give them credit for trying, though. The former Rao’s space has wood floors and a cool center bar. It’s not Brooklyn, but it’s not really Vegas, either. It feels good.
As for the food, it’s right on the mark. Similar to New York, the menu is minimal—steaks and some famous appetizers and sides. You can also order lamb chops, fish, shellfish towers, and a few other for-Vegas additions, but you go to Luger for steaks. Big porterhouses, to be specific. They’re dry-aged, brined, and cooked in garlic butter, then served cut in Luger’s distinctive style to dole out in portions. Fantastic!
Most famous of the sides is the salad, which comprises simply beefsteak tomatoes and slices of sweet raw onion with Luger steak sauce on the side that you drizzle on top. It’s a must. Luger is also known for its German potatoes and the plate of thick-cut bacon slices. There’s a good bread basket to start things off, the service is top notch — a delicious experience. It’s also expensive.
First, a comparison with prices in NY show about a 5%-9% mark-up at Caesars. “Single steak,” as it reads on the menu, is $71.95, but most order in multiples: steak for two is $148.95, steak for three $215.95, and steak for four $285.95. The tomatoes & onions side is $17.95. The bacon (three slices) is $24.95 and German potatoes are $14.95. Our bill for three was $582, but we did it up with drinks, including a bottle of wine. Realistically, you’re looking at about $120 to $150 per person before tip, depending on the drinks. Or are you? It was just a single sampling, but our steak for three was almost twice as much as we could eat. Unless you want the take-out, basic strategy appears to be to order one down—e.g., three in a party orders steak for two for a $67 saving. Or maybe a party of two orders a single steak and you’re out easily for under a buck-fifty total.
Luger Lunch
Another cost-saving strategy is to go for lunch and its two less-expensive options: the Luger burger for $25 and a steak sandwich for $30. We went back, tried them both, and were less impressed. The burger is just that, a burger on a bun with a slice of onion. No lettuce. No tomato. Heck, not even mustard, ketchup, or salt and pepper (we had to ask). Good burger, mind you, but we wouldn’t call it $25 good. The steak sandwich, however, was a disappointment all around. The bill for both specials, one slice of bacon ($8.95) and the tomato-onion side came to $90 (with tax, before tip). Whoa. If you go for lunch, you can order all the dinner fare discussed above; we don’t recommend it for the specials.
Luger Math
Don’t try to beat ’em on a portion premium. Usually, buying more of an item lowers the per-unit cost, but that doesn’t apply here. Following is the per-person breakdown for the steak options.
- Single steak $71.95
- Steak for two $74.48 per person
- Steak for three $71.98 per person
- Steak for four $71.48 per person
You do better with a single steak than with two of the three multiple-person options, though maybe the presentation isn’t as cool.
Finally, unlike at the original Luger in Brooklyn, which is all cash, this one takes credit cards.
South Point Seafood Buffet
The Friday night seafood buffet at South Point is so popular, the first time we tried to get in, the line was two and a half hours long. That got our attention. We also know an LVA member who goes to this buffet every week. Yes, every single week. Could it be that good? How good could it be? Recently, the opening time was bumped up from 4 p.m. to 3 and we heard that the wait time was cut in half. So we determined to find out for ourselves.
Now we know. But first, about the line.
When we arrived at 3 p.m. on the nose, the line was back to the escalators. It moves forward around 50 feet to the front of the buffet and another maybe 20 feet beyond it, then wraps around and comes back the same 20 to the cash registers. We expected the line to move quickly when the buffet opened, but it didn’t; at least it wasn’t around the corner and all the way back to the race book (another hour at least) like it was the last time we checked. From the escalators, it took 20 minutes to get to the front of the buffet (under the sign), then another 30 to make the turn and get to the head of the line.
At a bit before 4 after a 55-minute wait, there were plenty of available tables when we got in.
Meanwhile, the back of the line had moved up a lot. At 4 p.m., the wait looked to be perhaps a half-hour (and we’ve heard from others that’s usually the case). The bottleneck at the 3 p.m. opening is over and tables are still available. We kept an eye on the line and around 4:10, the end was well on the near side of the cashier, maybe 20 minutes long.
Anyway, once seated, plated, and reseated, it was exactly an hour from end of the line to food, glorious food.
And the verdict on how good it is: OMG! What a buffet!
There’s no lobster and that was just fine with us; with the immensity of the seafood selection, we didn’t miss it at all. Check out this line-up of ocean delicacies: steamed cracked crab legs, cold Dungeness crab claws, cold cracked snow crab legs, three kinds of salmon, oysters Rockefeller, clams, peel-and-eat and fried shrimp and shrimp ceviche, cioppino, swai, tilapia, fried cod, black-bean calamari, and more, plus live-action stations of shrimp tacos and build-your-own pasta with red and white clam sauces, and Manhattan clam chowder, which we can’t remember ever seeing at a buffet.
A line inside is always 10 deep for the big crab legs and if you want to see gluttony, even for a buffet, watch as people empty entire steam-table trays of crab on as many plates as they can balance. Meanwhile, the Dungeness crab claws are there for the taking, no waiting, and are as good as we could’ve wanted.
But it’s not just the voracious crowds and variety of seafood that astounded us. Check out the rest of the choices: fruit and melons; Caesars, potato, BLT, caprese, jicama, chicken, and spinach salads and four soups; beef broccoli, pad Thai, barbecue pork, sweet and sour, Chinese vegetables, egg rolls, fried and steamed rice, etc. at the Asian station; pizza, calzones, sausage and peppers, chicken parmesan, and the pasta station for Italian; the usual Mexican; house-smoked garlic salmon, maple-glazed salmon, ribs, rotisserie chicken, and prime rib at the carvery; even a Mongolian grill with beef, chicken, and shrimp and all the toppings!
After so much variety and so many good things to try, we were loaded down and had room only for one return trip for seconds, when we usually go back three or four times. All we had any room for again were the smoked salmon (excellent with horseradish sauce) and the crab claws.
For dessert, an action station serves warm apple strudel, along with a half-dozen pies, cakes and cheesecakes, brownies, eclairs, crème puffs, cookies, soft serve with toppings, the perfect choices to top off the pigfest.
Oh, and did we mention you get two tickets? One ticket equals one drink (beer or wine) from the bar.
All that for $45.95 (plus tax and tip) with a club card, an insane value (especially considering that the marginal MGM Grand brunch buffet is only $9 less expensive).
On our way out at 5, the end of the line was all the way back to the escalators. By then, the buffet was completely full, people weren’t leaving, and when they did, it took some to clean the tables, so the wait was back to at least an hour.
We say the play is to come right at 4 p.m. and hope for the best. But however long you have to wait, this buffet is all that and more.
The Trip to Zippy’s
It’s no coincidence or accident that Zippy’s, the beloved 57-year-old restaurant chain with 22 locations on Oahu, Maui, and the Big Island, opened its first restaurant outside of Hawaii in Las Vegas, which is often called the “ninth island” for its popularity with island visitors and transplants. When it opened on October 10 at 10:10 a.m. (a long five years after the initial announcement) on Rainbow Blvd. just south of the Beltway, the pent-upness was so strong that management had to issue a set of rules for impatient patrons. We waited a month for the hoopla to die down to see what all the excitement is about; a few parking spaces were available in the main lot, indicating that things have quieted down since opening.
We can certainly see why islander tourists and transplants flock to Zippy’s — the aloha vibe, Hawaiian comfort food, and familiarity with the brand, named after the zip code, which had been recently introduced when the chain was launched in 1966. The 24/7 restaurant is known for its Hawaiian chili (the signature dish), fried chicken, oxtail soup, saimin, loco moco (white rice topped with hamburger, fried egg, and brown gravy), mahi sandwiches, and Zip Pac bentos (boxed lunch).
Frankly, we weren’t expecting much. We like the food in Hawaii, for its melting pot of Polynesian, Asian, and European origins and its focus on fresh local ingredients such as coconut, pineapple, seafood, and slow-cooked whole pig (kalua). But it doesn’t seem to transfer beyond the islands. And it didn’t at Zippy’s, at least for us.
We were disappointed to start by the unavailability of the loco moco and mahi sandwiches. We tried the signature chili, basically chili without any signature that we could find and the large bowl ($9) was more white rice than spicy beans. The $14.75 bento was, again, a lot of rice; the fried chicken was crispy and moist and the teriyaki beef was decent, but we’re not big fans of Spam and the hoki (breaded fish) was tasteless.
Zippy’s is also known for its “napples,” apple turnovers (the “n” is for the Zippy-brand Napoleon bakery, $3.99), and malasadas, plain round donuts rolled in sugar ($1.40). They were the perfect bland desserts for the nothing-special lunches.
Granted, Zippy’s says the menu has been purposely limited in order to iron out the kinks of the first location on the mainland, so we’ll watch to see if and when it changes for the better. Also, we can’t argue with the food-delivery system. A greeter outside the front door directs you to the correct line (right to eat in, left to take out; there’s also an eight-seat counter for quick dine-in). Both options are very fast and efficient.
For take-out, you order and pay at the cashier, then repair to the waiting area where a readerboard tracks the progress of your order. When it’s ready, the server checks your ID (good idea) and hands you your bag o’ food.
Our bill for the bento, chili, and baked goods came to $30.23, including tax. Definitely reasonable for the amount of food and another explanation why Zippy’s is so popular.
The Sundry — Latest Overpriced Food Hall
The Sundry is the brand new food hall at the unfinished Uncommons, Las Vegas’ latest lifestyle center located just off the 215 Beltway and directly across Durango Road from the Durango, Station’s hotel-casino in the southwest valley.
Like Famous Foods Street Eats at Resorts World and Proper Eats at Aria, your first time here presents something of a challenge. When you walk in the front door, the big signboard directs you to the hostess, who seats you.
Buffet Update – November 2023
Bellagio – The Buffet at Bellagio: The price for Friday Dinner went up $10. Making it the same price as Saturday Crab Leg Dinner at $79.99.
South Point – Garden Buffet: All buffet prices went up by $1. Breakfast is now $17.95, Lunch is now $20.95, Prime Rib & Champagne Brunch is now $29.95, and Prime Rib Dinner is now $29.95. The Seafood Dinner ft. Prime Rib Buffet stayed the same at $49.95 regular price, but the club members pay one dollar more than before at $45.95 now. The hours for the Seafood Dinner also changed, it is now one hour earlier at 3 p.m. to 9 p.m.
Backstage Deli —Ghost of Luxor Past
When Luxor first opened, the Backstage Deli was a full-scale restaurant with a kosher-style menu and we tried the pastrami, matzo ball soup, and latke. It was 30 years ago and we still remember it. It wasn’t New York caliber, but good enough for an Egyptian-themed casino that seemed to be making some kind of statement about the Passover story.
We certainly had no intention of ever revisiting the skeletal remains of that deli. But a day earlier, a Sunday, we’d eyeballed the Luxor and Excalibur brunch buffets and Luxor looked so good that we returned the next day to try it, only to find it closed (open Wed.-Sun.). Meanwhile, we were famished, so we really had no choice but to grab a quick lunch at the nearby Backstage.
A Burger and a Breakfast in a Bar
Not that we’re implying that kitchens in Las Vegas bars are better than kitchens in the bars of other cities, but they just might be. The key is factoring in price. Las Vegas bars have gambling machines, which allows them to comp drinks to gamblers. That dynamic also affects pricing on food, as a good dining deal attracts and reattracts customers who play the games. Two prime examples are the burger at Jackpot Bar and Grill and breakfast at Kopper Keg West. Note that both of these bars are known for their good kitchens and rank high on our list of places for best bar food in general.
Jackpot Burger, Jackpot Bar and Grill (4485 S. Jones)
Served around the clock, the Jackpot burger ($13.99) is one of our favorites in town. No, it’s not tricked out with bleu cheese crumbles or strips of bacon (although, those versions are available for the same price), it’s just an old-fashioned half-pounder with the mixin’s of fixin’s that belong on an old-fashioned half-pounder—tomato, lettuce, onion, and pickle. Jackpot’s owner confirms, “It’s a full half-pound, that’s for sure.” As such, it can be cooked to order better than most. It’s served with choice of fries or onion rings. The one negative is the bun has a hard time containing its cargo—tread lightly, or be prepared to finish with a fork. An interesting side note: When we first wrote about this burger in 2017, it was $7.77 and came with a beer.
If you go on Mon., Wed., or Friday, Jackpot runs a play-$500-get-$50 promo. Designated a Kansas City Chiefs bar, the TVs are always tuned to sports, maybe because manager and swing-shift bartender Susan usually has a 3- to 10-teamer in play. Be alert and you might spot one of the Runnin’ Rebels from the ’90 NCAA Championship basketball team; a few of them hang out here.
Breakfast Special, Kopper Keg West (2257. S. Rainbow)
A bit farther north and west, Kopper Keg West checks in with one of the best breakfast specials in town. It’s the standard two eggs, choice of meat, potatoes, and toast, but this one’s a cut above. Get it with the thick-cut bacon and breakfast potatoes that are prepped in-house, not cracked out of a frozen bag. The best part, going back to the gambling/bargain dynamic, is it’s just $6—about as low as you’ll find anywhere for a full breakfast these days. And here’s a breakfast bonus. When we went in to try the special, KK’s resident Bloody Mary master, Shelly, said, “The special is fantastic, but Marco also makes the best omelets.” We had to try. Omelets, in general, are about as unremarkable as scrambled eggs, but not this one. As fluffy as an omelet can be and packed with your choice of three ingredients, it comes with toast and tots for $13. Kopper Keg gets it, the difference is in the details. The one negative is availability, the kitchen doesn’t open till 9 am.
Kopper Keg was for years one of Vegas’ top Cleveland Browns bars. They no longer have the NFL feed, so not all the Browns games are shown. But if the game is on network, the place will be full of “Dawgs.” If Shelly is behind the bar, be sure to get one of her famous Bloody Marys; they’re comped if you’re gambling (Kayla makes a pretty good one, too).
Aqua Seafood and Caviar Restaurant— Now We Can Say We Tried It
We’ve been intrigued by the Caviar Bar, recently renamed Aqua Seafood and Caviar, since it opened at Resorts World. Not that we’d pay the freight for the regular menu: $6 per oyster ($15 each with caviar), $22 for a Caesars salad, $29 for a crab-cake or foie-gras appetizer, $28 for spaghetti and tomato sauce, $34 for fried chicken, $89 for Dover sole, $110 for eight ounces of king crab, $175-$850 for caviar, let alone $16 for mashed potatoes or French fries.
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