PutTogether: Tasty Spots in Las Vegas

My family and I took our traditional family trip to Las Vegas over Memorial Day Weekend last week. I love Vegas so much! I am amazed at the number of my friends who say they don't like it. And to them, I say "you're doing it wrong!!!" For a good ol' Vegas trip, you've just got to abide by the trifecta: the pools, the shopping, and the food. Get a good hotel with an awesome pool (or multiple awesome pools like Mandalay Bay!). Go to the Miracle Mile Mall or the Fashion Show Mall cause pretty much ALL the best stores can be found in these malls. And get yoself to some of the fantastic restaurants there (I mean pretty much every Food Network chef has a restaurant in Vegas and they're all delicious).

As always, we ate some truly amazing meals while we were there. I always want to know the best eats when I visit a big city, so I wanted to give you some pro tips for your next trip!

Shoku Ramenya

We left for Vegas early Friday and despite delicious roadtrip snacks (like fresh sliced mango sprinkled with lime juice and Tajin fruit seasoning...so good) we were starved by the time we got there. We drove directly to Shoku Ramen Ya which is a ramen restaurant that my brother Wyatt has been raving about and insisted we go to. The restaurant is connected with a Bacci Burger, which is also amazing, but we were all about that ramen.

Wyatt and I both ordered tonkotsu, Chris ordered spicy miso, and my mom ordered Kiki's Burger with french fries from Bachi Burger. For an appetizer we ordered assorted pickles from the Bachi Burger menu - SO good and fun to try! Seriously some of the most unique amazing flavors I've ever had! Starting at the top left there was garlic, cucumber, daikon radish, eggplant, ginger (I think?) and radish.

Wyatt also ordered takoyaki, these little dumplings with octopus in the middle!

Why are french fries in a cone so much more delicious than regular fries?

The amazing thing about authentic ramen is that it takes several meticulous hours to make. There are so many components that take so much care and time and it's all put together in an incredible flavor medley. The broth is boiled for hours and had such a beautiful sweet flavor, and the pork seriously melts in your mouth. The round white thing you see in the pictures is a pickled egg - I know that sounds...interesting...but it went so well with all the flavors. The noodles of course were sumptuous and the greens & bean sprouts were the PERFECT touch. This meal was a work.of.art. I highly recommend partaking in this delicious ramen experience.

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Eat

We dined at Eat in downtown Las Vegas one morning for breakfast. This place gave Hash House (below) a run for its money and that is truly saying something. We heard about it through friends and Anthony Bourdain recommends it too!

We started out with cinnamon fried biscuits with strawberry compote. The biscuits were a little crunchy for our liking but the compote was delish!

I really wanted to try the huevos motulenos but kept seeing people delivered these amazing looking pancakes...so I ordered a pancake on the side. That pancake was the most delicious pancake of my life. I'm still thinking about that pancake guys. It was probably fried in so much butter because the outside was perfectly crisp while the inside was soft. Real maple syrup too....my mouth is watering.

The huevos motulenos had mexican chili, feta, peas, over-easy eggs, black beans, and sauteed bananas over corn tortillas. The bananas were unexpected but the BEST part! I reeeeally want to recreate this scrumptious dish.

Chris ordered the truffled egg sandwich and how tasty does that look?

Wyatt had the corned beef hash. The toast. Was. Heavenly.

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Burgr

For dinner one night we went to Burgr in the Miracle Mile Mall. The great Gordon Ramsay's restaurant. You know. Crazy perfectionistic Hell's Kitchen guy (who's actually quite a delightful person outside of that show). So you know this place has gotta be insanely good. We went here last year when we went to Vegas and were aching to go again.

So here's the deal. The menu is fairly small, but everything is SO flavorful. Every little ingredient has an important purpose. So it's concise and to the point, and you're getting something that lots of thought and care has gone into. I love the fancy cheeses and large amounts of arugula they use particularly.

You have to get the jalapeno poppers if you go. You get seven of them, and they're each kind of spicy, except there's always one mystery jalapeno mixed in with the rest that is SO much hotter than the others. It's like Russian Roulette jalapeno popper style. So fun right??

And the french fries.....they have regular fries with chipotle ketchup and garlic aioli, and sweet potato fries with this sweet vanilla powdered sugar sauce.

My mom got the caesar salad. Amazing. The kale in it was so tasty.

And the SHAKES. There's a thick layer of pudding on top. And they're huge. What more could you want? I got the Oreo shake with creme brulee pudding.

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Hash House a Go Go

Okay guys. If I were to recommend ONE restaurant in Vegas for you to visit, it would be Hash House. Theeeee best breakfast you will eva have. We went there twice because our taste buds beg for this place. There are a few locations throughout Vegas. There's one in the Linq hotel on the strip, but I'd recommend going to the one in Henderson because it's less busy. And definitely go as early as you can stand getting up on vacation (the struggle is real) because it gets busy FAST. Because it's so good!!

The portions are enormous, the ingredients are fresh and unique, and everything is scrumptious. I am particularly fond of their eggs benedicts, but they also have HUGE pancakes loaded with Snickers, chocolate chips, etc, amazing crispy sage-fried chicken, and of course the hashes that are piled with cheese, potatoes, and whatever your heart desires. I'm also a huge fan of their biscuits. No greasy weird eggs with fake cheese or wimpy soggy waffles here.