Aureole

A quick trip to Vegas last weekend and I found myself perusing 2009's michelin star winners along the strip. Since the two and three star winners all posted price tags that could easily hit 4 digits I kept my ambitions to the single starred chefs. We had reservations at Bradley Ogden's namesake restaurant at Caesar's palace, but at the last minute decided that it would be a shame to come to Vegas only to fall back on California cuisine and to skip out on the ostentation that is Las Vegas.

Charlie Palmer's Aureole really seemed like the perfect choice. French elegance combined with a four story wine tower complete with trapeze baristas that hang upside down to retreive your bottle? Yes please!

The reality is that like most things in Vegas the over the top opulence is entertaining from afar, just weird from close up. Let's start with the service. We made reservations but the restaurant was only a quarter full when we arrived at 8pm. They sat us in a dark booth that was directly underneath the wine tower - no flying stewards for this guy. Even on the other side of the table you had to crane you neck to watch the ascent. To their credit, they did ask if we wanted to change tables, but not until we had sunk into our chairs with bread and wine. It was difficult to tell exactly who our waiter is and at one point we got the response, "hey, I'm just the bread guy."

But service aside, the food was pretty delicious, beginning with the bread. We started with a tuna and king crab stack that was centered with an avocado mixture, which was as delicious as it sounds.

The creaminess of the avocado was a great compliment to the fleshy texture of the tuna, and the thick king crab legs were a good counter to the chopped crab stacks I've had elsewhere.

Another plus was the fact that they had wine flights. Being adventurous souls we both chose the soft red flight, which featured a California Pinot Noir, a Temperanillo out of Spain and a Gamay from France. All three were delicious and the price for the flights was pretty reasonable.

For mains we ordered the roast lamb and the beef tenderloin. The lamb had a very good flavor, drenched in a buttery red wine jus. It was a bit red for my medium request, but thats really the way I prefer it.

All in all it was a fun experience. It had all the theatrics, flare and underpar service you would expect from Las Vegas, and it was a lot cheaper than an evening at the Black Jack table. Worthy of five stars? No, definitely not, but a solid 3.5.