Las Vegas restaurant guides

In this section

• Joël Robuchon The most expensive and most decorated restaurant in Las Vegas is a purple-and-gold Art Deco salon hidden behind the MGM Grand casino floor. It is the closest thing America has to a Paris three-star, and it prices accordingly. Here is what you get for the money and how to book it.
• Guy Savoy Guy Savoy's only restaurant outside Paris sits on the second floor of the Augustus Tower at Caesars Palace, quiet, formal and looking out over the Colosseum. It is the softer, warmer counterpoint to Robuchon and many regulars prefer it. This guide covers the menus, the money and how to get a table.
• Wing Lei Wing Lei made history as the first Chinese restaurant in the United States to receive a Michelin star, and it still cooks at that level in a gold-leafed, pomegranate-tree-lined room at Wynn. This is the guide to the duck, the tasting menus and the practicalities.
• é by José Andrés Behind an unmarked door inside Jaleo at The Cosmopolitan is an eight-seat counter where José Andrés's team performs a two-dozen-course avant-garde Spanish tasting menu. It is the hardest table in Las Vegas to land and, for the right person, the most memorable. Here is how it works.
• Lotus of Siam For twenty-five years food writers have called Lotus of Siam the best Thai restaurant in America, and the remarkable thing is that locals agree. It is off-Strip, moderately priced and worth a taxi from anywhere. This guide covers the two locations, the Northern Thai specialities and the famous wine list.
• SW Steakhouse SW is the steakhouse with the best seat in Las Vegas: a terrace over Wynn's Lake of Dreams, where the waterfall lights up and animated shows play every half hour after dark. The beef is serious too. Here is how to book a patio table, what to order and what it costs.
• Delilah Delilah is the glamorous one: a 1930s-style supper club at Wynn with a live band, velvet booths, a hard-to-get reservation and a dress code that actually turns people away. This guide separates the scene from the food and tells you how to do it well.
• CUT by Wolfgang Puck CUT is the modern steakhouse — glass and pale wood instead of leather and mahogany — and it has the deepest wagyu list on the Strip. This is the guide to the beef programme, the dishes people do not expect, the prices and the booking.
• Momofuku David Chang's Momofuku brought its pork buns, its spicy cucumbers and its whole-shoulder bo ssäm to The Cosmopolitan's Boulevard Tower, and it remains one of the best mid-priced dinners on the Strip. Here is what to order, what to book ahead and what it costs.
• Catch Catch is the see-and-be-seen seafood-and-sushi room at ARIA, entered through a tunnel of fake cherry blossoms and lit like a music video. The food is better than that description implies. This guide covers the menu, the money and the reality of getting in.
• Scarpetta Scarpetta is the Italian restaurant with the best view in Las Vegas: a wall of glass directly across from the Bellagio fountains. It is also home to a $30-ish plate of spaghetti that food writers have been arguing about for fifteen years. Here is how to book the window and what to order.
• Bavette's Bavette's is the Chicago steakhouse that sneaks up on people: dark, low-ceilinged and lit by candles, with a jazz soundtrack and a menu that goes well beyond steak. Many regulars quietly rank it the best steakhouse on the Strip. Here is the case, the menu and the numbers.
• Golden Steer The Golden Steer has been serving steak on Sahara Avenue since 1958, and Sinatra, Elvis, Marilyn and half the mob had a regular booth. It is the last real piece of old Vegas you can eat in, and it is booked out weeks ahead. Here is how to do it properly.
• Peppermill The Peppermill is the neon-pink, fake-cherry-tree, fire-pit-in-a-pool diner that has anchored the north Strip since 1972, open around the clock and beloved by locals, film crews and hungover tourists alike. This guide covers the food, the lounge, the waits and why it matters.
• Esther's Kitchen James Trees's Esther's Kitchen is the restaurant that turned the Arts District from a place with a few bars into the neighbourhood every food-minded visitor now drives to. The pasta is made in-house, the bread is famous and the bill is half what the Strip charges. Here is the full guide.
• Raku Raku is a small, dim izakaya in a Chinatown strip mall where Strip chefs go after their own kitchens close. Mitsuo Endo's charcoal robata and house-made tofu made it nationally famous; the late hours and low prices made it a local institution. Here is how to eat there.
• Sparrow + Wolf Sparrow + Wolf is the restaurant that proved a Strip-calibre chef could thrive in a Chinatown strip mall. Brian Howard cooks over wood, borrows from every cuisine on Spring Mountain Road and charges a fraction of what his old Strip employers do. Here is the guide.
• Oscar's Steakhouse Former mayor and mob lawyer Oscar Goodman put his name on a steakhouse inside the Plaza's glass dome, looking straight down Fremont Street. The steaks are named for his old clients and the martinis are enormous. Here is what to expect, what to order and how to get the view.
• Superfrico Superfrico is what happens when the circus company behind Absinthe opens a restaurant: psychedelic decor, performers wandering between tables, a walk-in freezer that is actually a bar and, surprisingly, very good Italian-American food. This guide tells you how to do it right.
• Gordon Ramsay Steak Gordon Ramsay Steak was the first of Ramsay's Las Vegas restaurants and is still the most serious: a Union Jack-ceilinged room off the Paris casino floor, a trolley of raw cuts presented tableside and the Wellington that started it all. Here is what it costs and whether to pick it over Hell's Kitchen.