Daniel Boulud Brasserie

When I got the idea for this blog, I immediately went out and bought the Michelin guide for Las Vegas. There it sat on my coffee table for about a month with all the sticky yellow Post-It notes sticking out of it, until Brian decided to look through it to pick a place to take me for our anniversary. I usually get very excited about doing a project, and then the motivation seems to wane. I am so happy Brian took some initiative to motivate me. Brian chose Daniel Boulud Brasserie in the Wynn Resort.


Here is just a little background on Daniel Boulud. He was born March 25, 1955 in Saint-Pierre de Chandieu, France. Baulud is a famous French chef and restaurateur with restaurants in New York City, Las Vegas, Palm Beach, Miami, Vancouver and Beijing. He is best known for his eponymous restaurant, Daniel, in New York City.



While raised on a farm outside of Lyon and trained by renowned French chefs, Boulud made his reputation in New York, first as a chef and most recently a restaurateur. His restaurants include Daniel, Café Boulud, DB Bistro Moderne, Bar Boulud, and DBGB Kitchen & Bar in New York City. He has also created Café Boulud in Palm Beach and the Michelin-star award-winning Daniel Boulud Brasserie in Las Vegas (Which is where we will be dining).


Boulud received the James Beard Award for Best Chef of New York City in 1992 while Executive Chef at Le Cirque. The James Beard Foundation would again recognize Chef Daniel Boulud with “Outstanding Chef of the Year” in 1994 and “Outstanding Restaurateur” in 2006 for restaurant Daniel. In April 2007 he received the Culinary Humanitarian Award at the United Nations from the Adopt-a-Mine Field Foundation. The President of France made Boulud a Chevalier de la Légion d'honneur in March 2006 in recognition for his contribution to the advancement of French culture. Daniel, his flagship New York City namesake, was awarded three Michelin stars in the 2010 Michelin, the book's highest rating

Daniel Boulud Brasserie, accodring to the Michelin guide, has a comfort level of three and recieved one Michelin star for food.


Those of you that live in Vegas will understand this part. We are “self-parkers.” Everywhere in Vegas is free to park, but I personally hate going to valet because it always takes longer than just parking and walking yourself. Plus I never carry cash anymore, which you would need to tip. From the parking garage, Daniel Boulud is on the other side of the casino, by a huge waterfall with trees and forest. You would swear you were in the North West, if you could not smell the slight waft of chlorine when the wind changes. Brian had made a reservation, and when we arrived the hostess asked us if we wanted to sit inside or outside. We chose outside, it was a cool night for Las Vegas, about 55 degrees, but they had patio heaters out there, plus we were excited to see the waterfall and the light show that happens every half hour or so.



The place was pretty full so we were seated in a corner, which was kind of blocked by an enormous tree. I still am not sure if the tree was real or not. I know this sounds like a weird statement, but once you live in Las Vegas long enough you start questioning the reality of most things.




The waterfall and surrounding tress would change colors every few minutes from orange, to yellow, blue, purple, and pink.









The other interesting thing about sitting outside was that every so often they would put on this kind of light show, but they would project images of people, and different strange objects, on the waterfall and surrounding "lake." It was very “artsy" kind of theme with music in all kinds of different languages. Being as analytical as I am, I kept trying to figure out the symbolism or meaning, but I could not decipher any. We had a hard time seeing because of the position where we were sitting, and the real/fake tree blocking our view. About half way through our dinner, the lights dimmed, and we were ready to see another trippy version of what we joked must be Steve Wynn’s dreams, when a giant frog on top of the waterfall came out in a cowboy hat and started singing Garth Brook's song "Friends in Low Places." Now I know you are thinking... that we must have drank too much champagne, or the chef added the special mushrooms to our food, but I have pictures to prove it.







Turns out that Mr. Brooks has a new show at the Wynn and that is how they were promoting it. Overall, it was very nice sitting outside. I just wish that they had not put the tree in front of the waterfall, but I bet in summer when it is really hot, the tree provides some nice shade. I think if we would have sat inside the service would have been better also. Our server was very nice, but because of the location of our table, he was not around very much.




Anyways, lets move on to the food.... We started out the night with a glass of champagne. After all, we were celebrating right? Brian ordered, and it was very good. We are not poor people, but we both work for the school district, so we are definitely not "ballers" either. We like to have nice things, but we don't make it rain too often,so we just had the glasses instead of a bottle and it was $24 a glass. Imagine how much the bottles were…



We started out the night with appetizers. I had the seared foie gras in a light broth with root vegetables. This dish was amazing! The foie gras was sitting on a circle of grilled bread, with turnips, carrots, potatoes and sweat potatoes. The broth was like heaven. If I was not at such a fancy restaurant, I would have picked up the bowl and licked it clean afterwards.



Brian had the chilled lobster salad with hearts of palm and heirloom tomatoes. It was very good as well. They seasoned the lobster with cracked pepper and some other spices I could not identify, but it was heavenly. A very beautiful presentation as well.


For our main course, I chose seared scallops with cauliflower done three ways. The first ways was steamed, second pureed, and the third pickled. The cauliflower puree was the best of the three, it was smeared across the plate and was light and complimented the scallops very well. The pickled was very good, its bitterness set off the sweetness of the scallops and the third was just steamed so, you know what steamed cauliflower tastes like.




Brian chose Chilean sea bass poached in olive oil and served with eggplant purée with a shitake mushroom and pepper confit. This was also a great dish, the sea bass by itself was light and full of flavor. I expected it to taste oily because it was poached in olive oil, but it was actually very light. The mushrooms and eggplant complimented the dish very nicely. But of the two, I think the scallops were the better dish.






We finished the night with two chocolate desserts,( get used to this readers because I don't feel desert is worth it, if it's not chocolate). We were told that Daniel Boulud flies his own pastry chef in from France to make the deserts and we were in for a treat. The waiter recommended the chocolate moose with peanuts and brittle and homemade peanut ice cream.

Needless to say, when you cracked into that chocolate shell and ate the moose inside you felt like you were doing something illegal. The other desert we ordered was a chocolate torte with oranges, grapefruit and a chocolate/coffee sorbet. Both were amazing. The waiter was also were sweet enough to write "Happy Anniversary" on the plate.


We finished with cappuccino and a plate of complimentary little deserts from the chef. The cappuccino was very good, dry, and strong coffee flavor and the perfect combination of frothed milk and coffee.

The deserts were a coconut candy bite, apricot jelly, what tasted like a mini blueberry muffin and a crispy wafer like bite, filled with chocolate. The coconut one was my favorite.



Overall, the two best dishes of the night were the foie gras and the chocolate mousse. The champagne was excellent as well, but when I think back, those are the two dishes I am drooling over, as I sit here writing this now. The service was good, but not “Michelin star good,” like I expected. Brian would not let me look at the bill, but I am guessing about $250, or $300 including tip. I would definitely recommend the restaurant to anyone who likes French food, it a more relaxed brasserie setting. A great way to celebrate our anniversary!

Next Month: Either Bradley Ogden, a contemporary, restaurant in Caesar's Palace or Aureole Charlie Palmer's contemporary restaurant in Mandalay Bay. Both have one Michelin Star.
Tell me your vote.


~The Wanna Be Foodie

Isn't Michelin the tire guy?

Isn’t Michelin the tire guy?

Yes, it is.

I had always thought that Michelin was just the people who made tires, and it wasn’t until I heard it repeatedly referenced on shows like Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservations, and Top Chef, did I finally look it up, to see who this Michelin person was and why he gave out stars. Turns out Michelin the French company who makes tires in the United States also had a big business of confidential reviews of restaurants and hotels. According to the 2009 Michelin Guide, their aim is “ongoing commitment to proving travel and mobility, we do everything possible to make vacations and eating out a pleasure.” Makes sense, a tire company would want you to take road trips right?


The thing that makes Michelin better, in my opinion, than the ZAGAT, or reading a restaurant review from a critic is the anonymity of the review. A restaurant chef can see Gael Green (how could you not recognize her with those crazy hats) or James Oseland and give them the best seat in the house and make sure their food is perfect. ZAGAT guide is based on people writing in their reviews, so one persons standard can be different from another. Michelin takes great steps to make sure that their reviewers are anonymous and remain anonymous. This ensures that a regular Joe Schmoe will get the same service as those fancy restaurant reviewers. The other thing that makes Michelin very reputable is that they are independent. They choose restaurants to review not based on the Benjamin slipped to them in a letter, but made for the benefit of “the reader alone.” “Decisions are discussed by the inspectors and the editor with the most important decided at the global level.” Inclusion in the guide is also free of charge; no one pays to have their review written. As quoted from their website,

“Michelin has been in the business of evaluating and recommending restaurants and hotels for over a century. We employ full-time professional inspectors who anonymously visit restaurants and hotels, and evaluate them on a range of criteria. Our evaluation process has been honed over time to identify consistently high-quality establishments to suit a range of budgets and across a range of styles and cuisines. If our inspectors are impressed by a restaurant or hotel, they visit the establishment again. And again. It is this sort of obsessive research that makes the MICHELIN Guide such a reliable source of recommendations. No matter what the occasion, we think you'll find that the MICHELIN Guide will help you make the perfect choice.”

Other benefits include the fact that the selection ranges from low to high price range so it’s not just the super fancy restaurants and hotels that end up in the guide. They update every year, (usually, see* below), so you don’t go to a place to find out that the chef changed and the food is now horrible, and they are consistent. Michelin uses the same criteria in Paris that they do in New York. They also classify a restaurant for comfort, (which includes service and décor), and for food quality, (which are where the stars come in to play). The classifications for “comfort” range from, one-little spoon and fork which represents quite comfortable, two little spoons and forks represents comfortable, three-very comfortable, four-top class comfortable, five-luxury in the traditional style. The stars which are the things all chefs want, range from one star which means “very good cuisine in its category” two-excellent cuisine, worth a detour, and three which is the top honor of “exceptional cuisine worth a special journey.”



*For my project I will be working out of the 2009 Las Vegas restaurant and hotels edition. Because of the recession, Michelin decided to only come out with an edition for Las Vegas every two years, but New York and San Francisco still have yearly editions. There are actually more than twelve Michelin rated restaurants in Las Vegas, but for this project, I decided to pick twelve making it a one year project. There are actually thirteen- one-Michelin star restaurants, three-two star restaurants and only one-three star restaurants in Las Vegas, the amazing Joel Robuchon. (Who is actually on the list twice, one for Joel Robuchon with three stars, and one for L’Atelier de Joel Robuchon which received one star, both located in the MGM Grand.) The first one was actually picked for me by my wonderful boyfriend. For our anniversary, we went to Daniel Boulud Brasserie at the Wynn resort. The review will be coming soon….

Thank you for reading,

The Wanna-Be Foodie

The where and why of this...

First, I want to explain why I decided to start a blog. Especially since blogging is not such a popular thing anymore, I have always been a late bloomer. I majored in writing. I always wanted to be a writer, but like most English majors, I went into teaching to pay the bills (which sounds so silly, as I write it, but it’s true). "I can teach during the year and write in the summers,” that is what I told myself when I decided to get my teaching certificate. Well, the certificate turned into a master’s in education, and education became my career. Writing seemed to take a back burner during the last six years I have been teaching. Add to that a divorce, a new relationship, and a new baby, and writing was not even a thought for the last six years. I miss it a lot, even though I never thought I would be a successful writer, it’s something that I have always loved to do for myself. It helps me get my head together, clear my mind, and just makes me feel like I have accomplished something. Even if no one reads my writing, it’s therapeutic. I don’t go to shrinks, I have sometimes been known to pour my heart out to my sister or friends over some vodka, but for the most part, I like to write out what I am feeling.


My other love is food and cooking. I love to read cook books; I actually read them cover to cover. I like to think about flavor combinations and how I can change or tweak recipes to make them my own. I love watching the food network. Although most of my friends and boyfriend cannot understand why I love it, they don’t complain when they taste what I cook. I have watched the last six seasons of Top Chef religiously, I almost creamed my pants when they showed Joel Robuchon. I, like Eli Kirshtein, thought he was a unicorn. The thing I love best about food is going to a good restaurant because as much as I love to cook, I love to be cooked for, and waited on even more!

I moved to Las Vegas because they had an abundance of teaching positions, and actually offered bonuses to teachers to move here. Having just gone through a divorce and wanting a change, I decided why not...packed up the truck and moved to the city of lights. Reality set in when I discovered that people here are a lot different than people in the North West. There is a huge focus on body image, there is a huge emphasis on how much you make, and there was a tendency for most men I dated to lie through their teeth. All things I was not so happy about. Just about the time I considered moving back to Washington, the economy crashed. Teaching jobs were non-existent, I was totally upside down in my mortgage, and there was no way I could sell now. I was lucky to have a job at all. It looked like I was stuck in Vegas for awhile. I did not take it so well at first. I am a pessimist by nature and tend to focus on the negative whenever possible. I found myself slipping into a “stuck” feeling and I have never been one to deal with that well. I like to be able to move on a whim, and travel when I want. Being suck made me want to move even more. Then something changed. I met a wonderful man from Alaska, and we started a relationship. He is probably the most opposite from me that is possible. He is a true optimist, always looking at what is good about a situation. Now I am not about to say that he saved me from a world of pessimism, because I have never ever believed in that “man saving the woman” scenario, but he did succeed in helping me change my way of thinking, just a little bit. One thing I have always said is “if you’re not happy change it,” which is one reason I have moved fifteen times in the last ten years. Since I cannot move, and I am stuck here for awhile, I might as well make the most of it.


What is good about living in Las Vegas…not the people (well not all of course, I have some great friends here), not the crowds, not the bars, not the casinos (they are all the same after awhile), not the fact that their are slot machines everywhere, even in the grocery stores, not the bands, (no small bands come to Las Vegas, we only get the Celine Dion or the White Snake reunion bands …but that is another rant), not the scenery..brown, brown, brown…

I know! It’s the food. We have some of the best chefs and restaurants in Las Vegas! I mean where else in the world do you have over twelve Michelin starred restaurants located on one street? The Las Vegas Strip contains so many good restaurants, not to mention the great restaurants located in the rest of the city. I have decided that since I am here for awhile I might as well take advantage of what Las Vegas has to offer. I plan to visit a Michelin Starred restaurant once a month for a year, and you…lucky reader get to hear all about it. (that is if anyone actually reads this) This project will also give me and my boyfriend some much needed adult time together, as we just had a baby (he is almost 5 months). It will also give me a creative outlet, since my most innovative creation has been the song I made up to sing to Alex as I am changing him. (think of the song "Single Ladies" by Beyonce) "All the stinky babies...all the stinky babies...put your legs up oh oh oh... If you smell it then you better put a new diaper on it..." I don't ever want to lose that creative side of myself, even if it is horrible, and hopefully through this project, I can find my writing voice once again.
Any feed back, comments, or criticism are always welcome.
thanks,
~ The Wanna-Be Foodie