Hello, my Foodie Friends and welcome back! Today I’d like to talk to you about fine dining restaurants on the Las Vegas Strip. Nowadays, people who visit Las Vegas are aware of our exquisite dining scene. The city quite rapidly turned from a destination of bargains and giant meals to the Smithsonian of upscale dining options. As a local and a food fanatic, I can’t be happier that I have all of these options in my backyard. (The Strip is 10 minutes away to be precise!)
Now, I haven’t been to every restaurant on the Las Vegas Strip (I’m trying!), but I do have my favorites. The restaurants I’ve chosen are places that I make sure to take my friends who are visiting me from out of town. Keep reading to find out about my top five dinner spots on the Strip and why.
Estiatorio Milos
Milos is one of the few upscale Greek fine dining restaurants in the city. You won’t find any gyros here. Their specialty is freshly caught seafood, so fresh that they have a “market” where your server will walk your entire table over to the display and give you a presentation of all the different catches for the day. You then choose your fish, which your server will take into the kitchen to be prepared, and after enjoying your appetizers, he or she will bring it back out to be served tableside. Much of the food is prepared with the simplest ingredients, olive oil, sea salt, and oregano, bringing out the true flavors of the food.
My favorite dishes here are the heirloom tomato salad served with barrel-aged feta cheese and the octopus. This is arguably the best octopus in the city, and if you’ve never had octopus before, you need to order it. Dinner is served family-style, so portions are meant for sharing. If you go for lunch, you won’t get the “dinner experience”, but you’ll save 1/3 the price.
Sushi Samba
Japanese, Brazilian, and Peruvian cuisine are all combined into one eclectic mix of fun food and a playful atmosphere. The dining room is dark, accented with orange ribbon countertops and graffiti on the wall. This is a great place to start the party!
Sushi Samba is another family-style fine dining restaurant where it will benefit you to come as a group. The concept is similar to tapas, or small plates, so that you can order a wide variety of items from the menu to share with your friends. The menu is quite large and can be overwhelming especially since there are a lot of ingredients foreign to many American diners. Your server is more than happy to help guide you through the menu, or better yet, have him or her put together a custom made tasting menu just for your table. He or she will ask your party a list of about 5 questions regarding your dietary preferences and how much you’re looking to spend.
They also carry one of the largest sake menus in the city, and a have sake sommelier to help you choose the right kind of sake to go with your meal. Kanpai!
Mon Ami Gabi
To experience Las Vegas, you need to dine at Mon Ami Gabi. No, they do not serve “Las Vegas” food. Mon Ami Gabi is a French restaurant. Its located right in the heart of the Las Vegas Strip, across the boulevard from the Bellagio. If you sit on the patio (and I strongly suggest that you do or the experience here will not be the same), you get the astonishing view of the Bellagio fountains and the amusement of all the folie that can happen at any given moment on the Las Vegas Strip.
For the experience, ambiance, quality of the food, and price point, this place cannot be beaten. It’s perfect for a lighthearted anniversary dinner or a casual lunch with friends.
Helpful hint: You CANNOT make reservations for the patio, and the wait can be over an hour during peak times. I suggest showing up early, putting your name on the list, and grabbing an appetizer and a drink at the bar. Make sure your whole party is present when your table is ready or they will NOT seat you!
Bazaar Meat by Jose Andres
As the name suggests, Bazaar Meat is a steak house portraying itself as a marketplace of exotic meats (exotic for American standards). You’ll find meats from all over the world and specialty items that you don’t see on most menus like bison carpaccio, geoduck, carabineros, and whole roasted suckling pig. It’s not just the meats that are notable at this restaurant. Chef’s Cotton Candy Fois Gras and his Bagels and Lox Cone (just to name a few) are some of the most memorable bites that you’ll ever put into your mouth.
The ingenuity of Chef Jose Andres is expressed not only in his food but throughout the décor of the restaurant as well. You know what you’re getting yourself into when you see Iberico pork legs hanging from the kitchen, antler chandeliers, and alligator heads mounted on the walls.
The vast menu might be challenging and even intimidating to look through. Your server is there to guide you, but since you’re obviously here for an adventure, you should just do the tasting menu.
Harvest by Roy Ellamar
Tucked away in the Spa Tower of the Bellagio, Harvest is a gem worth stumbling upon. This is the only farm-to-table fine dining restaurant on the Las Vegas Strip, and possibly the only true farm-to-table restaurant in all of Las Vegas. You’ll find a wide variety of fresh vegetables on the menu from Candystripe Beets and Blue Lake Beans to Purple Top Turnips and Gold Bar Zucchinis. Chef Roy Ellamar’s beautifully vibrant colored dishes are sprinkled with slight Asian flavors, unveiling his Hawaiian heritage and creating a style of cuisine that’s unlike any other in the city.
Once a month, Chef Roy invites another chef into his restaurant (sometimes a celebrity chef or sometimes a popular local chef), and the two of them prepare special menu items right at your table. If you just so happen to be in town during one of the Snack Wagon Pop-ups, I urge you to make this your dinner plans for the evening. Not only do you get to meet the chefs, but you get to indulge in ingredients like truffles, caviar, and wagyu beef at $11 a dish.
What Makes A Great Restaurant
There are so many wonderful fine dining restaurants on the Las Vegas Strip. Each one boasting its own charm to attract the millions of visitors coming to Vegas each year. When looking for that special restaurant, it’s more than just the food that’s important. It’s about the atmosphere, the service, and the way it makes you feel.
These are my top five fine dining restaurants on the Las Vegas Strip. If you’ve been to any of them before, I’d love to hear about your experience. Let me know what you think in the comment section below.
Next time you come to Vegas and decide to give my suggestions a try, let me know, and I’d be happy to assist in making your reservations. If there’s something else that you’re looking for and would like my advice, please reach out! I’d love to provide you with more suggestions.
If you like what you’ve read, please subscribe to my blog and my YouTube channel to be the first to know about my newest recommendations. You can also join me and my team of foodie friends on a Taste Buzz food tour. We have walking food tours on the Las Vegas Strip and in the downtown area to take you off the beaten path to discover the smaller side and local favorite places that many passersby often overlook. For more information or to schedule your food tour today, visit our website or call me at 702-909-0337.
Thanks for joining me and I’ll see you in Vegas!
