Craftsteak, Or, How I Lost My Kobe Cherry

A few weeks ago I went to Vegas for "business". Sadly this "business" was bereft of hookers. Fortunately, for at least a night it was full of Kobe beef.

I've never had Kobe beef before. As my experience at BLT Steak and life in general has proved to me, I'm not really a big fan of beef and steaks and all that woo-ha. However, I am a fan of fully comped meals at expensive restaurants of any kind, so I wasn't going to argue over where said comped meal would occur. In this case, the location was Craftsteak at the MGM Grand.

Now, I have a love/hate relationship with Vegas. I used to really hate it, but this trip helped me come around to its charms - mostly because I was there for "business" so I didn't pay for a goddamn thing and I was with someone who had the "hookup" (see: comped meal at Craftsteak, among other things). To be honest, this is probably the only way I could go to Vegas unless I was loaded, as to enjoy Vegas you need to have money coming out of your ying-yang. Everything is ridiculously expensive and there's not much in between - you're either dropping $150 each for a great meal or you're eating at McDonalds. I generally shun McDonalds. Also, the city is clean trash-wise but seedy otherwise... like when you see an expose on a fancy hotel and the rooms look clean and nice and lovely, and then they bring out the black light and EVERYTHING in the room is covered in a fine film of dried semen. Yeah. Think about it.

Anyways - Craftsteak. Started things out and continued things with Perrier-Jouet, which is a good way to start things (for reference purposes - the glass cost about as much as a bottle.. I'm not sure why I note this as I live in NYC and should be used to this, but still, it just ain't right). Since the meal was comped, I was SORELY tempted to order a bottle of something ridiculous, but the three other people I was with didn't want to drink. Missed opportunity.

After much table discussion and prompting from our server, we went with a prix-fixe Kobe Surf and Turf. All details aside, this meant we had a bunch of typical fancy Steakhouse appetizers (salads, prosciutto, etc) which were all standardly good. Then the main courses: two pots of two-pound lobsters in bisque sauce, Kobe skirt steak, and Kobe filet. Since half of the table didn't like lobster, that left me and the other person with a pot of lobster. Obviously the little two-pound bastard didn't last more than a few minutes as it had been mostly pre cracked and cut up.

The Kobe filet was great, but it wasn't there that I really noticed the difference between Kobe and regular beef. I mean, a filet's always really good and since I'm no connoisseur I couldn't really say much other than it was a really really good filet. The difference came in the skirt steak. Skirt steak is the counterarguement to any time I proclaim that I don't like steak or beef, as I really like skirt steak.

I have positive memories of eating skirt steak mostly every night my first trip to Key Biscayne and getting really really drunk afterwards and being told the next morning The Other Mike had seen my balls as he rolled around the floor drunk as a skunk. The Kobe skirt steak was awesome. It was melt in your mouth awesome. Now, I'm not entirely sure what the difference between a filet and skirt steak is, but I'm inclined to believe that while both come from a cow they don't come from the same place on said cow. In this case it was like someone said, hey, here's a really good filet of beef, lets somehow turn it into skirt steak, AND THEY DID. Oh god did they. It was so good.

I doubt I will get Kobe beef anytime soon, though, as the entire meal for 4 was somewhere upwards of $800.. although about $100-120 of that was probably champagne... and about $100-120 of that was consumed by me. However, I must say, if the opportunity presents itself, I will Kobe again.

Kittichai Thai Why?

For some reason I've fallen off the blogging wagon and this is my attempt to get back on.

A few weeks (months maybe?) back I went to Kittichai with the Pale Imitation of Desmond (Deluca) and the Lobster Loving Afghan for a little dinner. Like all restaurants on Earth that I haven't been to, I've been meaning to go here for some time. So one Spring/Winter/I-can't-keep-track-of-time day, we three went downtown to Soho for a little Kittichai.

What is Kittichai? I'm not sure which food oriented website I saw this on, but I once read that Kittichai was Thai foods answer to high-end Japanese in the form of Nobu. I love Nobu. I love high-end. I love food. I especially love Thai food and the prospect of a Nobu-ish Thai restaurant in Soho. Sounds perfect right?

WELLLL.... here's the thing...

First of all, the decor was pretty tight. They had a pond in the middle of the dimly lit restaurant area (the bar area was small and nothing to write home about). I believe there were lily pads floating around and maybe even a few fish and the pond was referred to as the "reflecting pool". That's pretty tight, right? The rest of it was all "dark, trendy Thai restaurant in Soho" wicker and dark wood tables. I'm still fuzzy about the fish being in the central pond - I feel like if there were fish in there I would have made a comment about how much I wanted to eat them, but I don't remember making said comment, so maybe there weren't any fish?

So yeah, cool decor. I had a glass of champagne and Lobster Afghan had some form of mojito that came with (and I quote after checking with her what the hell she had) "sugar cane or some shit". Either way, it was good, as were most of the mixed drinks we had.. except I had some sort of berry mojito or some shit that was like sipping on liquid Nerds. Deluca might have had a lychee martini, but who can remember what she got. It's Deluca. Just like Paris Hilton exists for our attention, Deluca lives to be ignored. Oh, also, they had Hoegarden on tap, which is pretty much the best idea ever - Thai food and Hoegarden.

Anyways, the drinks were good, yada yada yada. The food... well... I wouldn't say I was "disappointed" per say, but I don't think I'd ever go back. It was pretty expensive and the portions were predictably small... but there were a lot of hits and misses. On the appetizer front, the fish cakes were awesome. The Northern Thai Beef Salad was eh, and I was really looking forward to that (I'm not sure why, but I was). The other interesting one was some finely shaved ham with stuff on top. Sorry I can't get more descriptive than that cause it's been like two or three months, but that should tell you something -- it wasn't that memorable except that it lookd like a ham pizza of some sort.

Main courses were... um... so so? I got the pineapple braised short ribs in a green curry because I had read sooo much about it (because of course, months prior to actually going I had been reading up all sorts of reviews).. and after consuming it, I'm not sure why it got so much attention. The meat was good, fell right off, but there was no "pineapple" flavor and the green curry sauce itself was a) not that good and b) hardly there at all. Deluca had a Sea Bass of some sort, which was just eh. Lobster Afghan, though, hit the jackpot with her lamb shank. Oh man. The lamb just melted off the bone. It came with a sauce, too.

See? This is what happens when I eat somewhere and don't blog about it till months later. I come up with inspired gems like "It came with a sauce, too".

Afterwards we retired to Tabac Ciroc where we got champagne cocktails and yelled at each other over loud music. Champagne cocktails were good. The air purifiers we were promised would protect us from the cigar smoke all around us? Not so good. Blame the Afghan for that (as well as the destruction of Buddha statues in her native homeland).

What a lame ass post. Later dudes.