The List – Where We’re Eating and Why

It’s been a minute, hasn’t it? Seven full months to be precise. Lots of travel (Scotland, Rome, London, Venice, Milan, Vancouver, Nantucket, Connecticut – just to name a few stops) since last we posted something, but we haven’t been idle, even if we don’t eat, report, and repeat like we did in the halcyon years of 2008-2020. These days (when we’re in town), we mainly put our energies into podcasting — gab-festing every week about where we’ve eaten on Eat. Talk. Repeat. (Which, from our completely objective perspective, is the liveliest restaurant podcast around.)

As any writer will tell you: talking is tons more fun than writing, and why everyone from Kato Kaelin to D-list actresses have one. Or maybe it’s because listening is easier than reading(?).

Regardless, we’ve always found podcasts (even ours) to be a poor vehicle for imparting accessible information in condensed form. Such as a list of what we consider the best/most important restaurants of 2025. So here goes, roughly in order of their newness, excellence, level of cooking, and importance to the Vegas food scene.

Unlike past years, we no longer scurry to and fro, trying to eat/try every worthy restaurant in Las Vegas. These days we pick our spots, so consider this more highly personal than comprehensive. Some places we adore (Guy Savoy, Ferraro’s, Main Street Provisions, et al) are still wonderful, we just haven’t been in a while. What you’ll get here is places I’ve been to recently (i.e., the last seven months) and to which I intend to return. All are worth your time and money if you seek the best Vegas has to offer.

And, as usual, if you’re looking for washed up celebrity chef retreads, forced fun (Hello, supper clubs!), or some place you “heard was good” from some bizarre “influencer ” who speaks like an annoying four-year old, you’ve come to the wrong place.

(As always, all places come highly recommended unless otherwise noted.)

THE LIST – 2025

1. TAMBA – Calvin Trillin once wrote that the average Italian restaurant gets more customers in a night than most Indian joints see in a month. Four decades on, not much has improved. Indian food – one of the world’s great cuisines –  was, for years, so underrepresented in America as to be almost invisible. Urban areas had their tandoori parlors and AYCE buffets, but that was about it. But the tide may be turning. Indian food, the refined, intricate, delicate cuisine of the sub-continent, might be having a moment, here and elsewhere, and Tamba is showing why.

Tamba has as much in common with your standard, cookie cutter curry shop as a Bentley does with a Dodge Dart. This is apparent from the second you step inside. Instead of nonstop Bollywood videos, what confronts you is an elegant, subdued restaurant replete with overstuffed chairs, refined flatware and an eye-popping bar that would be right at home in the Bellagio.

From there Chef Anand Singh flies you around the sub-continent (and even into China), dabbling in everything from upscale tuna sushi with smoked sea salt to artichoke sashimi to marinated goat biryani. Spicings are precise, presentations polished, and the multi-layered flavorings a revelation. (A one-curry-fits-all stop this is not.) You can go conventional (intriguing Samosa Chaat, soothing butter chicken) or unique (grilled Afghani saffron paneer, banana leaf-wrapped sea bass, Josper-grilled octopus with purple cauliflower), and be assured that whatever hits your table will probably be like nothing Vegas has ever tasted.

Modern Indian like this has been the rage in England for twenty years. Vegas may be late to the party, but with Tamba and  the arrival of  Gymkanha to the Aria later this year,  the festivities promise to continue for even longer than an Indian wedding.

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2. BAR BOHEME

– There were two important restaurant openings this year, and BB was the other one. Fine French and local Las Vegas have generally been as compatible as slot machines and opera, and breaths are being held as to whether James Trees’ ode to haute bourgeois cooking signals a pivot to more serious gastronomy,  or whether we are  forever consigned to the steakhouse/Italian circle of hell.  The Strip is no longer driving the culinary conversation; places like Bar Boheme (and its sister restaurant Ada’s) have taken the reigns….and where they take us is anyone’s guess.

(Cheesus Christ that’s good soup!)

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3. STUBBORN SEED  – is the kind of place where the chef (Jeremy Ford) makes a splash out of town (in this case, Miami), wins a TV cooking competition (Top Chef season 13), gets recruited by Vegas bigwigs to bring his concept to a giant hotel (Resorts World) in hopes of enhancing the cred (and pocketbooks) of the chef, the concept and the hotel. The food (like the room) is stylish and comfortable without being overthought or overwrought. This is high-wire, aggressive, veggie-focused cooking (but not strictly vegetarian), and Ford clearly has the chops for it.

He freely mixes his food metaphors and clearly has a thing for intricacy, playing with odd combinations (and lots of leafy accents) that always seem to work.Thus will you find carrots charred with jerk seasonings and spiced yogurt (above) , and a whole cauliflower (also above) roasted with a cashew puree, then garnished with every herb in the garden.

His proteins don’t miss any beats either: a foie gras/truffle tart (above) reminiscent of a pb&j, brown butter branzino, and a slow-cooked smoked beef both better (and better priced $85) than anything you’ll find in most steakhouses. None of this is cheap, but compared to most Strip restaurants these days, it feels like a bargain for cooking this complex and compelling.  Definitely the most interesting Strip restaurant to open this year, and we are rooting for it to find an audience.

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(Bream job – $95)

4. PISCES – Perhaps I’m getting soft in my old age, but I found more to praise than bury in our two meals here. The setting will pop your eyeballs, the service about as efficient as a 300 seater can have, and the Greek-French-Spanish-Italian-something-for-everyone-mash-up menu is a fun read. What also pops are the prices — $120 Dover sole, $34 crudo, and a grab-your-ankles wine list that should be presented with a tube of K-Y.

You are in the Wynncore, after all, where bargains are rarer than inconspicuous consumption, and the upscale crowd practically demands to be overcharged. Unsurprisingly, most of the Greek offerings (Horatiki salad, Gigante beans, the sea bream, aka Orata) is done better at Milos, and the paella ($155) is far more authentic (and cheaper) at Jaleo. But the fish is as fresh as it gets, this far from an ocean, and the desserts are in a class by themselves.

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5. CARAMÁ

– Nowadays, no one likes to bag on the Strip than yours truly, but the second best Italian food we had this year was at this Wolfgang Puck outpost in Mandalay Bay. It’s an all-purpose Italian, befitting the requirements of Big Hotel, but Puck’s troops have always been great technicians, and their proficiency with the whole spectrum of Italian gastronomy — from the top shelf salumi to squab (pictured above) to dolce to die for –is evident from the first bite. Are we going to drive to the ends of the Strip to eat here? Probably not. But the food is way better than it has to be for this hotel’s slack-jawed, lanyard

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6. JOËL ROBUCHCON – Without Joel Robuchon there would have been no Guy Savoy, Mario Batali, or Bradley Ogden. Without JR there would be no James Beard recognition, no José Andrés, Bobby Flay, and no Steve Wynn trying (for a time) to turn the Wynncore into a gourmet mecca. Wynn and Gamal Aziz may have started Las Vegas’s restaurant revolution in 1994-1999, but it was Robuchon, coming out of retirement to launch his international concepts (L’Atelier de Joel Robuchon and his namesake 3-etoile jewel box) IN LAS VEGAS(!), that made all the headlines, and brought the world’s food media to our door.

No one, except influencers looking for a free meal, gets excited about Strip restaurant openings anymore. But Robuchon coming here was a very big deal, and now, twenty years on, its cooking, decor, and service still have the capacity to astonish. This is rarefied air dining, and the tariffs are steep, but a la carte selections ease the pain (and the calories), and for better haute cuisine (and mignardises like these), you’ll have to travel to Paris:

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7. ADA’S FOOD+WINE

– Kat Thomas and Jackson Stamper are doing something very special at AFW. If it were in any other city, the accolades and awards would flow like Franciacorta. In Vegas, it’s just another gem struggling to find and audience among people with more money than taste. Its escape from the  Tivoli Village ghost town (and to Arts District digs) can’t come soon enough.

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8. VETRI CUCINA

We love Vetri. even if it’s harder to get to than Henderson at rush hour. But it’s still the best Italian in town, and for that reason alone, it rates a wave.

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9. WINEAUX

– has everything you’d ever want in a wine bar: comfy setting, good feng shui, lots of interesting bottles at all price points, thoughtful, handcrafted small plates to nibble on, attentive service. The only thing it needs is to be closer to my house.

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10. LE CLUB BY PARTAGE

– IS closer to my house. And a jewel box filled with fine champagnes, and delicate French food to compliment them. The steak tartare (above) is straight from Paris, and the grilled oysters and mini-cheeseburger (topped with a nugget of foie gras) are worth a trip all by themselves.

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11. ANIMA BY EDO

– We don’t go the ABE much because it’s both too far and far too annoying to travel to, no matter how good the Spanish-Italian mashup food (and wine) is. But no list of the best restaurants in Vegas is complete without it.

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(Ash Watkins and Gio, not exactly weeping in their wine)

12. MONZÙ

– Gio Mauro (operatic by nature, in talent and temperament) literally performs a passion play nightly, straight out of “Big Night”. His clientele are the cognoscenti, who recognize his genius with pizzas, pastas, proteins, and wine. One block away is Nora’s, his family’s other restaurant, strictly for the red sauce, chicken parm, and pepperoni crowd. Guess which one has more customers than the bacon cheeseburger egg roll concession at the Iowa State Fair? It’s enough to make me weep into my Barolo.

13. SPICY ZEST – wins our award for surprise of the year. Tucked into the side panel of a giant strip mall on south Rainbow/Warm Springs, nothing (from the location to the tells-you-nothing odd ball name) prepares you for what’s inside — which is some of the best Szechuan food in town. Sleek, spotless, and friendly, with food that will blow your head off (in a good way).  Everything from the hot and sour soup to the Szechuan boiled fish (above) comes to the table looking like someone in the kitchen really cares, and is not just going through the motions. A real find.

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14. THE PEPPER CLUB

– Italian with a kick, rapidly morphing into a downtown power lunch spot. The spicy spaghetti (pictured above) is the truth, as are the stracciatella cheese app, and pork meatballs. If you insist, the (sooo cheugy) chicken parm get raves from the cringe crowd (see what we did there?), but we prefer the double-cut pork chop, and the carpaccio. Service can be well–meaning but spotty, but even at its slowest, it’s a great alternative when you can’t get into Esther’s, for either lunch or dinner. FYI: Despite what the sign says, Todd English hasn’t had anything to do with the place for years.

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15. RAKU

– There’s a reason The Food Gal® (pictured above) and I go to Raku every year for her birthday. And the reason is it’s the best Japanese food in town.

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16. HIROYOSHI – doesn’t have the sushi chops of Kabuto, nor the izakaya game of Raku, but for a legitimate slice of Japan in the ‘burbs, it’s tough to beat. The $100 sashimi platter (below) is what everyone gets, for good reason. The house made appetizers, especially the steamed mushrooms, and tempura are not to be missed.

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(The Great Vincenzo, and some Luddite in a ball cap) 

17. CIPRIANI – Almost every Friday (when we’re in town) we’re here for lunch. And the reason is deliciously simple Italian food, the way it’s supposed to be.

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18. PUBLICUS

– The Food Gal is nuts about their coffee and their toasts (avocado and otherwise), so every Sunday morn, that’s where you’ll find us. Yearly winner of The Best Restaurant In The Worst Location In Town award.

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19. ESTHER’S KITCHEN – “No one goes there anymore. It’s too crowded.” – Yogi Berra

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20. SOULBELLY BBQ – the best ‘cue in Vegas. Don’t even think about arguing with me about this.

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21. WILD FIG BBQ – the second best ‘cue in Vegas. But skip the sausage, it’s terrible. If you want to argue about the rest of the meats v. SoulBelly, we’ll at least allow the discussion.

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(#yolkporn)

22. WINNIE & ETHEL’S – the ultimate breakfast and lunch diner is now open for dinner!

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(Chef Ivan has got the meats!)

23. DELMONICO – 26 years old and better than ever. The steaks (and Louisiana specialties) are superb. Service never misses a beat. And the cheeseburger in a league of its own. And by “league of its own” we mean it won out our 2025 Best Steakhouse Burger at Eat. Talk. Repeat. over some very rare and well-done competition. There might be a better double-smashed cheeseburger somewhere in Vegas, but from the beefiness to the bun, we haven’t tasted it. And we’ve tasted them all.

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24. CARVERSTEAK – In a crowded category, Carversteak gets our nod for the best all-around steakhouse. From its serious booze and wine programs, to the inventive apps (crab with caviar, above, would be right at home on an upscale tasting menu) and major league proteins, no beef emporium does as many things as well as this big hitter, tucked into a corner of Resorts World.

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25. PETER LUGER – Argue all you want about the dated menu (which we find charming), but no one ages their steaks better. Fight me.

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26. HARLO 

– The next time some knucklehead starts telling you how great Barry’s, The Steakhouse or Golden Steer is, do what I do: tell ’em to “Go eat at Harlo and then we’ll talk.”

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27. MAE DALY’S – the anti-Golden Steer, with no Instagram-addicted crowds congratulating themselves because, “they heard it was good.” There, I said it. Also, parking is easy (and free!), but tip the valet just like the old days. Get the grilled oysters and a burger as appetizers (like we always do), and thank me later.

28. RINCON DE BUENOS AIRES – In many ways, the anti-Vegas-steakhouse — informal, fun, friendly, and reasonable. Also very accommodating to the BYO crowd, even if their priced-to-sell Malbecs match perfectly with the meat. Ideal for a crowd of carnivores, looking for exotic ways to make their hearts beat faster.  You’d better like soccer though, and pity the fool who mistakes the poster of Diego Maradona for Pelé.

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29. YEN VIET KITCHEN

– Not your typical pho parlor. Not even your typical Vietnamese. Tiny with zero social media presence, but a loyal following of Southeast Asian regs who know the good stuff…like Chinese sausage and pork on sticky rice (above).

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30. LAMAII – never disappoints and always has the most intriguing wines to match with its incendiary food. No one leaves without getting the crab fat fried rice (above). Our favorite Thai on Spring Mountain Road.

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31. MOIA – guaranteed to quench your Peruvian food jones even if it has the second worst location in town (after PublicUs). Get the ceviche or  tiraditos or Papa a la Huancaina (potatoes in yellow pepper cheese sause) and thank us later. Dive into the seafood only at your own risk, or only if you’re familiar with Peruvian food. As with every Peruvian restaurant we’ve ever tried, lots of things sound much better than they taste.

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32. LETTY’S TACOS – if you find a better quesobirria taco in town, let me know.

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33. CAFE BREIZH

– Kouign Amann. ‘Nuff said. Also, the best cappucino in town. And pastries. And baguettes.

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34. THE DAILY BREAD – a thumbnail breakfast/lunch joint with serious (in-house) baked goods. We don’t know how Scott Commings makes a living out of this crackerbox of a bakery/deli, but we’re glad he does.

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35. NOM PANG – Cambodian sandwiches (which taste a lot like Vietnamese sandwiches, stuffed as they are with greenery and bevy of unidentifiable lunch meats) have found a home on N. Rancho Dr. — in the least likely Southeast Asia sammie spot imaginable. The made-to-order soups and stews are a treat, too, even if occasionally you won’t know what you’re eating.

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The post The List – Where We’re Eating and Why appeared first on Being John Curtas.