I’m writing this from the comfort of my own home after a day of rest and recovery.  Before I get into the details of the food I had at Mario Batali’s restaurant, I’d like to point out what an amazing place Las Vegas is for people that care about food.  I suppose I could try and come up with a list of how many celebrity chefs there are with restaurants in Sin City now, but it would probably take me a few hours and even then new places are opening ever 30 seconds or so.  I’m very grateful that I only need to fly to one spot to try cuisines from places all over.

The last night of our vacation, my wife and I managed to secure reservations for Mario Batali and Joseph Bastianich’s B and B Ristorante.  When we arrived, every seat was filled, including all of the chairs at the bar.  Rock music was playing fairly loud, but not loud enough that we couldn’t hear each other over it.  Apparently, one way to tell if Mr. Batali was in the kitchen was the volume of the music.  If it was so loud your ears started bleeding, Mario was in the house.

I had originally planned on taking pictures of our food, but the light was so low, and there were so many waiters and other diners around that I really didn’t want to be “that guy.”  Even then, I’d prefer not to show such amazing food unless the pictures could do it justice.  Sadly, I’ll have to use my limited grasp of the English language to try paint a picture of culinary bliss for you.

We started off with the Warm Tripe alla Parmigiana which I had actually tried to cook myself a few months back.  The restaurant’s tripe was much more tender, and the tomato sauce that accompanied it was very spicy, adding another dimension to the dish.  If you check the recipe above, you’ll notice that there isn’t an ingredient that would add heat.  I’m not sure what was added to bring the spiciness, but when I make this again I’ll be sure to add some chili flakes.  We ate as much as we could, but ended up having leftovers that were packaged up.  We were given a claim ticket to pick them up at the receptionist area later.  In all my years, I’ve never had that happen, but it’s a great way to show you the level of service we received.  Unbelievable.

Next up was the Lamb’s Brain “Francobolli” with Lemon and Sage.  I was very intrigued by this dish because of the lamb brain recipes that I have already made.  When the postage stamp shaped pasta arrived, the first bite yielded the rich and familiar flavor of lamb brains, mixed with ricotta cheese and butter, offset by the acidic lemon and earthy sage.  If you can make it to Babbo in New York, or B and B Ristorante in Vegas, order this.  I swear to you, you’ll enjoy it a good deal more than you could possibly imagine.

Lastly, we enjoyed a prickly pear sorbet special for dessert.  The chef and cooks had gone out to pick the pears themselves earlier in the day.  It was sweet, and tart, and the perfect way to end the meal.

After paying the bill, we went to go pick up our leftover tripe appetizer.  When we handed our claim ticket over, the hostess was unable to locate our takeout bag.  It turns out that someone had come by and taken our tripe.  While we were a bit disappointed, knowing that the thief was met with an “unconventional” meal seemed to make it okay.

Next week, it’s back to normal, see you then!