YELLOWTAIL

SUSHI WE HARDLY KNEW YEE aka Sushi Jumps The Shark– Part Three

In this last of our 3-part series, we examine another nouveau sushi-sashimi enterprise, and find one that hews closer to the spirit of true sushi/sashimi than you might expect from a restaurant associated with a nightclub. Click here and here to read Parts One and Deux.

Yellowtail in the Bellagio is another creation from The Light Group – nightclub impresarios who now run six food and beverage outlets in that hotel alone – along with several others around town. Like the Wolfgang Puck Fine Dining Group, it runs a tight ship in all of its outposts, and rarely puts forth food that feels commercialized or by-the-numbers. Make no mistake, like Sushi Samba, this is a corporate food factory, designed and planned to the nines; calculated at every turn to appeal to the zeitgeist of how modern America eats. Also like Sushi Samba, it’s next door to a nightclub, so many of its customers are of that ilk.

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GIORGIO RISTORANTE…and Piero Selvaggio

When Piero Selvaggio first opened Valentino in Santa Monica in 1972, he will tell you he knew very little about Italian food and absolutely nothing about Italian wine. By the time he and Chef Luciano Pellegrini opened Valentino in The Venetian nine years ago, ELV (and many others) will tell you he was widely considered the best Italian restaurateur in America, and that probably no one, outside of Italy, knows more about Italian wine.

Selvaggio’s personal and professional pilgrimage began on the southeastern coast of Sicily. He and his family moved to Brooklyn in 1963, and six years later, he was a very young man with a lot of ambition and no prospects. So where did he head? Well, to Las Vegas of course! Yes, even in 1969 it seems Vegas was the land of plenty for expatriates and nomads looking to make their mark on the world. As the French would say: plus la change, plus la meme chose (the more things change, the more they stay the same).

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Bocuse d’Or USA

Bocuse d’Or USA concluded last weekend in Orlando, Florida with pretty much every top toque in the American/French food world being present. After years of being creamed by foreign teams, the U.S. of A. decided to get serious this year with its competition — in order to field the strongest two-person team it could for the international cooking contest to be held in Lyon, France in January ’09.

Photos by Valeria Rispoli

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