Royally Flushed

Enjoy a glass of the signature Sauvignon "B" while perusing the menu at Enoteca San Marco at The Venetian Las Vegas.

Any trip to Las Vegas wouldn’t be complete without me making a sojourn to one of the many celebrity chef outposts on The Strip.  On our last visit, I left P.B. at the Bally’s Sports Book and took a trip to The Venetian where I had a completely enjoyable solo lunch at Mario Batali’s Enoteca San Marco facing St. Mark’s Square.

It was a relatively quiet Sunday afternoon so I had my choice of tables.  With newspaper in hand, I selected a table on the patio and settled in for a long leisurely lunch.  Soon after I was seated, a group of performers from the resort’s “Phantom of the Opera” production took to a small stage set up on the Square and proceeded to entertain diners and visitors to the Grand Canal Shoppes alike.

My server arrived promptly to give me a run-down on the Chef’s specials including the daily pizza, pasta and salad choices.  After looking through the selections on the menu, I chose one of the day’s pasta specials – cavatappi with pork belly ragu along with a side of the Brussels sprouts salad.  While a hearty red would have gone with the pasta dish, I chose a glass of the signature white Sauvignon “B” which was, in my opinion, a little more conducive to lunch.  The quality of the wine plus the hefty eight-ounce pour made the $15 price tag seem a lot more reasonable.

Casual seating at the marble bar is available for diners at Enoteca San Marco.

Shortly after pouring my wine, my waiter returned with a paper-wrapped serving of mahogany-crusted country bread along with a package of thin and crispy breadsticks.  These were excellent chewy complements to the Brussels sprout salad, a crunchy concoction of shredded raw sprouts, piquant Parmesan Reggiano cheese and a light slick of grassy olive oil.  (I’ve since made this and several of his dishes from his ” Italian Grill” cookbook and we’ve enjoyed them all.)

Impressed with my meal so far, I eagerly anticipated my pasta dish while flipping through the Sunday paper, sipping my wine and enjoying the entertainment.  My pasta arrived and, in a word, it was superb.  Redolent of caramelized onions and garlic, the rich meaty sauce featured a generous amount of meltingly tender shreds of pork.  The homemade pasta spirals a perfect vehicle for the luxurious sauce.  By far one of the most decadent pasta dishes I have ever had and I finished every bite.

Cavatappi with pork belly ragu.

Too satisfied to even think about dessert, I finished my wine while watching the crowd go by and, if my Las Vegas Review-Journal had been a copy of Le Monde and the blue above a true sky, I could have easily mistaken my afternoon meal for a luncheon in the real Venezia.

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Tags: fine dining Las Vegas, Italian restaurants, Las Vegas, Las Vegas restaurants, Mario Batali, review, The Venetian