Koi - Las Vegas
May 13th, 2008 bobby gI See Horrible Food. I Hear Loud Music. I Think I Am Going to Vomit.
Winnie and I headed to Las Vegas to get out of Los Angeles for the weekend for a little R&R. I wasn’t planning on writing anything about the weekend since our plan was to basically do nothing but, with a meal like this I feel a certain responsibility to post a little something something.
We had a confirmed 8:30PM reservation at Koi - Las Vegas which is located in the newly renovated Planet Hollywood Hotel & Casino (formerly the Aladdin). We had also requested to be seated in the Fountain Room which I am told has a great view of the Belliago fountain (if you have never seen it, you must). We never got to see it from that angle as when we arrived we were told the room was full. They were very kind about it and offered us the option to wait a few minutes at the bar for a table to open up. We chose to wait although after a few minutes the hostess came by and said it would be longer than expected. Fine. Take us to our table.
A calm washed over me as the hostess escorted us to a nice side booth in the main dining room. For the record, Koi has very nice decor, friendly wait-staff, and generally plays good music (more on that later though). Winnie described it as something out of the swinging 60s but with a darker color scheme. We were generally pleased so far and were really looking forward to the sushi.
When we sat down we were told the sushi menu was located on the back of the main menu. This should have been our first tip they had something to hide. While I won’t go into great detail on every single item I’ll throw you the lowlights:
- The waiter did not ask to take our drink orders and we had to flag him down to get sake.
- The edamame was overcooked and appeared to not be fresh (almost mushy and brownish).
- The rice was undercooked (not sticky enough).
- All the fish tasted like it was at least two days old.
The moment we knew we were in real trouble came by the way of the most disgusting sea urchin I have ever had. You know when you have something that is so bad it feels like something is crawling up your back? Yeah. The sea urchin gave me that feeling. This gave way to the most awful morning mouth and breath combo.
Right about when the gag reflex kicked in the restaurant turned into more of a lounge type scene. The music changed from classic rock hits to more or less club music. The bass was so loud that it rattled our dinner glasses and now made it almost impossible to talk to each other.
At this moment, still very hungry, we decided that ordering more sushi would possibly lead to vomit so we opted instead to order off the ‘hot’ menu (I use quotation marks here for a reason). We requested Roasted Duck Breast which I assumed would be tender, juicy, and full of flavor. Well basically it was like eating warm rubber. I can only assume they cooked it in a microwave and then threw it under a broiler to darken the skin.
I chose this place because it had gotten good reviews online, had a good reputation in Los Angeles, and was frequented by celebrities (they know what they are doing right?). Winnie was kind enough to remind me that just because people are famous does not mean they have good taste. She was so right.
For the price we would have been better off eating at Sushi Roku or rather, skipping it altogether. Save yourself the time and effort and head over to Sushi Roku if you really want sushi in the City of Sin.
