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| - My husband and I had dinner at Bartolotta to celebrate a special occasion in Vegas, and while we were initially very, very excited to eat dinner here, we were left a little bit disappointed at the end of it all. After reviewing our menu options with our server, Catalin, we decided to try the Bravo's Top Chef dinner menu. This is easily the most expensive item on the menu at $180pp, so we had very high expectations. We are no strangers to fine dining and usually opt for a chef's tasting menu if given the option.
Let me start out by saying that our reservation was for a 6:15pm seating. Service was very attentive during the first few courses, and eventually trailed off as the night went on and the restaurant got busier. That alone was disappointing. You would expect an establishment to provide outstanding service from start to finish, ESPECIALLY if they are well-regarded and put themselves out to be among the best of the best.
The Top Chef Menu:
- Catalin brought out some house-made bread, but warned us not to fill up on it since there were many courses to follow. I only had a few bites, but they were very good. It was hard to stop eating the bread for sure.
- We started with some fresh marinated Mediterranean anchovies. These were quite yummy and we felt that we were off to a great start.
- Next up was the Ligurian octopus salad, soaked in olive oil and lemon. The octopus was extremely tender and very flavorful. The olive oil and citrus notes were well-balanced. Followed by seared sea scallops with porcini mushrooms. (The scallops were by far, my favorite dish of the evening. They were perfectly seared and the mushrooms brought life to the party!) We also had some John Dory fish, and spiny lobster. These were all very good. The langoustine was sweet and delicious, and according to Catalin, Bartolotto is one of 12 restaurants in the world that get this type of lobster delivered fresh from Italy.
- Our pasta dishes arrived next... (This is sort of when service started to drop off...) We had sheep's milk ricotta ravioli with pecorino cheese, rigatoni with scorpion fish and eggplant, risotto with clams, scallops, shrimp, lobster, cuttlefish, and octopus, and penne with lobster, shrimp, and crab in a tomato sauce. The ravioli was smooth and my husband really enjoyed it. The rigatoni and risotto were both equally alright, but we didn't rave about these two much. I will add that the eggplant in the rigatoni dish was more "room temperature" than the rest of the dish. That was a little odd. The penne was my favorite of all the pastas. The penne tasted like it was boiled in a seafood broth - that's how flavorful it was. I wish I only ordered a huge plate of this penne for dinner.
- Finally, the grand finale was a whole Mediterranean fish, baked in an aromatic salt crust. (I believe it was sea bream.) This was the dish that everyone raved about and the sole reason for us having dinner here... Not only was there about a 15 minute gap between the time the pasta dishes were cleared and the fish brought out, but the fish was overdone!!! It was the driest fish I've ever had in my life, and although it smelled wonderfully aromatic (lots of fennel), it was actually very bland. The fish was filleted table side... Juan served it to us, and he didn't do that great of a job with his knife skills. Both my husband and I had bones in our fish and proceeded to eat with caution. We forced ourselves to finish the fish entree, but honestly, didn't care much for it at all. It was served with some steamed cucumbers, which I am assuming is a necessary pairing to add moisture to the dry fish.
- A symphony of desserts followed: 3 flavors of gelato, 3 flavors of sorbet, 3 flavors of shaved ice, an olive oil cake, a chocolate mousse with olive oil, and a few pieces of chocolate. It was dessert overload... The gelato, sorbet, and shaved ice were all enjoyable. The other parts of dessert, I didn't really care much for.
By the time dinner was over, almost 3 hours had elapsed and we had to be on our way to catch a show. It took about 20 minutes for Juan to get the check. Basically after the pastas arrived, our main server, Catalin, never returned and I guess Juan filled his role. They didn't refill our water glasses as often, and did not check on how we were doing after the dishes were served... It was upsetting that we were spending all of this money for a tasting menu, but all of a sudden it was like we didn't matter since there were other parties to tend to.
At the end of the day, we dropped well over $450 (excludes wine) and felt a little bit ripped off to be honest. Had the service been consistent from start to finish, and had the fish not been overdone, we might have felt differently. The meal started out well, but did not end up as well as I would have liked. I'd recommend to order a la carte and not to splurge on the Top Chef menu.
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