| rev:text
| - Before spending a half-hour at this wine bar, I wondered why it was called the Hostile Grape. Now, unfortunately, I know. First off, the M Resort is a $40 cab ride from the airport, which is how we arrived there from the airport, thinking it would be a quick trip for a wine-lover who had some time to kill before a flight back to LA. (The map on the website makes it look like less than a hop, skip and a jump from the Strip.) Second, you are required to buy a card from them ($5.41, non-refundable) and put a minimum of $25 on it. The minimum is fine--I can drink that in ten minutes--and given the wide variety of wines to choose from (at price levels varying from $2.50 to $7.75 for 1oz tasting pours), it was easy to spend $25. Once I'd tasted five or six wines, I was ready to purchase 5oz pours of my two favorites, settle back in one of the plush lounge chairs and enjoy the time I had left. I approached the bar and told the bartender that I would like to put $16 more on my card. He looked at me rather contemptuously and said that I couldn't: $25 was the minimum. Hmph, thought I, "How about zero?" I asked. He grabbed my card, turned away from me, and took it behind the bar.
Maybe he deals with a lot of unknowing philistines. Maybe he was ticked off that the four people who had just walked in had sniffed at the minimum and the card fee and turned around. Maybe he's just not a people person. Whatever the case, I had made a special, costly trip to visit his establishment and was about to spend another $40 to leave it. I chose not to be angry at him and decided to save my vitriol for a well-reasoned Yelp review.
For the record, I too experienced the broken machines mentioned in other reviews. One of them squirted out a fizzy spurt of wine and subtracted a fraction of a dollar from my card. When I told an (earlier) bartender about it, they fixed the problem right away and gave me a generous pour of the same wine gratis. (That's why I'm giving the Hostile Grape two stars). I did not taste any old wines, but I would suggest storing--at the very least--the pinots at a lower temperature, because at room temperature this particular grape suffers. The selection is decent, maybe erring a bit generously towards American Cabernet. The giant room is pleasant, roomy, and dark...less cellar dark, more library dark. The other staff I encountered were more than accommodating. But I won't be going back. There was too much hostility.
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