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| - Trattoria Nakamura-ya is described by its owner as a "Tokyo-style Italian" restaurant, and after our visit here, I feel that is a PERFECT description!
Walking inside, with a fully Japanese staff greeting you at the door, you wonder, am I really in Vegas? Does Vegas have places like this? The ambiance and decor definitely lean towards an Italian restaurant, but you can't deny the Japanese influence, from the chefs being visible behind the counter (like a sushi bar!) to the unmistakably non-Italian ingredients incorporated into the appetizers, entrees, and pastas.
My favorite example of the meeting of the two cuisines was when we ordered one of the specials - the branzino. The waitress asked how we would like it prepared - as carpaccio for a more Italian style, or as sashimi for a more Japanese style. I really liked how flexible and versatile the chefs were to be able to offer both options.
We ended up going with the branzino sashimi, in addition to ordering the garlic bread, kurobuta shabu shabu salad, miso carbonara, eggplant linguini, and kurobuta tonkatsu. We shared family style and three entrees, two appetizers, and two orders of garlic bread (plus regular bread!) were enough to reasonably fill up 5 people.
All the dishes came out fairly quickly and everything was flavorful! The Japanese and Italian aspects of all the dishes came together very well. Especially creative and delicious was the kurobuta tonkatsu, which was a tonkatsu cutlet but with mozzarella cheese inside - um, can you say amazing!? The miso carbanara and eggplant linguini were good - the boyfriend mentioned he probably could've downed a whole pasta entree by himself.
One of the only minor things was that they didn't catch one of our salad orders and we were left wondering if it was ever going to come out. The featured wine of the day was also a bit bland and not particularly worth the extra cost. However, overall, our visit was positive, staff was welcoming and friendly, prices were not exorbitant, and I would come back again to try the uni and squid ink pastas they are known for (and maybe some dessert)!
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