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Las Vegas Restaurant Notes

With all the "celebrity chefs'' lured by Las Vegas' new casinos, you could enjoy a great and different, although often expensive, restaurant every night for weeks. Here are four of the more moderately priced ones that I tried last week:

Mon Ami Gabi, at Paris, serves excellent food in a remarkably authentic atmosphere, although the service needs work. It's owned by Lettuce Entertain You, the Chicago company that first introduced the concept last year in that city.

The restaurant has several large rooms inside, and an outdoor section -- unique for the Strip and a great place to see the hourly fountain show in front of Bellagio, across the street. Watching diners at Mon Ami Gabi sitting outside with buckets of mussels and bottles of wine is reminiscent of the real Paris.

The menu is typical of French brasseries, where steaks and French Fries rule. There's also a fresh seafood bar. Entrees run about $20.

I had steak au poivre and a side order of scalloped potatoes called Pommes Dauphinoises. Both were excellent. The portions were larger than you'd receive in France, but I didn't complain.

The wine list is French, with products from the country's various regions. There are quite a few good selections that run under $40.

I rarely try buffets, but Le Village Buffet at Paris is an unusual one. Each of the five serving stations features specialties from one of five regions of France. The Alsace station, for example, may offer braised duck while the Provence station may serve sauteed sea bass.

Some of the items, of course, would never be found at a French restaurant, unless it catered to Americans. This is especially true at breakfast; the only thing the French have for breakfast is bread and strong coffee. So the platters of egg dishes and bacon are not authentic.

But many of the dishes are. I found the choices to be plentiful and the food good, subject to the limitations of a buffet format. The coffee is far too weak. Prices range from $11 to $20, depending on time of day. Lines can be long.

Royal Star has opened recently at the Venetian. It's owned by Kevin Wu, who runs the Royal Star in Santa Monica, Calif. I tried the Dim Sum, the wonderful small servings of Chinese dishes that many restaurants offer only on Sunday. Royal Star serves Dim Sum every day, from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.

The carts of Dim Sum items were a little slow coming around, and many of the 45 selections that were listed on the sign never appeared at all. Perhaps that's because the restaurant wasn't very busy.

This wasn't the greatest Dim Sum I've experienced, but it was good. Some of the less common selections were excellent, such as the spinach dumpling and a dumpling called shark fin gow.

The cost of these appetizer-sized items can add up. I was hungry and had no trouble spending $50. I didn't try dinner at Royal Star. Judging from the menu, the selections are not too exotic. Entrees range from $16 to $28.

One of the more interesting Mexican restaurants in Las Vegas is Taqueria Canonita, at the Venetian. It's owned by Stephan Pyles, a Dallas chef who has also opened a high-end restaurant at the Venetian called Star Canyon.

The menu at Taqueria Canonita includes items you don't see at the typical North American Mexican restaurant. I had a shrimp and mango quesadilla and entrée called Pork Barbacoa. That's a leg of pork marinated in chipotle barbecue and roasted in banana leaves.

Both the appetizer and the entrée were delicious. The restaurant also has a long list of specialty tequilas, with tasting notes. The dinner and two margaritas cost me $30.

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