Wing Lei / Wynn (Las Vegas)

[docsconz]

Russell, you addressed your question to David, but being this is a discussion forum, is any meal unenhanced by dining with a convivial group of people interested and knowledgeable about food? For my part, a shared experience is always preferable, though I am not averse to dining alone when necessary and would prefer to do so at a fine restaurant if my company would detract from the meal.

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John, I bring up this question from a certain cultural context. In my multi-course dining experiences in Chinese restaurants, the dishes are usually served communally, either "family-style" or "banquet-style." When I was looking through Wing Lei's menu, I did notice the tasting menu, as in each course is individually plated and served to the individual diner. That is not usually offered in a Chinese restaurant. The only time a course is served like that to a certain extent is the soup course, where the soup is brought out to the table, and then tableside, ladled into individual soup bowls already arranged, and finally served to each diner. And then there's the order of mu shu pork. But that's it!

I'm used to having tasting menus at "Western" restaurants by myself. Mind you, having a tasting menu dinner at a Chinese restaurant is having me do a double-take, just a bit. It would be a different dining experience for me, because of my previous dining experiences of eating a multi-course Chinese meal more communally. Mind you, I do eat Chinese food as a solo diner, mainly one-item meals like chow mein or a large bowl of noodle soup.

I hope this helps you (and others) understand where I'm coming from.

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It does. Thanks for the clarification.

[David Ross]

Mr. Ross, are you sure you're not Chinese?   

I'll be staying at the Wynn in early August. I'm definitely going to eat at Alex and Wing Lei.

Unless something changes, I'll be eating by myself. In your opinion, do you find that Wing Lei should be experienced more as a group than as a solo diner? Mind you, I've read the excellent accommodations Wing Lei made for solo diners.

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Actually I've only been as far 'East' as Hawaii, so I haven't even set foot in any country in Asia, although someday I plan to take a train trip into the far reaches of China.

Wing Lei is a great experience whether you go alone or with a group. I'm pretty serious about my dining experiences at this level, so if I did go with a group, I would make sure it was a group of people who had an appreciation and respect for Chinese cuisine like I do. For example, I would not want to go with a group of friends who were expecting to be served 'combination' plates of Egg Foo Young, Fried Shrimp and Fried Rice.

As far as when you go with a group eating 'family style,' yes, there is that opportunity. In fact, about half of the table have a lazy Susan in the center where the dishes are placed, allowing each member of the dining party to serve themselves just like you are used to in your home.

On the other hand, some dishes are served already 'plated' and served just to one person. For example, if there is a party of six and each person has ordered their own entree without an intention of sharing, it would be served solely to them.

In the end though, Wing Lei will cater to your specific needs and tastes in how you prefer the dishes be served.

[David Ross]

Superb report, David. Wing Lei is the only restaurant in Las Vegas right now that I would make a point of returning to the next time I am there. I haven't been to Alex yet.

One point about eating the spot prawns. Your waiter would have been correct to say that most non-Asian Americans do not suck shrimp heads, but he was wrong to apply the term to Caucasians in general as the practice is standard in Europe, especially along the coasts. I very much enjoyed doing that with the langoustines and Denia prawns that I recently had in Spain - magnificent! One difficulty is that in the US it is quite unusual to ever be served the heads - such a pity. It is almost impossible to buy head on shrimp, for example, retail other than at specialty markets or direct from the fisherman. Any degree of processing and the heads are gone. But that is one of the beauties of Wing Lei.

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Yes, how unfortunate that we weren't raised to suck shrimp-heads! Seriously.

I have to buy head-on frozen shrimp at my Asian market. If I am on a trip to Portland or Seattle I can buy them live.

In addition to sucking all that good goo out of the head, head-on prawns make a delicious base for Shrimp Bisque. I saute them with aromatics and then stab the heads with a wooden spoon to break all that head flavor into the base for the Bisque.

[Bu Pun Su]

Excellent review by Molto E and David

I never really thought of having fine dining for Chinese food

I always grew up with the idea that eating Chinese food, we're seating at a round table with 4 people or more and share many dishes in the middle (with rice or noddles). Who's the chef Wing Lei's Macau?

[jsmeeker]

Russell, you addressed your question to David, but being this is a discussion forum, is any meal unenhanced by dining with a convivial group of people interested and knowledgeable about food? For my part, a shared experience is always preferable, though I am not averse to dining alone when necessary and would prefer to do so at a fine restaurant if my company would detract from the meal.

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John, I bring up this question from a certain cultural context. In my multi-course dining experiences in Chinese restaurants, the dishes are usually served communally, either "family-style" or "banquet-style." When I was looking through Wing Lei's menu, I did notice the tasting menu, as in each course is individually plated and served to the individual diner. That is not usually offered in a Chinese restaurant. The only time a course is served like that to a certain extent is the soup course, where the soup is brought out to the table, and then tableside, ladled into individual soup bowls already arranged, and finally served to each diner. And then there's the order of mu shu pork. But that's it!

I'm used to having tasting menus at "Western" restaurants by myself. Mind you, having a tasting menu dinner at a Chinese restaurant is having me do a double-take, just a bit. It would be a different dining experience for me, because of my previous dining experiences of eating a multi-course Chinese meal more communally. Mind you, I do eat Chinese food as a solo diner, mainly one-item meals like chow mein or a large bowl of noodle soup.

I hope this helps you (and others) understand where I'm coming from.

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when I went, about two weeks ago, they did plate up the "main course" course of our duck tasting menus to share amongst the people ordering the duck menu as well as to share with those who did not. The dessert course was served the same way.

I'm not sure if this is normal for them or if they only did it because some people at the table ordered regularly. I think it worked out OK.

[BryanZ]

In early August 2007, I spent a few food-centric days in Las Vegas. My full trip report can be seen here. This is an excerpted report on my meal at Wing Lei:

Dinner that night would be at Wing Lei, the Chinese fine-dining restaurant at the Wynn. rjwong and I corresponded a bit right after his most recent trip earlier this month and immediately before mine. In one of his PMs he warned me that the tasting menu at Wing Lei had been somewhat dumbed down or Westernized since initial reports. I would have to agree with this assessment, and though the price has been brought down as well it’s not quite as appealing. I thought that this meal was quite good, at times very good, but failed to fundamentally change the way I feel about Chinese cuisine. This was my first high-end Chinese dining experience in this country and would have to rate it at about two stars. We selected the Peking duck tasting menu at $88/person.

While the duck dishes themselves were quite tasty, sometimes exceedingly so, the service experience and attention to detail was lacking. I’m not sure if there are better Chinese restaurants in Vegas, as I’ve not eaten at any others, but this meal fell somewhat short of comparable French or New American ones. If some of the service issues were resolved it would stand to be on par for the price point.

Menu

The signature tasting menu has come down in price, but the Peking duck menu has gone up. I didn’t feel that it was necessarily overpriced, however; the quality of the food was very good. Ordering presented a slight problem, as we were ignored for a few minutes after receiving our initial welcome and water. This wasn’t ignored in the let-them-get-settled sense but more like we were sitting there with our menus closed waiting for someone to come by. Even after I made eye contact with out captain he went off to put in an order at the bar for another table before coming to even check on us and explain the menu.

Carved Peking duck

The whole duck was presented tableside by our captain and assistant captain. The assistant quickly flayed off eight slices of duck enrobed by gloriously crispy skin. The captain the proceeded to place two slices in each pancake, giving us to wraps each. Extra hoisin sauce was provided for a little extra salt and sweetness. This was simple but pretty awesome.

Peking duck salad

Perhaps the most Western-tasting of all the evening’s dishes, this presented a nice balance between bitter greens, unctuous duck, and the sweet acidity of orange. The truffle vinaigrette, while very assertive, did a good job in giving the dish some body. I should note, however, that this dish was brought immediately after we had finished our duck wraps. As in, the busser cleared our dishes which were immediately replaced by the salad. To me this is a major faux pas, as there was no need to serve the salad immediately. It could have been fired in no more than a couple minutes or even could have sat on the pass as we regrouped.

Wild duck soup

A deep, rich soup that was laden with shredded vegetables, duck, and anise. To me, this dish tasted the most Chinese, probably because of the spices. This dish was brought out while my dining companion was in the bathroom. Thankfully it had a cover, so I told my captain to leave the cover on. Still, there was no need to serve the soup with one diner absent. The cover to my dish also had a small chip on its handle. I found these two service lapses disappointing.

Wok-fried duck and pan-seared duck noodles

This picture is so not representative of the amount of food we received it’s almost comical. While I might consider what I show on my plate a fair tasting-sized portion, not seen is the heaping mounds of food on the middle of the table. These dishes were both delicious and sufficiently diverse, but the amount of food most certainly betrayed the tasting menu aspect of this meal. Seriously, there was about ten times the amount of food on our communal plates in the center of the table and unfortunately we were not quite able to finish all of it. I’m sure, and hope, they serve the same amount of food to four tops.

Chef’s dessert selection

We made a request that no chocolate desserts be served at the beginning of the meal because we did not want a heavy finish. With the previous course under our belts a light finish was pretty much a necessity. The sorbet and honey was nice and palate cleansing and the sesame napoleon a little bit more substantial. Both made for a nice end to the meal even if they weren’t explicitly memorable.

[mcohen]

In one of his PMs he warned me that the tasting menu at Wing Lei had been somewhat dumbed down or Westernized since initial reports. I would have to agree with this assessment, and though the price has been brought down as well it’s not quite as appealing. I thought that this meal was quite good, at times very good, but failed to fundamentally change the way I feel about Chinese cuisine.

From reading the initial reports in this thread, this restaurant sounded like it had always been geared towards the gwai lo, ie white people. I don't know why you would be so shocked that the food was westernized if you read the menu or description of the food. I know this place uses Chinese ingredients, but I'm not even so sure we should call it Chinese cuisine. Maybe, fusion food would be a more apropos desciption.

When I was in Vegas when this place had just openeed, I remember asking some of my Chinese associates if they wanted to eat there and they just scoffed at the place and said it wasn't real Chinese food.