Last night my wife and I dined at Harlo. It’s a newish restaurant in Summerlin fifteen minutes west of the Strip in Las Vegas.
One of the things that you have to do when you leave a town is find your new groove. Chicago is one of the best restaurant towns in the United States and arguably, the world. Las Vegas has some of the best restaurants in the US, but most are on the Strip. I am slowly finding my spots off the Strip. It takes time and frankly, some tolerance for failure.
That’s changing. The pace of change is happening a bit more briskly now. More and more places are opening where chefs off the Strip have decided to open a small place and get back to their roots.
If you are a restauranteur or chef in a place like Chicago and you don’t think Vegas is your scene, think again. Summerlin or Henderson might be your scene and you won’t have anything to do with the Strip. Your crowd will be locals. They want to patronize you over and over again.
The people I meet in Summerlin where I live are all from somewhere else. Mostly they are transplants from California but also Oregon, Seattle, Illinois, Minnesota, and New York. They left their indigenous states for a lot of reasons but the two most that are cited are crime and taxes.
One thing that I have told my friends here is that I am a snob when it comes to steak. Being from Chicago will do that to you. I am a hard grader when it comes to steak. Sure, there are steak places on the Strip of course. But, I don’t want to go to the Strip for a steak.
I love that casinos draw crowds and have great restaurants. But, sometimes, you don’t want the pomp and circumstance that comes with parking, walking a long way through a casino and into a restaurant. Plus, casinos cater to tourists and conventions, not locals. It’s a subtle difference.
I can make a pretty mean steak at home. But, while I can get very close to a top-notch steakhouse, it’s not exactly the same and sometimes you don’t want to put in the effort. I am a hard grader on myself as well.
For what it’s worth if you are familiar with Gibson’s, Erie Cafe, and Chicago Cut those were my three go-to’s in Chicago. Gene and Georgetti used to be on the list but it has fallen. I have not been impressed with a single steak I have had at a restaurant in Las Vegas.
I tried T-Bones at the local Red Rock Casino, and frankly, it’s a gentleman’s C and if we weren’t in grad school, it would get a lower grade. My local country club has a steak night but the food at the club is not the reason you join it. I did the Echo and Rig thing and it’s a B at best. E+R does offer $0 on corkage which is nice. But, the steaks are just okay at both of those places and the sides are less than inspiring.
Enter Harlo. It was started about a year and a half ago and this was really our first chance to try it. We have been many times to its “sister” restaurant, La Strega. La Strega is one of our go-to’s and I was there the night before I went to Harlo. It’s a top-notch place. Harlo isn’t cheap eats, but no decent steakhouse is. Don’t go there if you are trying to maximize your pleasure but you really want to spend $25 a plate.
It’s in downtown Summerlin which is a euphemism for a shopping mall. Anyone that lived in an urban area laughs a little when they hear “downtown Summerlin”. But, Harlo has sliced a nice part of the mall out with parking right there and it feels isolated and cozy. They did an A+ job there. Plus, I don’t have to worry about getting car-jacked or shot at.
You walk in and the space is large and expansive. It’s not done up like a typical steak place. It’s airy. Often steakhouses are tight, and loud and you are on top of one another. This is more 1960s California cool midcentury modern. There is a high ceiling with acoustical tile, and there are draperies around the outside that makes it feel very private but they also damp down the noise. There is a long bar in front with a couple of televisions, but they don’t dominate the room.
Even though the space is expansive, it’s intimate. If you were coming there for business, you could get stuff done. The decor is calming and nice enough so that you can bring your wife and have a very nice dinner. The lighting is correct and easy on the eyes. Harlo strikes the right balance there. They really hit it out of the park.
We sat at a table in the back and our server told us it was one of the quieter ones but unlike a lot of restaurants that are full of hard surfaces and noisy, this one is conversational. No shouting above the din.
The servers are Harlo know their stuff. They know their way around the menu and instead of commodity showy service that you get on the Strip, they are trying to build a regular clientele and relationships. There is a difference and people that are regulars at restaurants know what I am talking about.
The wine list at Harlo is well-chosen. Some of the wines are trophy wines, some spectacular, and all are very good. I was looking at the vintages along with the producers and they are top vintages with top producers. They didn’t sneak in lower-quality vintages with a top producer. Harlo is an “Italian steakhouse” but they have wine from every region there both red, white, and sparkling. They also have some very nice dessert wine and amaro’s along with cognac/Armagnac and really anything you wanted. It should become a Wine Spectator award wine list if it isn’t already.
The menu at Harlo has a little something for everyone. I was surprised at how many things were on it. One thing I will get there on another trip is not a steak, but Dover Sole served tableside just like they do in France with some white burgundy. Their menu changes seasonally which is kind of fun. It really makes for some interest when it comes to vegetables.
They have a fun caviar service which we didn’t order. It’s not cheap, but caviar isn’t cheap either. We did oysters and they were fantastic. Super fresh. Some people don’t like oysters but we love them. One thing about Vegas is you can get good seafood in restaurants, but there is not one fishmonger in town, like Dirk’s, to buy good fish from. I can still taste those oysters this morning.
My wife and I split a huge steak. We order them medium-rare to rare. A lot of people don’t like their steaks cooked like that but we do. One thing that is key to me when you order a steak is the crust on the outside combined with the right cook on the inside. A steak shouldn’t be mushy inside, but it shouldn’t be firm either. A lot of steakhouses try to cover up their sins of buying lower-quality meat by overseasoning or using too much butter. Harlo didn’t. It was crusty, and the meat had the right amount of give. It had the right amount of buttery salty flavor to hit the umami level you want. You didn’t need a special steak knife to slice it.
The sides were very very good. In Chicago, there used to be a place called David Burke’s Primehouse. One feature of it was the time spent making sure the sides were excellent. Harlo has spent a lot of time figuring that out. We had the spring peas and they were wonderful. They were prepared to pair nicely with the steak. The crispy potatoes were exactly that. They weren’t soggy at all like you might get at some places nor were they dried up too much.
Desserts at steakhouses often are just massive pieces of cake. At Gibson’s in Chicago, if you order one piece of chocolate cake, it really is a portion size for a busload of migrants. They are an afterthought. Something a restaurant has to have but doesn’t really work on crafting to a different level. Harlo worked on crafting something special. Banana’s Foster was pitch-perfect. As good as I would get in New Orleans. The caramel had the right profile. Not too sweet. The other desserts we had were just as well executed.
Las Vegas is a city on the rise and will keep rising if they do things right. The Strip is the Strip. It will always be the Strip and frankly, that’s great. It’s nice being 15 minutes away from one of Earth’s greatest manmade playgrounds. Summerlin and Henderson are not the Strip and they are forging their own identities.
Harlo is a must-do, can’t miss if you like fine dining. It’s gonna go on my ledger. I can’t wait to be a regular. If you have moved here from somewhere else, you need to give it a try. I also think it’s worth a trip off the Strip.
Have not been to vegas in a while. Looked over the wine list. My thoughts. Champagnes. Not enough 2008 vintage (best in last 30 years). Krug 2008 is available. Scoop it up while it lasts. No Veuve Cliquot. I prefer La Grande Dame over Dom, but thats just personal pref. Very good selection of desert wines. The fact that they have DRC pretty much tells you everything you need to know on that end on the whites. Very nice indeed. Nice Sassicaia selection from Italy. Like that too. Also a very nice selection across the entire region of Bordeaux. St. Emillion and Pomerol along with traditional Paulliac and Margaux. Very nice, good vintages and selection. Its generally my opinion that when a steak house puts in this much effort into its wine list, it says really good things. May have to go out to Vegas to try this out.
We live in AR and we have a lot of friends who claim Taylor's Steakhouse in Dumas AR is among the best. But we really have no experience to guide us, so we just take their word for it. If anybody travelled to various top-notch steakhouses and have eaten at Taylor's, we would love to know your thoughts on Taylor's Steakhouse in Dumas AR. Thank you for your review.