Philadelphia Steak & Hoagie

It was always going to be a mistake trying the famous 'Philly cheese steak', anywhere, but in Philadelphia. But in Vegas, you do crazy things, and this was not my first mistake on the strip.

The cheese steak arrived, looking nothing like the wizz cheese doused sandwich i expected. I asked at the counter, 'Is there cheese wizz?', to which she replied yes.

Still dubious about the presence of cheese, i took the first bite. The roll was the first letdown, being a ghastly pale white colour, which tasted equally as bad. The meat, was overcooked, and flavourless. There was the slightest hint of a cheese flavour, which was quickly eradicated by the other terrible ingredients slopped together in this visually & sensory culinary failure.

Needless to say, this was shithouse. After 1/3 complete, i could go no further. Hence the shortest review to date.

Hot N Juicy Crawfish : Las Vegas : United States

After seeing the travel channel shows 'Man Vs Food' Vegas episode, and being devoted, yet deprived shellfish eater, this place was a MUST-DO. You see, in Australia, shellfish are top-dollar, and not particularly accessible for this reason. You enjoy them on the odd occasion, but luxuries like 3-5 varieties of crab, are unheard of.

With expectations exceedingly high, we set off for this crustacean exploration. Greeted by friendly staff, who were helpful & attentive, guiding us through the menu.

With the orders, you can select between mild, medium & hot spices for your seafood. You then select a seasoning, such as cajun, garlic/butter & hot n juicy special.

Warned of their tendency to heavily spice food, we decided to order 2lb of the crawfish, hot n juicy special style, and 1lb of snow crab legs, with garlic/butter. Both mild, because why ruin the flavour of good shellfish?

The bags arrived, presented like this to further steam the flavour into the shellfish.

After a short time, not being able to wait any longer, we ripped into it

Starting with the ever so tasty looking crawfish, their heads were ripped off, and sucked of their juices. The Hot n Juicy special tasted like a combination of their seasonings, with hints of cajun, garlic & chilli. Needless to say, the combination of lobster-esque head juice, and the seasoning was amazing. The body of the crawfish is a much more enduring, and possibly less satisfying process. Their hard shell is difficult to remove, unlike a prawn or shrimp. It takes a combination of technique, process & strength to quickly peel one. Once peeled, however, the small piece of meat is flavourful, and has an amazing after taste, of yes, lobster.

As you can see above, the crawfish 'massacre' was swift and efficient, each of us trying to eat as many as possible as fast as possible, to ensure we got our even share. We then moved onto the crab. It had been a long time since my last over-indulgenet meal of crab, i mean a looong time. Using the nut-cracker to open the shell, exposing long arms of pure crab meat, was a thoroughly enjoyable process.

The crab meat was very fresh, and tasted sweet and succulent. The garlic butter only complemented the gentle flavour. I could eat this all day i thought to myself. The legs were large, with hidden chunks of meat throughout.

After finishing two huge piles of fresh seafood, we were both immensely satisfied, but it was obvious, we could not leave Vegas without another journey to Hot n Juicy.

The second visit, we tried king crab. We had read so much about the lengths fisherman go to catch it, which made it all the more desirable. Hopefully this image puts the sheer size of these legs to scale...They were enormous!

The king crab had an entirely different flavour to the snow crabs. Where the snow crabs were light and sweet, the king crab was robust and slightly meaty. They contained huge amounts of meat, that when peeled correctly, pulled out of the shell like candy bars.

This one here, is actually the 'claw bar'.

The second journey was equally as satisfying & enjoyable. If i was a Las Vegas local, i would without a doubt be here weekly.

Philippe's : Los Angeles - United States

Philippe's is a cool old-school diner located in just 10 minutes from Sunset Boulevard in LA. They specialise, and are famous for their french-dipped sandwiches & home-style cooking, done well.

With Philippe being the self-proclaimed original, the stage was set for my first french-dipped sandwich. A process which involves a roast beef roll, which is then dunked in beef broth, making the roll and its contents, undoubtedly juice, and meaty.

Different grades exist from a single dip, where i believe just the meat is dipped, right through to the double dip.

Sitting down with my double dipped beef roll. I was overcome with a sense of beef satisfaction, that it was now blatantly clear Arby's had not provided.

The roll super crusty on the outside whilst super juicy, and slightly soggy on the inside. But this was different to your old soggy burger...intentional beef tasting soggy...is amazing.

The beef is finely sliced, highly flavoursome and tasted like Mum's roast beef, which sets a high standard. The beef stock was a real standout, turning a potentially boring beef roll, into something special and memorable, in such a simplistic fashion.

The sheer number of customer's at around 9pm said it all. Philippe has created a hoard of loyal followers, which i now know why.

Location : 1001 N. Alameda Street, adjacent to Chinatown

Arbys : Los Angeles - United States

Arby's was always a must-do for this Australian, after seeing the Apprentice jingle challenge for their chicken tenders, which is forever etched into my mind.

Located near our hotel, we stopped there for a roast beef injection. Ordering the classic, 'regular' roast beef combo, we waited for its delivery, accompanied by curly fries and some doctor pepper.

The roast beef sandwich exceeded expectations of Los Angeles fast food, being packed with thinly sliced roast beef, when stacked upon one-another, must have totaled around 20 slices, topped with cheddar cheese.

A simple concoction, which actually worked really well. The beef was decent, but could have had more flavour like a tasty doner kebab from home. The cheese really overpowered this beef, and i won't even go into the soggy bread roll which made the burger far less downable.

This experience makes me wonder whether something so simple, could be a successful franchise at home in Australia, where who knows whether there's room for another large fast food joint.

Is beef & cheese too simple for 2010? I personally think not, just look at the Philly cheese steak!

Hooters : Los Angeles - United States

I had long resisted the temptation to visit hooters. The only one back in Sydney, being located in the western suburbs, Paramatta to be precise, was not particularly alluring, nor did i think it would do justice to the franchise.

So when we stumbled across one on of these 'tacky yet refined' establishments on Hollywood Boulevard, we had to visit.

There were not many patrons, and those there represented a cross section of society, from young ladies, to old grumpy men. Presumably everyone wanted to see the waitresses in short, orange, lycra pants. And hey, so did i. Here is a sneakily taken picture, for everyones benefit.

We ordered some Cajun styled chicken wings, and beer, for a healthy & tasty late night snack. The wings arrived and looked great! I ripped into them, and discovered the tasted almost as good as they looked. However, this was for my preference for salty snacks seemed to cloud my judgement as Alisha was not so impressed.

The chicken seemed like it originated from a clean bird, and was moistly enjoyable.

We discovered the wings were served with carrot, celery & blue cheese sauce, a style which was to be reiterated through our USA travels. Why blue cheese and vegetables to be paired with this salty delight you ask? My guess is that it cuts the heat of the wings, making it easier for you to eat more. This technique proved effective as we chowed down the 'chosen wings'.

Pink's Hotdogs : Los Angeles - United States

What better way to start my blog than with a staple of Los Angeles, and perhaps all American food, the hot dog. I had exceedingly high expectations of Pinks, being talked up by locals, friends and numerous celebrity endorsements. With a line of people 30 deep waiting for their dog, i was sure this was going to be a winner.

We visited Pinks around 9pm on a weeknight, already starving for dinner, the line slowly crept forward. There were so many 'specials' from the Saturday Night Live, to the Hoff Dogg. I decided to go with the safe, and permanent menu item, the bacon chilli cheese dog.

The hot dog just looked so good i automatically presumed i would devour it. Unfortunately, to my dismay, it looked far better than it tasted. The first few bites were great, tasting the sweet/salty bacon with cheese, onions, tomato...and chilli. Oh, the chilli. This was the element that did not agree with my pallet, or my stomach. Perhaps growing up on chilli would have helped, but for the 'untamed' pallet, it was too much. I barely finished the hotdog, and was left moderately disappointed.

Overall, i am glad we tried this unique Los Angeles experience, but will not be rushing back for a bacon chilli cheese dog......or even a hoff dog.