What the hell, Keller?
A Mini Rant about Bouchon Bakery, Las Vegas.
Since watching Anthony Bourdain eat at the French Laundry on an episode of A Cook’s Tour way back when, I’ve been dying to taste Thomas Keller’s food. I’m saving my appetite and wallet for one of his massive tasting menus at Bouchon sometime in the future, but in the meantime, I thought I’d take advantage of a more affordable way to get a taste of what he’s all about at his Bouchon Bakery in The Venetian Hotel in Las Vegas.
Along with supplying the baked goods for Keller’s upscale Bouchon Restaurant, the Bouchon Bakery sells a variety of pastries and fancy snacks along with coffee and cappuccinos to Venetian casino patrons (which, although the Venetian is one of nicest casinos on the strip, still seems to be a bit of an odd fit).
On my first visit to the bakery I bought what was marked as a “Cheese Danish” from the Vienoisserie section. The Bouchon Bakery website says that “Vienoiserie is the name given to a category of baking that includes croissants, milk-bread doughs, and brioche.”
The “Cheese Danish” turned out to be a slab of puff pastry that had been stuffed into a muffin tin, baked within an inch of its life while still allowing for under-baked globs in the centre and topped with an overly sweet twist of cream cheese icing. The pastry was so dry (read dry, not light and flaky) that it exploded into a shower of sharp crumbs with the first bite, leading to an embarrassing episode of sneezing and coughing in the Venetian poker room. Even with the price tag of $4.50, I still didn’t want to finish it.
On my next trip to Vegas I was feeling optimistic. Surely I had purchased a dud pastry at the end of a long wait on the shelf. This is Thomas Keller, after all, one of my food idols. So back to Bouchon Bakery I went again, determined to buy the most delicious sounding pastry in the display case. I settled on a Strawberry Croissant and asked what was in it. The gal behind the counter assured me that it was great, and made with fresh strawberries.
The Strawberry Croissant turned out to be the bottom half of a sliced croissant, once again baked to extreme dryness, so bad that the edges of the pastry were rock hard and inedible, any flakiness long since baked away. The “fresh” strawberries had been baked and had dissolved into an unpleasant pink/grey goo over the accompanying almond paste (at least I hope that’s what is was). The croissant was topped with a mediocre crumb topping that only sucked more moisture out of the gummy filling. Once again, didn’t even finish half.
My love for Thomas Keller and his food philosophies is so strong that I’ll still be waiting for the day to try his full restaurant menu at Bouchon and (dare to dream) someday at The French Laundry.
But knowing what I do about his bakery, I just might skip the bread basket.
This entry was posted on Friday, June 18th, 2010 at 5:25 pm and is filed under Food, Las Vegas, Travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.