Jean Philippe Patisserie - Aria

Jean Philippe Patisserie
at Aria
3730 Las Vegas Blvd South
Las Vegas, NV 89109
(702) 590-8550

This post is mainly eye candy as you've already seen Jean Philippe's Bellagio location. Remember how I mentioned that the Aria location is bigger? Well, here's how amazingly spacious it is:

Mini wedding cakes surround one side of the patisserie.

Lots and lots of chocolates.

More displays and treats. The Grinch centerpiece there? Yup, made from sugar.

Here comes the best part. This longgggg display case filled with desserts!

Let's go from left-to-right.

Almost to the middle!

Middle section!

Almost to the end...

Finally, we're all the way to the right! It look me quite a while to have a look at everything before ordering.

I went with the light and flaky Nutella Napoleon and picked out a Pie Crust flavoured flan for Howard. Seriously though, how many days would it take for you to try everything Jean Philippe makes?

Jean Philippe Patisserie - Bellagio

Jean Philippe Patisserie
at Bellagio
3600 Las Vegas Blvd South
Las Vegas, NV 89109
(702) 693-8788

Before our trip, we actually saw an episode of Fabulous Cakes (Las Vegas edition too) on TLC that featured Jean Philippe and his chefs working on a wedding order. They still have the clip showing him making sugar flowers posted here.

Keep in mind that this isn't the last post about Jean Philippe. He was two locations in Las Vegas, both worth having a look at. The Bellagio location is smaller but features this:

Behold! The largest chocolate fountain in the world (certified by Guiness World Records)! The fountain goes from floor to ceiling behind the glass partition. I'm kind of glad that the glass is there to prevent any waste. Can you imagine if it was opened to the public? *shudder*

But don't worry, you can still get a piece of that chocolate!

Wedding cupcakes rotating on display. It is worth seeing some of their cake designs at this location, but it was very crowded both times we went. There are people snapping photos of the fountain and the lines go all around, making very little space for you to browse the displays and shelves.

The first time we stopped by, I didn't get anything at the Bellagio location because I was waiting to see the Aria location. We did eat desserts at Aria, but on our last day, I came back (this location was closer to our hotel) and got the carrot cake. I kept thinking about how delicate this carrot cake looked - I couldn't resist!

With mixed feelings, I finally sliced into the cake. I was excited to get a bite, but heartbroken that this little piece of art had to broken up into small slices. The filling inside the cake was still moist, you can see the nuts and carrots in it. That cake though, wow! So light, fluffy and delicate!

Payard

Payard
at Caesars Palace
3570 Las Vegas Boulevard South
Las Vegas, NV 89109-8924
(702) 731-7849

They're on facebook and twitter too!

Has breakfast ever looked so good? Since we were staying at Caesars Palace, we had breakfast at Payard. François Payard is a French Pastry Chef with locations in New York, Japan, and Korea. He also has three cookbooks (Chocolate Epiphany, Simply Sensational Desserts, and Bite Size) with delicious looking covers that I want to have a look at.

But let's go back to breakfast. I ordered the brioche French toast with sauteed berries and whipped cream. At this location for breakfast, you sit around the buffet and cooking area. I got to watch the Chef make my French toast and sauté the berries and top the dish with whipped cream. When it was ready, I was eagerly waiting for our server, who fondly chuckled at my anticipation.

It was quite good. The lip smacking kind of good. I neatly sliced my French toast and dipped it in the berry juice and for good measure, whisked the whipped cream onto it. Mmm!

Howard went for the continental breakfast buffet and would come back with low fat yogurt with berries and granola, flaky croissants, smoked salmon and cream cheese bagels. Howard's not a fan of breakfast like I am, but he was captivated by the croissants (which I sadly didn't have a bite of). And anywhere that serves good smoked salmon gets a nod of approval by Howard. =)

Besides the dining room, Payard also has a storefront where you can get meals to go.

There was also this construction, I see the chocolate showpieces and the moving gears, but what does it do? Does chocolate pop out into the tray?

Our Las Vegas Adventures

Welcome to the first post of our Las Vegas adventures!

Why Las Vegas some of you may wonder? While it's true that Howard and I aren't gamblers, drinkers, or clubbers, it was the end of the year and I wanted to go somewhere, anywhere. So I traded in all my left over vacation days for the second last week of December and asked Howard to look up travel rates. The best deal we found was for Las Vegas, NV. Howard had never been and I was interested in what the city could offer food wise, and as it turns out, quite a lot!

Plus, where else could we see replicas of:

The Statue of David?

The Eiffel Tower in fog? (Yes, we heard from locals that it only rains about 5% in a year. We got that 5% + fog when we went. Booyeah!)

The Venetian canals?

Medieval castles beside the Statue of Liberty?

Or the ROM's Crystal?

Curvy escalators? Okay, these aren't world wonders, but look, they curve! We don't have those here. Fancy, fancy!

I already had a list of places to see as recommended by Suresh Doss (thank you) to visit, but stumbling upon a place I wasn't expecting is always a great treat.

At first, I didn't even see the restaurant because of this distraction:

They have chocolate and red velvet cupcakes!

Max Brenner is located in the Forums Shop by Caesars Palace and has a little gift shop attached to the restaurant. The place is decked out in chocolate decor (what did you expect from "chocolate by the bald man?"). If you take a look at their menu, they serve chocolate pizza slices, chocolate syringes, hot chocolate, chocolate crepes, chocolate chip cookies, chocolate sundae, chocolate fondue, and many more. They go all out for dessert (click here to have a look at their menus). Right? I not exaggerating here!

It is sort of like if Willy Wonka opened a restaurant. I mean, I wish there was a way to capture aroma with photos, the place smelled wonderful!

My first cupcake! So here, here to a very good start in Las Vegas!

New Owners of Our Favourite Cookbooks

Happy New Year! We hope everyone had a very nice holiday and rang in the new year with cheer!

It was so nice to sleep in and eat out for a week. And did we eat! Howard and I tried many desserts in Las Vegas and gave ourselves a dinner at Bouchon for Christmas. When we came home, we were met with many lunch and dinner get-togethers with family and friends. On New Year's Eve, I still remember that the last item I ate was a piece of cantaloupe and Howard's was a slice of cucumber with five cheese dip (we never did finish that fruit and veggie platter as we watched the countdown on TV). It wasn't until the day before work started that we actually ate at home! I guess we may have gotten plumper.

Before the holidays, we ran our Favourite Cookbooks Giveaway. We promised to announce the winners today, so we used Random.org's List Randomizer to generate them.

Aren't the covers and back covers of these cookbooks appetizing? The two lucky winners are announced below:

The winner of The SoNo Baking Company Cookbook: The Best Sweet and Savory Recipes for Every Occasion by John Barricelli is:

Congratulations Ceri Marsh! Ceri shared What to Cook and How to Cook by Jane Hornby with us. Thank you! We hope you enjoy creating yumminess like this:

Next, the winner of Ready for Dessert: My Best Recipes by David Lebovitz is:

Congratulations Sara! Sara shared Baking: From My Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan. It's actually quite puzzling as to why we don't have this cookbook yet! Please enjoy the scrumptious creations:

Ceri and Sara, please e-mail info@abakedcreation.com - we will need your mailing information in order to ship you your cookbook (d'oh! I forgot to ask for e-mails again).

Thank you to everyone for entering and we wish you a delectable and delicious 2011!