A stop to check out the new Wynn hotel seemed out of the way – UNLESS we HAD to go there to eat dinner. That was the logic we used, anyway, when we made reservations at Corsa Cucina, one of the restaurants in the new hotel and casino.
I was surprised that it wasn’t named the Wynn Cucina, as everything else in the hotel has got his name all over it (who does this guy think he is? Trump?). While the restaurant doesn’t bear his name, it does scream Steve Wynn with its very masculine décor and pictures of Ferraris everywhere. (Wynn is involved with racing, and the restaurant just happens to be right next to the Ferrari shop that is located within the hotel.). My friend said it felt like she was eating in a 12-year-old boy’s room. While I didn’t think it was THAT bad, we were interested to learn from our waiter that the restaurant would be undergoing a redesign, as the restaurant had morphed from its original idea of a Ferrari café. (I mean, it’s already been 5 months since it opened, that’s OLD!)
As relieved as I was to hear that they would be redesigning, I was even more relieved – and pleasantly surprised, when the food that we ordered was very gourmet. The restaurant is billed as "creative and casual", and it was the "casual" that had me concerned. The food is Mediterranean, but it seemed that the majority of the tables around us – and including us – were ordering one of the pizzettes. These are square, thin-crust pizzas with some very interesting toppings. There was the standard tomato pizzette, but I opted for the meatball version, while my friend ordered a shrimp pizzette. Everyone was raving about how good they were. And at only $15-$18 each, it was an inexpensive meal by Vegas standards.
We even had a minor celebrity sighting – the chef! Chef Stephen Kault is one of seven world-renowned chefs that Wynn captured and brought to Las Vegas to bring high culinary standards to his new hotel. While he said he missed New York, he was enjoying Las Vegas, and the opportunity he had been given.
This turned out to be one of those places where you rely less on the menu itself to order but rather you look around to see what everyone else is having. Then, you spend time chatting with your neighbors about how good everything was. Expect to pay a bit more if you order one of the items on the menu that isn’t the pizzettes I recommend. I give this restaurant an 8 of 10, and will look forward to seeing the redesigned version sans all the sports car images.