I know it’s not cool for a journalist to get all giddy in her reviews.  We’re supposed to be experts in our field — we’ve seen and done it all, and we’re jaded.  We’re not supposed to use superlatives; we’re not supposed to impress easily.  But I’m more blogger than journalist, and I’m honest.  You guys — Zine is superlatively impressive.

A good blogger also writes about more interesting things than what she had to eat for dinner — but you guys!  Let me tell you about what I had for dinner!

Now that I’ve broken all those rules, I’ll break one more and admit that I’m not an expert food critic.  My friend Alex loves to laugh about the time I was helping him cook for a party and he asked me to hand him the ginger.  I failed, because I didn’t know what ginger looked like.  My complete lack of cooking knowledge precludes me from ever being a real food critic, but I have fully functional taste buds, and they were thrilled with my meal at Zine, the luxurious, authentic Asian restaurant on the casino level of The Palazzo in Las Vegas.

Have I mentioned yet that I’m not a food critic? I don’t have a food critic’s vocabulary, but one word is all I need to describe the taste of each of my five courses: exceptional.  I never knew a salad could pack so much flavor, but you’ve got to try the mandarin salad at Zine if you want to have lettuce that tastes intense.  And I’ll bet you thought tofu was tofu, right? Not so. Room chef Danny Choi created a tofu masterpiece for my main course — braised tofu with veggies and mushrooms, and vegetable fried rice.

The real food critics have already decided, without my input, that Zine Executive Chef Simon To runs one of the finest Chinese restaurants in the United States, and whether my input matters or not, I agree with them.  Each time I tasted one of the dishes set in front of me, my first thought was “Oooh!  This is my favorite!”  You just can’t go wrong.

The atmosphere inside Zine is perfect for a quiet, romantic date night.  Take a time out from the wild and crazy Vegas experience and enjoy your evening in this beautiful restaurant, decorated in a contemporary Asian style.  Soft, almost unnoticeable music and gentle orange light create a very peaceful environment to relax and enjoy the best meal available on the Strip.

The food critics will tell you essentially the same thing, with fancier words and probably more to say about the food itself — but writing as someone who likes to eat dinner, Zine is the place to do it.  Zine is open from 11am to 1am daily.  Call (702) 607-2220 for reservations.

This entry was posted on Monday, March 8th, 2010 at 11:53 am and is filed under Food. 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.