Unlike the theater, a concert is not something you want to attend on a full stomach.  Especially a rock concert at which you expect to be up on your feet at various points throughout the performance.  Such was the case recently when, joined by the delightful Dawn Hume, I was on my way to try Washing Potato—the dim sum concept by Chef Richard Chen at Fontainebleau Las Vegas—before heading to BleauLive to see rock’s favorite sister act, Ann and Nancy Wilson and Heart.  And as it turns out, the choice was rather Goldilocksian. *

Now, I’ve been a huge fan of Chef Chen’s since 2008, when he moved from Chicago (where he’d been the chef de cuisine at the acclaimed Shanghai Terrace at the Peninsula Chicago) to Las Vegas to open Wing Lei, which would become the first Michelin-starred Chinese restaurant in the Americas (and remains one of my five favorite restaurants in town).  One bite of his signature Peking Duck Salad, and I was a fan for life.  Enough so that I’ve crossed borders to enjoy Chen’s mastery of French-influenced light plates in Canada (at 1886 at Parq Vancouver), then more recently, back on the Strip at Chyna Club at Fontainebleau Las Vegas (which is fab); but I’d yet to try Washing Potato, and this concert made for a perfect opportunity.

Once seated, our server presented us with our menus, and we got to ordering.  And as is the case with dim sum, it wasn’t long before a procession of plates and bamboo steamer dishes was presented at our table.  First was a hearty version of Chef Chen’s Peking Duck Salad (mesclun lettuce, almond, orange, heirloom tomato,  citrus, peanut dressing, truffle oil), which included huge slab-like slices of succulent Peking duck.  Hashtag Yum!

This was followed by some steamed vegetables for Dawn, who also enjoyed some Scallop Shumai (shrimp, pork, and scallop, with a won ton wrapper, garnished with tobiko), and the Squash and Pine Nut Dumplings (mashed squash with pine nuts, in a wheat flour and potato starch wrapper), which she reported were particularly tasty.

I wasn’t really paying attention, as I was focused on my Chicken Pot Stickers (finely ground chicken and yellow chive in a wheat flour wrapper) and Xiao Long Bao (a wheat flour wrapper filled with beef broth with chicken and Iberico pork).  The former were zesty, and the latter put a massive smile on my face, which tells you everything you need to know.  What can I say?  Those little Shanghainese soup dumplings bring me joy.

We also enjoyed the Pan-Fried Prawn and Chive Dumplings (prawns and chives in a wheat flour and potato-starch wrapper), which were as tasty as they looked (see the third photo in the slideshow above).

After dinner—which cost less than I’d have expected for a multi-course meal by one of the Strip’s true master chefs—we headed over to BleauLive and rocked out with the Wilson sisters to classic rock jams like Bébé Le Strange, Crazy On You, Magic Man, and Barracuda, and not once did I put a hand on my stomach and wince, thinking “Oof, I never should’ve eaten that much rich food before coming to this concert.”  Meanwhile, as my fellow Gen X-ers will attest, the true proof of my gastro-intestinal wellbeing was my requiring nary a Pepcid, a Prilosec, nor a Phazyme, upon returning home.

And if, like me, you were wondering about the name of the restaurant (Washing Potato?  Come on…  You were totally thinking it, too.), it’s a whimsical reference by Chef Chen to an observation by a group of paleontologists in the 1950s.  They were studying the Japanese Macaques on the Japanese island of Kōjima and noticed that an 18-month-old female macaque (dubbed ‘Ito’) had come to find that the sweet potatoes dropped on the beach by the scientists tasted better if she rinsed the sand off in the ocean or a stream, first.  Before you could say “group consciousness,” washing potatoes was all the rage among Kōjima’s macaque population and remains so to this day.

Washing Potato
Fontainebleau Las Vegas
Click HERE for info

Get into it!
#FBLV

[Editor’s Note: * Neither too little nor too much, but just right.]