Category: Locals

The Smith Center for the Performing Arts

October 13, 2011
Smith Center for the Performing Arts

The Smith Center for the Performing Arts nears completion

Click to enlarge : Smith Center for the Performing Arts

Art Deco design

Click to enlarge : Smith Center for the Performing Arts

Close up detail

Click to enlarge : New Discovery Children’s Museum

New Discovery Children’s Museum

Click to enlarge : Smith Center for the Performing Arts

Stainless steel Art Deco detail

Click to enlarge : Symphony Park

Symphony Park takes shape

Click to enlarge : Smith Center for the Performing Arts

Smith Center

The Smith Center for the Performing Arts is a public/private partnership that will become the centerpiece of cultural life in Las Vegas offering a blend of performances by resident companies as well as first-run touring attractions. The 4.75-acre cultural complex will feature inviting lobbies with beautiful balconies, refined acoustics and a tastefully landscaped plaza linking surrounding hotels, restaurants, shops and offices in downtown’s 61-acre urban development, Symphony Park. Home to the 2,050-seat Reynolds Hall and the Boman Pavilion, The Smith Center will be a living room for Las Vegas; a place that will educate, entertain and excite the citizens of our great community. The Smith Center broke ground in May of 2009 with a ceremonial carillon bell casting and ringing. In February 2010, it celebrated its “Topping Out” with the raising of 50 tons of steel and is projected to open in March 2012.

Next door the the Smith Center is the new home for the children’s museum, a state-of-the-art building to be named the Donald W. Reynolds Discovery Center. The children’s museum currently is located on Las Vegas Boulevard in the historic Cultural Corridor, where it will continue to serve the children and families of Las Vegas until the new facility is ready to open in late 2012.

Next to the Smith Center, a small park called, Symphony Park will be a two-acre open space within the heart of Symphony Park destined to become the neighborhood’s “Central Park.” The Park is expected to serve as a gathering place and outdoor venue for cultural, art and social activities.

For more information, visit www.thesmithcenter.com.

Photos by: LasVegas360.com
Date of photos: 11/13/2011

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Vegas StrEats October 8, 2011

October 2, 2011

It’s October and the weather is cooling off, which makes it great time for Vegas Streats! This Saturday night October 8, 2011. Experience Las Vegas’ food trucks in the monthly Las Vegas Streats Festival. The Festival starts at 6pm – 2am in Downtown Las Vegas across the street from the El Cortez. Admission is free and there will be Live Music, Dj’s, and Artists, and Vegas’ own upscale Food Trucks. Including: Slidin’ Thru, Tasty Buns, Snow Ono, Fukuburger, Sausage Fest, Sin City Wings, Engine 1 Pizza and Pop’s Philly cheese-steak. This looks like one of the best food truck line-ups ever. Great food and music bringing new life to the downtown, see you there.

20111002-224844.jpg

Vegas Streats - October 8, 2011 - 6pm-2am @ El Cortez

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Vegas StrEats: Event Photos

September 9, 2011

Vegas StrEats event photos.

This September’s Vegas StrEats event photos.

Featured Trucks: Tasty Bunz, Sloppi Jo’s, Ben’s BBQ, BBQ Boy, Yellow Lunch Box, Snow ONO, Muncheeze, The Chuck Wagon, Slidin’ Thru SWAG Booth, and HauteChix Fashion Truck.

Photos by LasVegas360.com

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Nothing Bundt Cakes a Las Vegas Original

August 31, 2011

Ask almost any Las Vegan the best place to get a cake for any occasion and they will most likely tell you to go to Nothing Bundt Cakes.  This delicious bakery, which is now a franchised brand, started in the late 1990s by two local women who were best friends and loved to bake.  They spent months perfecting their recipe and Nothing Bundt Cakes was created. It is a Las Vegas original.

If given a choice to select only one dessert, I have to admit, cake would be near the bottom of my list, but this isn’t just cake.  It’s more like a muffin or pound cake or banana bread. It’s moist, full of flavor and their cream cheese frosting makes it sinfully sweet and addictive.

Nothing Bundt Cakes has come a long way from it’s humble beginnings in the kitchen of founders Dena Tripp and Debra Shwetz.  When they moved out of their kitchen they set up shop in a small, narrow store on West Sahara.  This store was so small it was more like a bakery counter and there were no frills, just great cakes.  Since it has become a franchise, the store looks like a Hallmark store.  They moved into a large boutique location just down the street from their original store, they are now located at 8320 W. Sahara Ave #140 with an additional location at 9711 S. Eastern Avenue.  Some of the flavors of cakes they have available are Chocolate Chocolate Chip, Lemon, White Chocolate Raspberry, Cinnamon Swirl, Marble, Red Velvet with Chocolate Chips, Carrot, and White White Chocolate. You can pick up more than just bundt cakes there they have everything from small gifts to baby clothes, aprons, cards and other small items.

Nothing Bundt Cakes now come in several sizes from the original 8 and 10 inch diameter cakes to a single serve bundt and the bundtinis (bite size bundts sold by the dozen).  Each cake can be personalized for any occasion you can imagine with decorative ribbons, flowers and whimsical cards.  They also provide cakes as corporate gifts.  The next occasion that calls for cake be sure to give Nothing Bundt Cakes a try, you won’t be disappointed.

Nothing Bundt Cakes Store front

The To Go Case at Nothing Bundt Cakes

Nothing Bundt CakesPhotos by: Lasvegas360.com

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Food Truck: Tasty Bunz

August 28, 2011

Saturday night at the Opportunity Village charity event, OV Nation, I was able to catch up with the Tasty Bunz food truck to sample some of their eatz.  Tasty Bunz is a gourmet food truck specializing in soft-dough buns that are filled with different kinds of meat. It is kind of a cross between Chinese dim sum and a Hot Pocket.  They also had sliders, fries, tots and dessert items on the menu.

One of the things I liked right away when getting my order was the nice “to go” box that my meal came in. It looks like a chinese take out box but wider.  Since eating at a few different food trucks in the past, I have learned that finding a place to eat your food is one of the major challenges. You usually end up sitting on a curb or squeezing in on a small cocktail round (if you are lucky). Your food comes in a bag and you have to balance your meal on your lap, sometimes in the wind or rain. The Tasty Bunz box provided a safe place to keep my food warm and it serves as a plate to eat from, which made eating it much easier.

In the Tasty Bunz box I had one of the bunz called the “Fist Pump”.  This was a soft sun- dried tomato dough with a chicken pesto filling. It had great flavor with big chucks of chicken. I also tried the “Wild West Slider” (beef patty, cheese, bacon, tempura onion & sweet-n-spicy BBQ sauce).  This was one of the best sliders I have had. For a small slider, this sandwich had a lot to offer. First, the bacon was sliced thin, but piled up high, it gave the slider a nice smoky bacon flavor which was great with the cheddar cheese and sweet BBQ sauce. But what made it stand out were the big chunks of tempura encrusted onions.  This made the meal for me. It gave it a good crunch along with the bacon. The flavors worked very well together. For a food truck whose specialty is not a slider item this was very good (watch out slider trucks). The meal was topped off with an ice cold Arizona tea. I look forward to seeing this truck out and about in Las Vegas. Give them a try next time you see the trucks out and about.

Tasty Bunz Truck

Tasty Bunz Truck

TastyBunz Tasty Bunz - food box

Tasty Bunz Box - it is nice to have a box to use as a plate

Tasty Bunz Treats

Tasty Bunz Treats - Wild West Slider and a Sun dried tomato dough with a chicken pesto filling

Links:
http://tastybunz.com/

Tasty Bunz on Urbanspoon

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Vegas Streats Festival Food Trucks Ran Over by Crowds

August 14, 2011

Fukuburger Truck

Muncheeze - Grilled Cheese Sandwiches

Tasty Bunz

The monthly Vegas Streats Festival was held on August 13, 2011. This was the 6th monthly festival in a row and is growing larger each month. East Fremont was hammered by flocks of people to get a chance to listen to some music, see some art and stand in extremely long lines for food from speciality food trucks. Has the Las Vegas Streats Festival become too big to handle the crowds?  Well, I went down to East Fremont about 8:30pm, again a long line just to enter the festival area like last month but bigger. My intention was to sample a few new trucks this month.  I wanted to check out Fukuburger, Muncheeze, and stop by Snow Ono for a tasty cool treat. But, the lines. The lines were quite long. They were 30-40 people deep at most trucks just to place an order.  Fukuburger, I know you have lots of fans, but damn, that line was ridiculously long. I had to pass you guys up this time (Fukuburger), catch you at a different venue.

I got in the line for Muncheeze, I was hoping these guys were cranking it out.  Well it took over 30 minutes just to get up to the window and to place my order.  I walked around while the food was getting prepared., came back, and then walked around some more.  Now the thing I noticed over the previous month was the masses of people at the festival lined up at the trucks.  There was a continuos line of people outside waiting to get in and it extended half way down the block to the Beat Coffee shop.  I went back to the Muncheeze truck to see if my order was up. Nope. I even spent some time talking to a girl who was handing out menus for Muncheeze and she pointed out what was the most popular items on the menu.  She even mentioned something about a management change and that it was now a family business.  I even got to visit the inter sanctum inside the truck to snap a few photos.

About 30+ minutes passed after placing my order, the food was ready.  My food review will be in a separate post from this one. Spoiler – I like the food from Muncheeze.  Now, I am a great fan of food trucks, but this will probably be my last time at the Vegas Streats Festival.  I really don’t blame the guys and girls in the trucks, but they need to step it up or scale it up a little to move the food out faster.  Now this was just not a problem for this food truck. This seemed to be the theme affecting all the food vendors.  I went over to the Snow Ono truck and there was no line at the window, I walked up ready to place my order and the guy said that there is an 1 hour wait to get your order.  At this point, I said to myself, the Vegas Streat Festival (at least for the food trucks) have hit their maximum capacity.  I will meet up with them on an individual basis at other venues, not here for future food eats.

My hopes for the Vegas Streats Festival, I guess was too high. The music was good, the mix of people, the artists, even the El Cortez placed at least a half dozen more tables out since last time, but fell short in delivering enough food out their windows of those fabulous trucks.  I will just have to track your trucks down in a less crowed place.

Food trucks and business mention in this article:

http://muncheezetruck.com/
http://snowonoshaveice.com
http://www.fukuburger.com
http://www.thebeatlv.com
http://vegasstreats.com
http://tastybunz.com
http://www.elcortezhotelcasino.com

Photos by LasVegas360.com

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