A staple of the Downtown Arts District since 2016, Vesta Coffee Roasters built its reputation on hands-on attention to detail, roasting beans in-house from the world’s great coffee regions including Ethiopia, Columbia, Mexico and Costa Rica.
Two years ago, an expansion near Summerlin allowed the business to develop a baked goods lineup with a trio of croissants among the top sellers. Owner Jerad Howard is now seizing the company’s next opportunity—two locations at the new Durango Casino and Resort inside the Eat Your Heart Out food hall and a grab-and-go version in the lobby—to take things up a notch in the food department.
Instead of three croissants, there will now be at least 10, along with a variety of breads, cookies, cakes and other treats with a few seasonal pies in the works. Howard credits new pastry chef Julissa Escobedo for steering the operation into a more refined direction. The Mexico City native was part of the baking team that opened the Bellagio and worked at resorts like MGM Grand, SLS and Wynn, where she expanded her French pastry knowledge under the mentorship of Boris Villatte.
The recipes look as good as they taste with colorful photo-ready presentations. Have your phone camera ready when ordering a sticky-sweet pistachio-topped baklava croissant or a roasted pineapple tart with marmalade and almond cream. Escobedo offers a nod to her Latin heritage with pinole shortbread cookies (made with roasted maize flour), a tequila lime tart and Mexican pound cake with a chipotle glaze.
“They are very open to new and exciting things from other cultures,” the chef says about her Vesta teammates.
A few pastries are on the savory side. A pear and blue cheese Danish, inspired by an ice cream flavor at Salt & Straw, is a beautifully complex combination of flavors, ideal for pairing with a glass of wine. A lively blend of brown butter and sage brings chunks of butternut squash to life in a seasonal galette, matching the ambiance of autumn. Even the cheese Danish has a funky touch of flavor with a delicious miso cream cheese filling.
The bread is truly exceptional, whether it’s a traditional French baguette or the thick, fluffy focaccia used for sandwiches. Escobedo emphasizes the importance of the starter and fermentation in the latter, folding the dough and letting it rest every half hour to develop flavor and strength in a process that’s at least 10 hours long.
All items are made daily at Vesta’s Sahara Avenue location and will be brought directly to Durango, now scheduled to open December 5.
The scratch-kitchen mentality carries over to the coffee menu, featuring everything Vesta fans have already grown to love and appreciate over the years. The seasonal Camp S’More latte, for example, is crafted with the precision of a bartender, utilizing house-made ingredients like a graham cracker syrup, marshmallow bitters and Vesta’s own dark chocolate—also available as bars sold near the cash register, crafted with the same attentive touches that make the coffee so good.
“We have traceability down to the farm level on almost all our ingredients,” Howard says. “So we know where the coffee came from, we know where our chocolate came from, not just on a country, state or city level, but at a farm level.”
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