Casino coffee shops attempt to be all things to all people, and that goes double for ones that stay open 24/7. Planet Dailies makes an ambitious effort in that direction, but as with Julius Caesar in the Shakespeare play of the same name, ambition can be a grievous fault.
That’s not to say that this slick, modern operation doesn’t have its good points. For one thing, there are something like 48 TV screens in here, so if you come in for a late breakfast on the Saturday of your choice, you’ll be able to watch an NCAA football game from any angle.
For another, there is, apparently, a team of Asian chefs in the kitchen at all times, which explains why the Chinese food in this joint is so good.
It’s all part of the catchy, all-inclusive makeover that changed the Aladdin into Planet Hollywood, aka PH, and the Desert Passage into Miracle Mile Shops. Now, the place is jammin’, where before it was bone-empty. The casino has morphed into an ultramodern and attractive space. New restaurants, like Strip House upstairs, are worth a visit, too.
Planet Dailies’ menu is almost as large as its space, which includes a two-sided counter that bisects the main seating area. My wife complained about the chairs being too tall and her feet dangling over the floor. For me, a larger entity, they were just right. But service has a ways to go before you’d call it snappy.
On my first visit, my waiter never even showed up. One of his teammates took our food order, and after what seemed like an interminable wait, a runner brought it to us and a bus boy wearing a T-shirt with the incongruous message “I Don’t Watch The News ... I Make It” cleared our table grudgingly. At least the staff looks snazzy, in brown and jet-black. Now, if they could just learn to coordinate with each other.
Ambition gets in the way in the form of an unwieldy menu, offering more variety than any Vegas restaurant I can think of. In keeping with PH’s international appeal, the menu spans the globe. Just look at a few of these appetizers: Tex-Mex eggrolls (delicious), pot stickers (workmanlike), tempura veggies (oily and tasteless) or tasty Kobe sliders.
One entire page, called The Noodle Shop, is devoted to Chinese soups, appetizers and entrees, most of which are just as they would be on Spring Mountain Road. Hong Kong wonton noodle soup, for instance, served in a pedestal-shaped porcelain bowl, tastes like a proper Chinese soup, laced with a shrimp-flavored broth and Chinese greens.
Kung pao chicken has the requisite amount of peanuts, red pepper and water chestnuts, and the barbecue duck is crisp, not overly cloying with Hoisin sauce, and properly roasted. A nice Peking pork chop could lose the sweet glaze, though. And pad Thai, priced absurdly high at $18.50, smacks of a sugary premade sauce.
Moving on down the menu line, fishbowl-sized salads are just fine, thanks, especially a turkey avocado salad with bacon, bleu cheese and ranch dressing, and an Asian chicken salad with a tangy ginger-mustard dressing. One of the best sandwiches is a classic patty melt, an Angus beef burger layered with Swiss cheese and sautéed onions on marble rye bread, and I’d also come back for the chipotle chicken sandwich on a fresh onion roll.
From the grill, choose the Jamaican jerk porterhouse pork chop, or something the place calls its Cowboy T-bone, a chipotle-rubbed steak served with all the trimmings. Both are above $20, which may strike you as high for coffee-shop items, but they are not so bad if you compare them with similar Strip venues.
If you are coming for breakfast, bear in mind that the regular breakfast menu is only served until 11 a.m. After that, you’ll have to settle for a smaller 24-hour breakfast menu, featuring the artery-clogging favorite chicken and waffles and a chicken-fried steak that wouldn’t float in the Dead Sea.
Now, I can live with this menu being pricey, although the mac and cheese, at $12.50, is so rich it could feed an entire family. But what did annoy me was the attitude I got when it was time for dessert. At either $7.95 or $8.50 a pop, these are high-end desserts, so one expects consistency.
It didn’t turn out that way. First I got an ordinary bread pudding instead of the chocolate bread pudding specified on the menu, and a spiel about how the chocolate was “hidden on the bottom.” (It wasn’t.) On another visit, I asked for strawberry shortcake and got a dish of lemon bars doused with canned whipped cream. The server insisted that the dish was “our strawberry shortcake” because there were sliced berries on the bottom.
Planet Dailies
Inside Planet Hollywood. 785-5555. Open 24/7.
Suggested dishes: Hong Kong wonton noodle soup, $10.50; turkey avocado salad, $15.50; patty melt, $12.50; Jamaican jerk Porterhouse pork chop, $20.50.