Traveling to Vegas from our home in Florida can really mess with your inner clock. The time difference is 3 hours earlier in Vegas than at home. For our first day or two this presents us with a bit of a challenge for meal times. We wake up super early and are ready for lunch when everyone else is still thinking about breakfast. When planning our reservations for this trip I decided that we would have an early lunch at Yardbird. They open at 11am Vegas time which is 2pm for our appetites. We grabbed a piece of fruit and some coffee from the coffee shop in our hotel and spent some time answering emails and working remotely before heading out.
Decor Makes You Feel at Home
Yardbird is located in the Venetian Casino in Las Vegas. They also have locations in Miami, Singapore and Los Angles. The theme is Southern cooking and they are hitting on all cylinders. From the menu which features fried green tomatoes, fried chicken (the house specialty), biscuits with several choices for fillings to the extensive list of bourbon (over 50 bourbons and 50 whiskeys) and atmosphere, Yardbird is Southern hospitality from beginning to end. The decor is casual but detailed. The floors are wide planked. The walls are either white washed brick or weathered panels. The tables are a high gloss wood and aren’t covered by place mats or table clothes. The furnishings are simple and evoke a sense of comfort. Pictures of Southern days gone by are projected on several of the white brick walls. It is almost like paging though a family photo album (if you were related to Johnny Cash.)
Menu for ALL tastes
While you can certainly eat your way into a food coma, there are delicious light choices as well. I chose the Butter Lettuce and Grilled Mango salad and topped it with shrimp. The salad has smoked pecans that gave a unique savory flavor to compliment the sweet mango. I loved that the pecans weren’t sugared but rather had their natural flavor enhanced by smoking. Definitely going to try to replicate that at home. My husband had the chicken wings. They are served with fried okra that was absolutely sublime. The breading was light and stuck to the okra so that each bite was perfectly seasoned. Accordingly to my husband, who makes some legendary wings himself, the wings were excellent but the okra was the star. We opted not to have dessert but will definitely be back to try the Butterscotch Cake with bacon frosting and the Peach Cobbler.
I highly recommend Yardbird for a tasty and reasonably priced (for Vegas) lunch. Our tab totaled slightly over $40 and it was worth every penny.