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Heidi Knapp Rinella

RJ food critic Heidi Rinella takes you inside your favorite Vegas eateries and let's you know what's worth the bite. Hungry for more? Head to bestoflasvegas.com for all of your foodie needs

Lucky Foo’s hip without being hipster

Lucky Foo’s Restaurant & Bar is the kind of place that could be insufferably hip. That would kill it in the suburbs, and it appears the owners are smarter than that. What they’ve created is a fun, fusiony restaurant with an edge, without the annoying hipster elements.

At Mingo, simplicity meets complexity

The decor of Mingo Kitchen & Lounge is very simple. It’s in an older building in the downtown Arts District, and the owners took a sort of minimalist approach, cloaking what I assume are old walls, pipes and ventilation shafts with black fabric and paint.

Viva Las Arepas a bright spot near the Naked City

Twenty years in Florida, dining at some of the best Cuban restaurants in the state, and never did I have a tostone as good as the ones I had at Viva Las Arepas.

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Follow the bouncing meatball …

Readers are confident they know where to find the best meatballs in the valley.

Red Rock’s Hearthstone is quintessentially American

Hearthstone fulfills the quintessentially American part with a menu that mixes small plates, shared plates and full-size entrees, a staff that’s welcoming and accommodating and a warm interior design.

Food critics ‘going public’ becoming a trend

So, you may have noticed that there appears to be a nationwide trend of food critics “going public” and allowing — even encouraging — photos of themselves to be published. If you have, you may have wondered if I’m going to follow suit.

Casa Don Juan’s suburban expansion makes sense

It’s been a while since I’ve been to downtown stalwart Casa Don Juan, and hearing it had opened a second location in the ‘burbs nudged me to give the mothership another look. Turned out to be a good move: I noticed some changes, and they were positive ones.

The Midori is wise to concentrate on sushi

The Midori self-identifies as a sushi restaurant, and they’re not kidding. For the most part it’s all sushi, all the time — nigiri sushi, sashimi, standard rolls, special rolls, baked rolls, deep-fried and crunchy rolls, low-carb rolls (wrapped in cucumber with no rice) and on and on.

Sharing a reader’s recipe for Kaiserschmarrn

According to legend, the court chef dedicated this dish to Empress Elizabeth, wife of Austrian Emperor Franz Josef I, calling it Empress Pancake (Kaiserinschmarrn). Since it was not to her liking, but instead satisfied the Emperor’s sweet tooth, it was simply renamed.

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