I understand that America is a car-based culture. Driving 10 minutes to go to your local fast food place is nothing out of the ordinary. I never learned to drive however, and I've always lived in neighborhoods where food is readily accessible by walking. However, the selections here in my current Long Island City neighborhood pale in comparison to the cheap and wonderful food available near my previous addresses in Jackson Heights and Sunnyside. There are certain cuisine types that I believe should be present in every neighborhood, and certain cuisine types that are in every neighborhood that shouldn't be.
I think that every neighborhood, especially in NYC, should have a good variety of affordable ethnic options. Of course, if your neighborhood is known for a specific ethnicity (Greek food in Astoria, Indian food in Jackson Heights, etc.), then that's different. Here are my picks for my ideal restaurants and food options that I want in my neighborhood.
Vietnamese/Pho
It's cheap, the portions are big, and it's basic. Refreshing choices in the summer and hearty choices in the winter. This is the kind of food that you can eat every day, and can even afford to do so.
Pizza/Red Sauce
Every neighborhood needs a pizzeria, but do you really need a semi-fancy italian place? I mean, the top end italian food in NYC is amazing, but so many italian "restaurants" are barely serving food better than a good red sauce joint and just charging you for white tablecloths.
Chinese
As Jennifer Lee noted in her talk, Chinese food might just be America's cuisine, since it's everywhere. Chinese food is efficient. Lots of combination platters, lots of options, and can be cooked to order to a certain degree.
2 Eastern Mediterranean-based cuisines
A lot of countries border or are near the mediterranean, but a lot of their cuisine is similar too. Greek, Turkish, Israeli, etc. types of cuisine share many common styles. This is why I want more than one of these places, and more importantly, at least one of them must be kosher or halal. This is important because then you will know for sure that their meat is fresh. The thing about this type of cuisine is you will often get good yet inexpensive bread, good simple meat, and good salad that's not doused in cream-based dressings. Very diet friendly.
Fried food
Everyone loves fried food. While there's really good fried food out there, normal fried food is usually enough to satisfy anybody. Whether it be a fish and chip shop, a fried chicken place, or anything along those lines, I think every neighborhood needs a place devoted to fried food. That way, they can get enough turnover to keep the oil fresh.
Diner
Every neighborhood needs a real diner. Nothing fancy, just good old American greats done simply and inexpensively. A lot of diners are mediocre, but even then, sometimes a simple open-faced turkey sandwich with stuffing and gravy is all you really want.
Taco cart
Fast, authentic Mexican street food. Made to order. What more do you need?
Many of the foods above are suitable for a neighborhood because they can be both sit down and takeaway. One other main criteria I use is that it should be a cuisine where the cheap version can provide just as good value as the expensive version of that cuisine. However, there are many cuisine types where the cheaper version and the expensive version are just too far apart in quality. However, many of these places pop up in neighborhoods all the time because of the built-in premium by association with the expensive counterparts.
Japanese
There is no cuisine that has more of a built-in premium than Japanese food. $6 for gyoza? $5 for edamame? They're just blanched soybeans. Or how about those "designer" maki rolls that cost the equivalent of a full meal at other places? I'll travel for really good Japanese. I'll also have Walmart sushi if they ever have it because I'll know it'll be cheap and fresh enough with a high turnover. The in-between restaurant that's ubiquitous in NYC? No thanks.
Thai
Thai food also has a premium although I never understood why. There really is amazing Thai food in NYC. However, there are also plenty of expensive mediocre Thai restaurants all over NYC. Often times I'll have a craving for simple Americanized Thai food (like the pad thai they serve over here) and then I'll go up to the restaurant and can't justify the cost to myself and leave.
French/Modern American Bistro
These places feel like they're in the neighborhood so that you can say there's a nice restaurant in the neighborhood and the area is not a dump. However, my experience has been that these places usually try to do too much, often led by chefs who think they're much better than they actually are.
Did I forget anything? Is there any cuisine type that you'd really want in your neighborhood not on this list? Or are there other overrated cuisine types floating in your neighborhood? Let me know what you think.
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
Poker at South Point: The Weirder (VegasSummer 09, gambling)
Oh, yes. There's more! Well, this really is the end of it, but here's the stuff that I thought was crazier than the previous crazy stuff. The strange thing was that all of this actually happened on my last day of playing.
I was first playing during the late afternoon, and we started out with a full table. One guy was an annoying, talkative fellow. An older man from LA who clearly felt that watching poker on TV and the occasional pro live at the Commerce made him an authority figure on poker. He kept talking about how people overvalue their AK and giving out other random "advice". After he lost his first buyin of 100, I was very happy to see him rebuy for 200 more. Not much time went by and all of a sudden our table had dwindled down to 6 people when this hand came up. I held QJ offsuit and limped in the cutoff. The small blind completed and the aforementioned man was the big blind who checked. The flop came A K 10 with two clubs, of which I had none. It was checked around to me and I checked. The turn came an offsuit 9. At this point the big blind bet out 25 into the 6 pot. This is actually quite a problem. If I try to slowplay and call here, there are a large number of scare-cards that could hit on the river and minimize what I can get from him. On the other hand, he made such a large bet that if I raised (he had 120 more behind him), I might scare him off. So I took some time to think about this, and while I was thinking, the guy kept talking and talking. At one point, I heard him say, "You know you're drawing dead." Wow, really? He certainly sounded confident about his hand so I pushed all-in. He called and I showed my straight, which held up. He said that he had two pair, though we never saw his hand. He was mumbling about "can't believe you flopped a straight" as he walked away.
Later that evening, I sat down to play again as we started a new table. Barely three hands in, one guy straddled. With 3 limpers, I decided to raise it to 30 from the button with AK offsuit. The straddler was the only guy to call and we saw a flop of A K 5 rainbow. It was checked to me and I bet 40. He checkraised me to 100, and after some thought, I pushed all-in for 120 more. He called and the turn came 9 and the river came another 9. I asked if he flopped a set as I turned over my AK. He said he only had a king as he flipped over his cards, but as I leaned towards the pot, he added, "Oh wait, I have a 9. I didn't even know what my kicker was." Yes, I had just lost to running 9s to a guy who couldn't fold K9. I subsequently looked it up and the odds for hitting the running 9s were (3/45 x 2/44) = 0.3%. In fact, had he held a random 2-9, the chances of him beating me would have been 7 times more likely. I went back upstairs as fast as I could to get more money, but the guy left by the time I came back down. During this session, I also lost a buyin when I hit a set on the flop and the other guy's overpair caught a bigger set after the money went in.
Later in the night, I went back to the poker room as I was trying to avoid playing any more table games until I got to the Bellagio. So I sat in a 2/15 game. That was not a typo. There was a young guy in the 1/2NL game who made it 15 preflop 9 out of every 10 hands. It wasn't a dead raise as he saw his cards before he bet, but he was consistently firing away at it. After the flop he would usually keep betting and people would either fold or he'd hit some sick cards as he pretty much played any two starting cards with that raise. Well, it seemed like all I had to do was to wait and catch some cards or perhaps play back at him in position. There was certainly no limping speculative hands at this table. After a while, I got dealt aces under the gun and limped. A different player raised it to 15 and there were two other callers by the time it got back to me. I decided to reraise it 50 more and everyone went away. A pot of 48 is not bad for 1/2NL without even having to see a flop. I continued to sit there waiting patiently, folding my suited connectors knowing that I'd have to call 15 to see a flop. A couple of new guys came to our table, and it took them a while to figure out what was going on. One hand, I picked up QQ from the big blind. One of the new guys limped and the raiser did his thing. I called and the limper folded. This was heads up with the crazy preflop raiser. The flop came 10 5 3 rainbow, and I check called a flop bet of 20. I couldn't risk making a raise out of position because he could have started with any two cards, and I fully expected him to keep betting regardless. The turn came another 3, and I check called a bet of 40. The river came a 6 and I checked to him betting 100 on the river. I didn't feel very well, but there was nothing left to do but call, and luckily my queens held up against his 56 suited. The guy continued to play the same way and the table kind of broke up once his stack dwindled down to about 100, from a high of over 700.
I was first playing during the late afternoon, and we started out with a full table. One guy was an annoying, talkative fellow. An older man from LA who clearly felt that watching poker on TV and the occasional pro live at the Commerce made him an authority figure on poker. He kept talking about how people overvalue their AK and giving out other random "advice". After he lost his first buyin of 100, I was very happy to see him rebuy for 200 more. Not much time went by and all of a sudden our table had dwindled down to 6 people when this hand came up. I held QJ offsuit and limped in the cutoff. The small blind completed and the aforementioned man was the big blind who checked. The flop came A K 10 with two clubs, of which I had none. It was checked around to me and I checked. The turn came an offsuit 9. At this point the big blind bet out 25 into the 6 pot. This is actually quite a problem. If I try to slowplay and call here, there are a large number of scare-cards that could hit on the river and minimize what I can get from him. On the other hand, he made such a large bet that if I raised (he had 120 more behind him), I might scare him off. So I took some time to think about this, and while I was thinking, the guy kept talking and talking. At one point, I heard him say, "You know you're drawing dead." Wow, really? He certainly sounded confident about his hand so I pushed all-in. He called and I showed my straight, which held up. He said that he had two pair, though we never saw his hand. He was mumbling about "can't believe you flopped a straight" as he walked away.
Later that evening, I sat down to play again as we started a new table. Barely three hands in, one guy straddled. With 3 limpers, I decided to raise it to 30 from the button with AK offsuit. The straddler was the only guy to call and we saw a flop of A K 5 rainbow. It was checked to me and I bet 40. He checkraised me to 100, and after some thought, I pushed all-in for 120 more. He called and the turn came 9 and the river came another 9. I asked if he flopped a set as I turned over my AK. He said he only had a king as he flipped over his cards, but as I leaned towards the pot, he added, "Oh wait, I have a 9. I didn't even know what my kicker was." Yes, I had just lost to running 9s to a guy who couldn't fold K9. I subsequently looked it up and the odds for hitting the running 9s were (3/45 x 2/44) = 0.3%. In fact, had he held a random 2-9, the chances of him beating me would have been 7 times more likely. I went back upstairs as fast as I could to get more money, but the guy left by the time I came back down. During this session, I also lost a buyin when I hit a set on the flop and the other guy's overpair caught a bigger set after the money went in.
Later in the night, I went back to the poker room as I was trying to avoid playing any more table games until I got to the Bellagio. So I sat in a 2/15 game. That was not a typo. There was a young guy in the 1/2NL game who made it 15 preflop 9 out of every 10 hands. It wasn't a dead raise as he saw his cards before he bet, but he was consistently firing away at it. After the flop he would usually keep betting and people would either fold or he'd hit some sick cards as he pretty much played any two starting cards with that raise. Well, it seemed like all I had to do was to wait and catch some cards or perhaps play back at him in position. There was certainly no limping speculative hands at this table. After a while, I got dealt aces under the gun and limped. A different player raised it to 15 and there were two other callers by the time it got back to me. I decided to reraise it 50 more and everyone went away. A pot of 48 is not bad for 1/2NL without even having to see a flop. I continued to sit there waiting patiently, folding my suited connectors knowing that I'd have to call 15 to see a flop. A couple of new guys came to our table, and it took them a while to figure out what was going on. One hand, I picked up QQ from the big blind. One of the new guys limped and the raiser did his thing. I called and the limper folded. This was heads up with the crazy preflop raiser. The flop came 10 5 3 rainbow, and I check called a flop bet of 20. I couldn't risk making a raise out of position because he could have started with any two cards, and I fully expected him to keep betting regardless. The turn came another 3, and I check called a bet of 40. The river came a 6 and I checked to him betting 100 on the river. I didn't feel very well, but there was nothing left to do but call, and luckily my queens held up against his 56 suited. The guy continued to play the same way and the table kind of broke up once his stack dwindled down to about 100, from a high of over 700.
Why I'm thinking about playing the lottery (gambling, entertainment, bridge)
I've been thinking about this for a while, but first, a topic that's indirectly related. While discussing my post Poker at South Point: The Normal, my friend, who plays a lot of poker, had some thoughts about a couple of the hands. Regarding hand 1, he said, "I can't believe that nit folded for 30. that's an awful raise - and you're not raising for info, you're raising for value. TPTK is the nuts live, so overpairs are the supernuts." Then he said, "hand 2, you absolutely have to bet middle pair for value on the flop. you have the best hand here an overwhelming majority of the time at 1/2." The thing in common I noticed about the two comments was the use of the term "value".
I know that poker players love talking about EV and I certainly know enough about it, with my Bayesian stats background. Also, as another friend said, "In poker, EV tends to equal EU. It won't always, but on any given hand, it probably does." But in this case, it really was about EU. It's about utility. I'm perfectly happy to sacrifice expected value for other things that mean more to my personal utility. I wasn't out there to play 3000 hands/week and grind out a second living. I was out there to have some fun, play some cards, and maintain a +EV without risking much capital if I could avoid it. Keeping the pot size variance down when the hand was speculative was very important for me. Everybody has their own style that maximizes their playing ability, ie. personal utility.
This topic also comes up in bridge. While discussing bidding with a potential partner, he would frequently retort, "Bob Hamman doesn't bid like that." Bob Hamman also plays Flannery and I believe he is the only world class player that plays standard carding. Two things that most modern experts would classify as technically inferior (and hence not maximizing EV, right?). But when you play as well as Hamman, the things that matter are comfort and reducing randomness. The marginal return on pressing that edge is much smaller than the utility created from avoiding randomness and additional comfort. I've read somewhere that the Italians tend not to preempt at the 3 level for fear of generating random results.
Okay, back to the lottery. I was once told the story of a statistics professor who won a third prize in the lottery. One of his students asked him, "Sir, you're a statistics professor. You know that the odds are against you. So why did you play?" The professor replied, "Well, somebody's got to win it." That is true, and you only have to win it once. Or maybe not. There have been many stories and documentaries about people who won the lottery only to end up worse than before. What's the problem there?
The point I want to make is that I think more middle-class and upper middle-class folks should be playing the lottery. These are the people who, if they won the lottery, would buy real estate, spend on education, invest in businesses, and donate to charity. I think it would be better in terms of both personal utility as well as social utility. However, it is also in these educated circles that people think of playing the lottery as a waste of money and think of its horrible expected value. Insurance, however, is also bad from an expected value point of view, and yet everyone has it or wants it. I just want a dollar and a dream.
I know that poker players love talking about EV and I certainly know enough about it, with my Bayesian stats background. Also, as another friend said, "In poker, EV tends to equal EU. It won't always, but on any given hand, it probably does." But in this case, it really was about EU. It's about utility. I'm perfectly happy to sacrifice expected value for other things that mean more to my personal utility. I wasn't out there to play 3000 hands/week and grind out a second living. I was out there to have some fun, play some cards, and maintain a +EV without risking much capital if I could avoid it. Keeping the pot size variance down when the hand was speculative was very important for me. Everybody has their own style that maximizes their playing ability, ie. personal utility.
This topic also comes up in bridge. While discussing bidding with a potential partner, he would frequently retort, "Bob Hamman doesn't bid like that." Bob Hamman also plays Flannery and I believe he is the only world class player that plays standard carding. Two things that most modern experts would classify as technically inferior (and hence not maximizing EV, right?). But when you play as well as Hamman, the things that matter are comfort and reducing randomness. The marginal return on pressing that edge is much smaller than the utility created from avoiding randomness and additional comfort. I've read somewhere that the Italians tend not to preempt at the 3 level for fear of generating random results.
Okay, back to the lottery. I was once told the story of a statistics professor who won a third prize in the lottery. One of his students asked him, "Sir, you're a statistics professor. You know that the odds are against you. So why did you play?" The professor replied, "Well, somebody's got to win it." That is true, and you only have to win it once. Or maybe not. There have been many stories and documentaries about people who won the lottery only to end up worse than before. What's the problem there?
The point I want to make is that I think more middle-class and upper middle-class folks should be playing the lottery. These are the people who, if they won the lottery, would buy real estate, spend on education, invest in businesses, and donate to charity. I think it would be better in terms of both personal utility as well as social utility. However, it is also in these educated circles that people think of playing the lottery as a waste of money and think of its horrible expected value. Insurance, however, is also bad from an expected value point of view, and yet everyone has it or wants it. I just want a dollar and a dream.
Dinner at Picasso (VegasSummer 09, food)
During my stay at the Bellagio, I decided to go all out and have a real vacation, so I made sure to eat at Picasso and Robuchon (review coming later) at my first available opportunity. Picasso is at the Bellagio and is open Wed-Mon. It is most famous for showcasing actual works of Pablo Picasso in the restaurant. A food fight in here could cost hundreds of millions of dollars!
Atmosphere: I arrived for my 7:30pm reservation and it was still light out. The windows looked out onto a ground level view of the Bellagio fountains. The room itself was dimly lit except for where it showcased the artwork. The flowers and carpet were very colorful, but it was clear that the Picassos were meant to be the visual attraction. Every time the fountain show went off, it sounded like there was a mild typhoon outside.
Service: It was excellent but nothing beyond what I would expect at this price (outside NYC especially). The tables were well-spaced and the ratio of servers to tables was just right to provide attentive service without them being all over you.
Food: The stuff that really matters. During the summer, they only offer a 4 course prix fixe and a 5 course degustation menu. I asked my server for the best dishes here, emphasizing that I was more interested in skill than in ingredients. He pointed to 4 possibilities from the prix fixe and one item from the degustation. Since I already had my eye on the choices my server recommended, I went with the prix fixe and added the one dish from the degustation menu.
The amuse was a cold corn soup, with a little skewer of hard-boiled quail egg and osetra caviar as well as a little skewer of smoked salmon with creme fraiche and cucumber. This was very good. A nice fresh start to the meal and the sweetness of the corn soup matched very well with the saltiness of the caviar and salmon.
The first course was poached oysters garnished with osetra caviar in a beurre blanc vermouth sauce. Delicious, but I thought what really made the dish was the sauce. I asked for another piece of their very good French bread to soak up the rest of the caviar and sauce after I was done with the oysters.
The second course was roasted langoustine with roasted zucchini, crispy artichokes, tomato confit, and piquillo pepper vinaigrette. I love langoustine and this was perfectly cooked with good flavors and a terrific mix of textures. I thought that the tomato confit and pepper vinaigrette were a little strong for the delicate taste of langoustine. Nevertheless, it was an overall delicious dish.
The third course was the added course from the degustation menu. It was the sauteed "A" steak of foie gras with obtuse poached cherries on PX gelee and crushed almonds. At this point I ordered a glass of pinot noir which was actually from California by Soter. I only knew of his Oregon stuff but this was very good too. The seared foie gras was lovely and showcased again the chef's great use of sweet with salty. While many places use foie gras with fruit, I thought the addition of the almonds really gave it something else.
The fourth course was a roasted milk-fed veal chop with rosemary potatoes and au jus. A generous portion of bone-in veal was tasty, but did not wow like the other dishes. I would expect to be able to have something like this in many restaurants in NYC.
Strangely enough I wrote in my notes that there was no dessert. I'm pretty sure I had something since dessert is included in both the prix fixe and the degustation menus. Perhaps it was just not memorable, as is often the case with me and desserts.
Overall: My mind wandered more towards what would happen if someone threw their food at the artwork rather than admiring the Picassos on display. I found the sounds from the fountain show to be distracting, and do not particularly care for restaurants that are too dimly lit. That being said, it's a wonderful atmosphere for a date. The food was excellent and a terrific value for the price. The 4 course prix fixe is 113 while the 5 course degustation is 123. The sauteed foie gras added a la carte was 25. I would definitely recommend going there and plan to be back if I somehow found money to go to Vegas again.
Atmosphere: I arrived for my 7:30pm reservation and it was still light out. The windows looked out onto a ground level view of the Bellagio fountains. The room itself was dimly lit except for where it showcased the artwork. The flowers and carpet were very colorful, but it was clear that the Picassos were meant to be the visual attraction. Every time the fountain show went off, it sounded like there was a mild typhoon outside.
Service: It was excellent but nothing beyond what I would expect at this price (outside NYC especially). The tables were well-spaced and the ratio of servers to tables was just right to provide attentive service without them being all over you.
Food: The stuff that really matters. During the summer, they only offer a 4 course prix fixe and a 5 course degustation menu. I asked my server for the best dishes here, emphasizing that I was more interested in skill than in ingredients. He pointed to 4 possibilities from the prix fixe and one item from the degustation. Since I already had my eye on the choices my server recommended, I went with the prix fixe and added the one dish from the degustation menu.
The amuse was a cold corn soup, with a little skewer of hard-boiled quail egg and osetra caviar as well as a little skewer of smoked salmon with creme fraiche and cucumber. This was very good. A nice fresh start to the meal and the sweetness of the corn soup matched very well with the saltiness of the caviar and salmon.
The first course was poached oysters garnished with osetra caviar in a beurre blanc vermouth sauce. Delicious, but I thought what really made the dish was the sauce. I asked for another piece of their very good French bread to soak up the rest of the caviar and sauce after I was done with the oysters.
The second course was roasted langoustine with roasted zucchini, crispy artichokes, tomato confit, and piquillo pepper vinaigrette. I love langoustine and this was perfectly cooked with good flavors and a terrific mix of textures. I thought that the tomato confit and pepper vinaigrette were a little strong for the delicate taste of langoustine. Nevertheless, it was an overall delicious dish.
The third course was the added course from the degustation menu. It was the sauteed "A" steak of foie gras with obtuse poached cherries on PX gelee and crushed almonds. At this point I ordered a glass of pinot noir which was actually from California by Soter. I only knew of his Oregon stuff but this was very good too. The seared foie gras was lovely and showcased again the chef's great use of sweet with salty. While many places use foie gras with fruit, I thought the addition of the almonds really gave it something else.
The fourth course was a roasted milk-fed veal chop with rosemary potatoes and au jus. A generous portion of bone-in veal was tasty, but did not wow like the other dishes. I would expect to be able to have something like this in many restaurants in NYC.
Strangely enough I wrote in my notes that there was no dessert. I'm pretty sure I had something since dessert is included in both the prix fixe and the degustation menus. Perhaps it was just not memorable, as is often the case with me and desserts.
Overall: My mind wandered more towards what would happen if someone threw their food at the artwork rather than admiring the Picassos on display. I found the sounds from the fountain show to be distracting, and do not particularly care for restaurants that are too dimly lit. That being said, it's a wonderful atmosphere for a date. The food was excellent and a terrific value for the price. The 4 course prix fixe is 113 while the 5 course degustation is 123. The sauteed foie gras added a la carte was 25. I would definitely recommend going there and plan to be back if I somehow found money to go to Vegas again.
Sunday, July 12, 2009
The South Point Hotel and Casino (VegasSummer 09, entertainment, gambling)
I stayed there for the first 6 nights of the Vegas trip, and I actually liked the place a lot. It's away from the strip, but there were a good number of things to do on the property. With a theater, arcade, bowling, spa, and full casino as well as a poker room, I didn't really need to be back near the strip. Most of the people who spent their time there were families. There were many dads in the poker room, gambling away while their wives were at the spa and their children at the lanes or arcade. The rooms are a nice size and while the bathroom was not as nice as the Bellagio, the water pressure in the showers were comparable. While I would definitely recommend staying on the strip if you were with a bunch of 20-30 year olds looking to party and do whatever it is that hopefully stays in Vegas, I would recommend South Point for a relaxing quick family getaway.
While I clearly spent a lot of time in the poker room, I also played a decent amount of table games. I started off mostly playing 10-25 a hand, usually at Pai Gow Poker or Baccarat. The only really big players I saw were a table of Vietnamese people who were playing about 2-3k per hand of Baccarat. At one point, I was down to the last 400 or so that I would spend at the tables there (knowing that I still had to go to the Bellagio afterwards for 3 more nights) and of course I decided to play 200 a hand of Pai Gow Poker. Well, I managed to stay afloat long enough to hit a ridiculous run where I won 8 in a row and got back to even for my time at the tables there. I got up after the dealer started talking about the streak, as I'm superstitious enough to feel that talking about it will jinx it. My seat would have won the next one but lose the one after that, so it all came out to be about the same.
With that run of hands and a bit more time put in at 100 per hand, I decided that I'd done enough gambling and would only play poker on my last day there. I went to the pit with the Pai Gow Poker early that last afternoon and asked what the pit bosses could do for me. They told me that because I booked my room through a third party, they couldn't take any nights off, but they comped whatever I'd charged to the room previously, and comped me a big lunch at the Oyster Bar. After that, I wasn't in the mood to go to the poker room, so I decided to check out the spa. They had day and multi-day passes, but if you book some sort of spa or salon treatment, then you get to use the spa for the rest of the day as well. So I chose the cheapest thing on the menu, a manicure for $25, since my nails were way too long at the time anyway. I didn't quite like the manicure, but the spa was a good time. The spa pass included use of the gym (decent sized with normal range of machines) as well as the spa which included a lounge, jacuzzi, steam room, sauna, showers, and complimentary drinks and fruit.
After the spa closed, I went back to the pit to see if I could get a dinner taken care of as well. They told me that they usually give out one comp a day, but managed to get me another full meal at the Oyster Bar. I was happy with that as I didn't think that I had given them that much play besides that one big run during Pai Gow Poker. Then again, 200 a hand was a lot compared to most of the players there. Being in NYC all the time, where everyone feels like a tiny goby in a vast ocean, it was good to be a little bit of a bigger fish in a small pond. One of the interesting things about Pai Gow Poker there was that they let you bet multiple hands with the ability to set them all yourself, as well as bet a different amount on each hand. I think that someone with a good memory and a strategy to use that extra information could take good advantage of that.
In all, I would say that if you're flying way across the US to Las Vegas from the East Coast or going there to party it up, stay on the strip and do the sightseeing and the clubbing. But if you were taking a short trip there with your family or just to get some gamble on without fully indulging in "Sin City", then I think it's a nice place and good value for money. Another place that the dealers talked about away from the strip was Red Rock Casino, which is about a $50 cab ride from the airport. However, I was told that if it was on the strip the property would be comparable or even better than the Bellagio, so perhaps that's a place worth trying out.
While I clearly spent a lot of time in the poker room, I also played a decent amount of table games. I started off mostly playing 10-25 a hand, usually at Pai Gow Poker or Baccarat. The only really big players I saw were a table of Vietnamese people who were playing about 2-3k per hand of Baccarat. At one point, I was down to the last 400 or so that I would spend at the tables there (knowing that I still had to go to the Bellagio afterwards for 3 more nights) and of course I decided to play 200 a hand of Pai Gow Poker. Well, I managed to stay afloat long enough to hit a ridiculous run where I won 8 in a row and got back to even for my time at the tables there. I got up after the dealer started talking about the streak, as I'm superstitious enough to feel that talking about it will jinx it. My seat would have won the next one but lose the one after that, so it all came out to be about the same.
With that run of hands and a bit more time put in at 100 per hand, I decided that I'd done enough gambling and would only play poker on my last day there. I went to the pit with the Pai Gow Poker early that last afternoon and asked what the pit bosses could do for me. They told me that because I booked my room through a third party, they couldn't take any nights off, but they comped whatever I'd charged to the room previously, and comped me a big lunch at the Oyster Bar. After that, I wasn't in the mood to go to the poker room, so I decided to check out the spa. They had day and multi-day passes, but if you book some sort of spa or salon treatment, then you get to use the spa for the rest of the day as well. So I chose the cheapest thing on the menu, a manicure for $25, since my nails were way too long at the time anyway. I didn't quite like the manicure, but the spa was a good time. The spa pass included use of the gym (decent sized with normal range of machines) as well as the spa which included a lounge, jacuzzi, steam room, sauna, showers, and complimentary drinks and fruit.
After the spa closed, I went back to the pit to see if I could get a dinner taken care of as well. They told me that they usually give out one comp a day, but managed to get me another full meal at the Oyster Bar. I was happy with that as I didn't think that I had given them that much play besides that one big run during Pai Gow Poker. Then again, 200 a hand was a lot compared to most of the players there. Being in NYC all the time, where everyone feels like a tiny goby in a vast ocean, it was good to be a little bit of a bigger fish in a small pond. One of the interesting things about Pai Gow Poker there was that they let you bet multiple hands with the ability to set them all yourself, as well as bet a different amount on each hand. I think that someone with a good memory and a strategy to use that extra information could take good advantage of that.
In all, I would say that if you're flying way across the US to Las Vegas from the East Coast or going there to party it up, stay on the strip and do the sightseeing and the clubbing. But if you were taking a short trip there with your family or just to get some gamble on without fully indulging in "Sin City", then I think it's a nice place and good value for money. Another place that the dealers talked about away from the strip was Red Rock Casino, which is about a $50 cab ride from the airport. However, I was told that if it was on the strip the property would be comparable or even better than the Bellagio, so perhaps that's a place worth trying out.
Thursday, July 9, 2009
More Las Vegas Food (VegasSummer 09, food)
Taking a break from the poker posts, here's a post about some more of the food from my trip to Vegas. This post will talk about one dinner outing and all the other non-event dining I did when I was out there.
Musashi Japanese Steakhouse
I'm always in search of good teppanyaki (frequently called hibachi cooking in the US). In fact, last time I was in Hong Kong I specifically went looking for a decent one. The problem is that teppanyaki in the US almost always seems to end up with Benihana and that is meh at best. So when I heard about this place on some travel channel show, I knew I wanted to try it when I was out in Vegas.
It's located in some strip mall behind the Flamingo. Strangely enough, within the same block are locations of three of the more prominent US steakhouse chains, Morton's, Ruth's Chris, and Smith & Wollensky. The place is divided into two sections, a restaurant with a sushi bar on one side and the teppanyaki grills on the other. There was a foul stench as we entered the restaurant, something like a burst sewer pipe, but luckily it did not permeate into the teppanyaki room.
Their main attraction is Kobe beef, which they advertise as being the only Kobe beef in Las Vegas actually from Japan. I assume this just means that they don't go through a US supplier. A 4oz portion cost $85 while a 9oz portion cost $135, so I went for the 9oz portion. After I asked them to bring out the meat for a look, three other diners (including the friend I was eating with) opted for the Kobe as well. The food and the sauces were very good. I'm not big on the show aspect of teppanyaki, which is more of a big deal here in the US than, say, in HK, but he did some entertaining tricks. Since teppanyaki is a communal experience, it helped that our fellow diners were very friendly. The fried rice was also very good, and while the prices didn't look cheap, the portions were generous. There are supposed to be a couple of other good teppanyaki places in Vegas, but they're mostly in hotels with a higher price tag while this place has more locals dining.
Burger Bar
Located in the Mandalay Bay shopping center, this burger-centric restaurant was created by Hubert Keller, owner-chef of Fleur de Lys in San Francisco and the first week winner of Bravo's Top Chef Masters. The highest priced item on the menu was a $60 burger with American wagyu meat, foie gras, perigord truffle sauce, and slices of black truffles. I opted to create the same burger without the slices of truffles, for about $34. It was very good for the first few bites but then just got boring very quickly. The truffle sauce was the real deal although it cost $5. The foie gras wasn't bad but wasn't particularly great. The burger was not particularly flavorful, though that could have been from being overshadowed by the other add-ons. We also had an order of sliders, which I really thought were flavorless, with a bread (I say bread, not bun) that just did not work for me at all. I also had a shake which was good and not too sweet. Overall, the burgers weren't great despite the generally favorable reviews and I'm beginning to doubt all this West Coast love for In-N-Out. The other thing of note was that of the topping options, there was only crispy bacon, no slab bacon.
The Buffet at the Palms
We ate there for lunch after getting tickets for the IMAX Transformers 2. I kind of knew what to expect given the $11 price, but it was just bad. The options were very limited and nothing looked particularly pleasing. The carving station was actually carving corned beef (instead of some type of roast beef or prime rib) and yet still served au jus with it. The dough in the pizza was horrendous. I mostly ate salad and pasta. Stuff that I almost never eat at a buffet.
The Buffet at the Bellagio
I'd been there before for lunch and was not impressed, but I'd heard that dinner was much better, although $35 is definitely not cheap for a buffet in the US. Went after the crab legs to start, but there wasn't much flavor or sweetness to them. My guess is that they'd been too frozen, and that since everyone ate them with drawn butter, many people probably didn't mind. The selection was pretty good, with 4 different meats on offer at the carving station, although the lamb that I got was also pretty tasteless. The only thing that I really liked was the made to order spicy tuna hand roll. Crisp nori covered a spicy tuna mix that was not heavy on the mayo. The only other good part of the buffet was that I discovered that chilled smoked salmon with room temperature/warm drawn butter and a squeeze of lemon is an amazing combination. Maybe I'm just spoiled by amazing US$50+ buffets all over Hong Kong.
Silverado Steakhouse at South Point
Nothing special although I only ordered the prime rib. Everything was USDA prime and dry-aged, but not particularly flavorful. A nice touch was that even the house salad was mixed at the table. Good pretzel bread in the bread basket. Wouldn't be a steakhouse that I purposely visit, but I can't complain too much since this meal ended up being comped.
Hot Dogs at South Point
In the sportsbook at South Point, there's a little hot dog stand that's open till about 10pm. It serves all-beef hot dogs that are about the size of what they call a sausage at most NYC dirty water hot dog carts. Topping choices include ketchup, mustard, raw diced onion, and relish. They were really good and really convenient being about 2 steps away from the poker room. They were also a fantastic deal at 75 cents each.
Oyster Bar at South Point
I will explain my comp situation in a later post about the two hotel casinos that I stayed in, but for now, just know that I was comped two $50 meals at this Oyster Bar, one for lunch and one for dinner. The comp wasn't for $50 as much as an app and an entree and two drinks and the server just pointed me in the direction of the most expensive things on the menu. For lunch, I had the jumbo shrimp cocktail and their version of a cioppino, which was a seafood mix (with lobster) over a soupy tomato base with linguine served in a bowl. The cioppino was actually quite good in that none of the seafood managed to get overcooked and it was just a nice simple rustic taste. The jumbo shrimp cocktail were really jumbo, looking to be about 5.5 inches spread out. Those were so good that when I went back for dinner, I ended up having another two orders. For dinner, I had more of that shrimp and a dozen oysters. While the oysters were very meaty, I found them to be lacking in flavor, and almost a chore to finish.
Noodles at Bellagio
I enjoyed Noodles the last time I stayed at the Bellagio, but I'd heard that they changed the head chef since my last visit. With two $90 comps, there was a lot of ordering, a lot of eating, and a lot of taking away, back to my hotel room and even onto the plane. I had the Hainanese chicken which was good, probably more so because I miss it than it being a superior version of the dish. I had some fermented eggs (the century eggs as people like to call them) which were nice, as well as a Cantonese-style roast duck and wonton noodle soup at the recommendation of the floor guy who wrote my comps. That was really good in that they were the best wontons I've had in the US. For the dishes that I took away however, it seemed like there wasn't much care put into the cooking. I ordered water spinach and chinese broccoli with garlic twice, and every time it seemed like they were just simply blanched. I also ordered the crab meat with XO sauce over rice noodles, with extra XO sauce one time, and both times there really wasn't much in the way of XO sauce.
Musashi Japanese Steakhouse
I'm always in search of good teppanyaki (frequently called hibachi cooking in the US). In fact, last time I was in Hong Kong I specifically went looking for a decent one. The problem is that teppanyaki in the US almost always seems to end up with Benihana and that is meh at best. So when I heard about this place on some travel channel show, I knew I wanted to try it when I was out in Vegas.
It's located in some strip mall behind the Flamingo. Strangely enough, within the same block are locations of three of the more prominent US steakhouse chains, Morton's, Ruth's Chris, and Smith & Wollensky. The place is divided into two sections, a restaurant with a sushi bar on one side and the teppanyaki grills on the other. There was a foul stench as we entered the restaurant, something like a burst sewer pipe, but luckily it did not permeate into the teppanyaki room.
Their main attraction is Kobe beef, which they advertise as being the only Kobe beef in Las Vegas actually from Japan. I assume this just means that they don't go through a US supplier. A 4oz portion cost $85 while a 9oz portion cost $135, so I went for the 9oz portion. After I asked them to bring out the meat for a look, three other diners (including the friend I was eating with) opted for the Kobe as well. The food and the sauces were very good. I'm not big on the show aspect of teppanyaki, which is more of a big deal here in the US than, say, in HK, but he did some entertaining tricks. Since teppanyaki is a communal experience, it helped that our fellow diners were very friendly. The fried rice was also very good, and while the prices didn't look cheap, the portions were generous. There are supposed to be a couple of other good teppanyaki places in Vegas, but they're mostly in hotels with a higher price tag while this place has more locals dining.
Burger Bar
Located in the Mandalay Bay shopping center, this burger-centric restaurant was created by Hubert Keller, owner-chef of Fleur de Lys in San Francisco and the first week winner of Bravo's Top Chef Masters. The highest priced item on the menu was a $60 burger with American wagyu meat, foie gras, perigord truffle sauce, and slices of black truffles. I opted to create the same burger without the slices of truffles, for about $34. It was very good for the first few bites but then just got boring very quickly. The truffle sauce was the real deal although it cost $5. The foie gras wasn't bad but wasn't particularly great. The burger was not particularly flavorful, though that could have been from being overshadowed by the other add-ons. We also had an order of sliders, which I really thought were flavorless, with a bread (I say bread, not bun) that just did not work for me at all. I also had a shake which was good and not too sweet. Overall, the burgers weren't great despite the generally favorable reviews and I'm beginning to doubt all this West Coast love for In-N-Out. The other thing of note was that of the topping options, there was only crispy bacon, no slab bacon.
The Buffet at the Palms
We ate there for lunch after getting tickets for the IMAX Transformers 2. I kind of knew what to expect given the $11 price, but it was just bad. The options were very limited and nothing looked particularly pleasing. The carving station was actually carving corned beef (instead of some type of roast beef or prime rib) and yet still served au jus with it. The dough in the pizza was horrendous. I mostly ate salad and pasta. Stuff that I almost never eat at a buffet.
The Buffet at the Bellagio
I'd been there before for lunch and was not impressed, but I'd heard that dinner was much better, although $35 is definitely not cheap for a buffet in the US. Went after the crab legs to start, but there wasn't much flavor or sweetness to them. My guess is that they'd been too frozen, and that since everyone ate them with drawn butter, many people probably didn't mind. The selection was pretty good, with 4 different meats on offer at the carving station, although the lamb that I got was also pretty tasteless. The only thing that I really liked was the made to order spicy tuna hand roll. Crisp nori covered a spicy tuna mix that was not heavy on the mayo. The only other good part of the buffet was that I discovered that chilled smoked salmon with room temperature/warm drawn butter and a squeeze of lemon is an amazing combination. Maybe I'm just spoiled by amazing US$50+ buffets all over Hong Kong.
Silverado Steakhouse at South Point
Nothing special although I only ordered the prime rib. Everything was USDA prime and dry-aged, but not particularly flavorful. A nice touch was that even the house salad was mixed at the table. Good pretzel bread in the bread basket. Wouldn't be a steakhouse that I purposely visit, but I can't complain too much since this meal ended up being comped.
Hot Dogs at South Point
In the sportsbook at South Point, there's a little hot dog stand that's open till about 10pm. It serves all-beef hot dogs that are about the size of what they call a sausage at most NYC dirty water hot dog carts. Topping choices include ketchup, mustard, raw diced onion, and relish. They were really good and really convenient being about 2 steps away from the poker room. They were also a fantastic deal at 75 cents each.
Oyster Bar at South Point
I will explain my comp situation in a later post about the two hotel casinos that I stayed in, but for now, just know that I was comped two $50 meals at this Oyster Bar, one for lunch and one for dinner. The comp wasn't for $50 as much as an app and an entree and two drinks and the server just pointed me in the direction of the most expensive things on the menu. For lunch, I had the jumbo shrimp cocktail and their version of a cioppino, which was a seafood mix (with lobster) over a soupy tomato base with linguine served in a bowl. The cioppino was actually quite good in that none of the seafood managed to get overcooked and it was just a nice simple rustic taste. The jumbo shrimp cocktail were really jumbo, looking to be about 5.5 inches spread out. Those were so good that when I went back for dinner, I ended up having another two orders. For dinner, I had more of that shrimp and a dozen oysters. While the oysters were very meaty, I found them to be lacking in flavor, and almost a chore to finish.
Noodles at Bellagio
I enjoyed Noodles the last time I stayed at the Bellagio, but I'd heard that they changed the head chef since my last visit. With two $90 comps, there was a lot of ordering, a lot of eating, and a lot of taking away, back to my hotel room and even onto the plane. I had the Hainanese chicken which was good, probably more so because I miss it than it being a superior version of the dish. I had some fermented eggs (the century eggs as people like to call them) which were nice, as well as a Cantonese-style roast duck and wonton noodle soup at the recommendation of the floor guy who wrote my comps. That was really good in that they were the best wontons I've had in the US. For the dishes that I took away however, it seemed like there wasn't much care put into the cooking. I ordered water spinach and chinese broccoli with garlic twice, and every time it seemed like they were just simply blanched. I also ordered the crab meat with XO sauce over rice noodles, with extra XO sauce one time, and both times there really wasn't much in the way of XO sauce.
Tuesday, July 7, 2009
Poker at South Point: The Weird (VegasSummer 09, gambling)
Before I get to the tales of the weird, here's a hand I played and I want you to guess what I had:
I limped UTG and a middle position player as well as the button also limped. The small blind completed and the big blind checked. The flop came ♣A ♣4 ♥5 and it was checked around to the middle position limper who bet 10. Everyone else folded and I called. The turn was the ♠5 and I checked again to the middle position player who bet 20. I thought for a little bit, then asked the bettor how much he had remaining in chips. Upon hearing the answer of 80 more, I thought some more, then moved all in over the top. Any guesses what I held?
So during four of the six nights I was there, there was a guy on vacation who was also in the poker room every night. He was recognizable because he was very talkative and decently loud. While some of the regulars got annoyed, I didn't mind him at all and I knew that at the very least the table he was at would be friendly and fun. As some of my bridge partners know, I'm capable of playing at a pretty good level while chatting away.
On his last night playing, he tried to get the people at the table to play a 2-7 sidebet. For those who don't know, it's a simple side game where if someone wins a hand and shows 2-7 (it can be a hand where everybody else folds), everyone in the bet has to pay off a predetermined amount to the winner. It wasn't for anything crazy, just 5 per person. We only had 4 people willing to play and there was a woman who said she wanted to play but that a sidebet like that can easily mess up her play. After a little bit of trying to persuade people to play, one guy said he'd play if it was for 10 per person. With that, the woman agreed to play and we had 6 of us in the sidebet. While the floor did their job of telling us that sidebets were not allowed, we kept going anyway. Now that there was a 50 bonus riding on the 2-7 in a 1/2NL game, it made it worthwhile.
The weirdness began on a hand that I hadn't even been paying attention to. After two limpers, the woman on the button makes a nice sized raise. On the flop, the early limper bets out, and after a call, the woman makes a big raise again. After the turn, it gets checked to the woman who bets about 2/3 of the pot and is then check-raised all in by the early limper for about 80 more. She seemed visibly troubled, and then said, "I call. See, this is what that stupid bet made me do!" as she turned over 2-7 for a pair of 7s, drawing dead to the other guy's set. It's one thing to take a stab or even two stabs at it with 2-7. It's another to call an all-in drawing dead for 80 more. The weirdest thing was that she had been playing really tight, smart poker for an hour and a half before this.
She went all-in and lost about a few hands later. She seemed to be able to laugh about the incident, but she left shortly after. After she left, we managed to get the whole table in on the action. One guy won the 2-7 with a decent-sized preflop reraise while another won with a preflop raise and a flop bet on an AK7 board that scared everyone away. A couple guys took stabs at the 2-7 on the flop, but gave up on it fairly easily and didn't go down in flames like the woman did when faced with resistance. The first 2-7 hand that won post-flop was, well, have you figured out my hand from that first question I asked? I did indeed have 2-7 on that hand, and the middle position limper folded an A face up.
But there was one more weird little hand before I decided to call it a night. The talkative fellow raised it to 11 UTG, which was his regular raise. One guy called and I called from the button with ♦J♦3. The big blind called as well and four people saw a flop of A 10 2 rainbow with no diamonds. It was checked to the preflop raiser who bet 20. For some reason it felt like a standard continuation bet to me, so I decided to float him as everyone else folded. For those unfamiliar with the term, floating essentially means to call an opponent's bet with nothing with the intention of taking the pot away from him on a later street. See here. The turn was the ♦9 and it was checked to me so I took a stab at it with a bet of 30. He said, "Good hand." as he folded 2-7 face up and added, "You couldn't let me have this one?" I showed him my complete bluff and we had a good laugh about it. His 2-7 was actually well ahead!!!
I limped UTG and a middle position player as well as the button also limped. The small blind completed and the big blind checked. The flop came ♣A ♣4 ♥5 and it was checked around to the middle position limper who bet 10. Everyone else folded and I called. The turn was the ♠5 and I checked again to the middle position player who bet 20. I thought for a little bit, then asked the bettor how much he had remaining in chips. Upon hearing the answer of 80 more, I thought some more, then moved all in over the top. Any guesses what I held?
So during four of the six nights I was there, there was a guy on vacation who was also in the poker room every night. He was recognizable because he was very talkative and decently loud. While some of the regulars got annoyed, I didn't mind him at all and I knew that at the very least the table he was at would be friendly and fun. As some of my bridge partners know, I'm capable of playing at a pretty good level while chatting away.
On his last night playing, he tried to get the people at the table to play a 2-7 sidebet. For those who don't know, it's a simple side game where if someone wins a hand and shows 2-7 (it can be a hand where everybody else folds), everyone in the bet has to pay off a predetermined amount to the winner. It wasn't for anything crazy, just 5 per person. We only had 4 people willing to play and there was a woman who said she wanted to play but that a sidebet like that can easily mess up her play. After a little bit of trying to persuade people to play, one guy said he'd play if it was for 10 per person. With that, the woman agreed to play and we had 6 of us in the sidebet. While the floor did their job of telling us that sidebets were not allowed, we kept going anyway. Now that there was a 50 bonus riding on the 2-7 in a 1/2NL game, it made it worthwhile.
The weirdness began on a hand that I hadn't even been paying attention to. After two limpers, the woman on the button makes a nice sized raise. On the flop, the early limper bets out, and after a call, the woman makes a big raise again. After the turn, it gets checked to the woman who bets about 2/3 of the pot and is then check-raised all in by the early limper for about 80 more. She seemed visibly troubled, and then said, "I call. See, this is what that stupid bet made me do!" as she turned over 2-7 for a pair of 7s, drawing dead to the other guy's set. It's one thing to take a stab or even two stabs at it with 2-7. It's another to call an all-in drawing dead for 80 more. The weirdest thing was that she had been playing really tight, smart poker for an hour and a half before this.
She went all-in and lost about a few hands later. She seemed to be able to laugh about the incident, but she left shortly after. After she left, we managed to get the whole table in on the action. One guy won the 2-7 with a decent-sized preflop reraise while another won with a preflop raise and a flop bet on an AK7 board that scared everyone away. A couple guys took stabs at the 2-7 on the flop, but gave up on it fairly easily and didn't go down in flames like the woman did when faced with resistance. The first 2-7 hand that won post-flop was, well, have you figured out my hand from that first question I asked? I did indeed have 2-7 on that hand, and the middle position limper folded an A face up.
But there was one more weird little hand before I decided to call it a night. The talkative fellow raised it to 11 UTG, which was his regular raise. One guy called and I called from the button with ♦J♦3. The big blind called as well and four people saw a flop of A 10 2 rainbow with no diamonds. It was checked to the preflop raiser who bet 20. For some reason it felt like a standard continuation bet to me, so I decided to float him as everyone else folded. For those unfamiliar with the term, floating essentially means to call an opponent's bet with nothing with the intention of taking the pot away from him on a later street. See here. The turn was the ♦9 and it was checked to me so I took a stab at it with a bet of 30. He said, "Good hand." as he folded 2-7 face up and added, "You couldn't let me have this one?" I showed him my complete bluff and we had a good laugh about it. His 2-7 was actually well ahead!!!
Monday, July 6, 2009
Poker at South Point: The Normal (VegasSummer 09, gambling)
I stayed at the South Point Hotel and Casino for my first 6 nights in Vegas. It's off the strip and was the best value that I found on Hotwire. I will write a more detailed post about the hotel and casino later. The poker room at the South Point was a small area, perhaps able to fit 11 tables at the most. During the 6 nights I was there, there were at most 3 1/2NL tables going and only once did they get a 2/5NL table going. Most of the players were locals, about 60% I would say. Not local pros, but rather just locals and local dealers who wanted to play without dealing with the strip traffic.
The floor staff was friendly and most of them as well as some dealers knew me by sight by the third night. Unlike poker rooms on the east coast, most of Vegas seems to rake rather than count time. At the South Point, there was a high hand jackpot. This is hit when you use both cards in your hand (must have pair for quads) and hit quads, a straight flush, or a royal flush. These were then divided into suits or which quads you hit (2-A). The hand did not need to reach showdown, but there needs to be $10 in the pot to qualify (of which $1 went to the jackpot). During the time I was there, the diamond royal flush was the biggest draw, having reached over $6k from not having been hit for over a month. The comp system was time-based, with $1.5/hr for the first 4 hours, then $.75/hr after that, with a $9 cap per 24 hours. By the time I left I had $30 in comps (still there I never took them), and that didn't even include the times when I forgot to clock in or out. So you can imagine how much time I spent in that poker room.
Most of the tables were friendly, and whenever possible I tried to get onto a friendly table. There were players who were pretty blatant about their tendencies. One old asian woman, who seemed to be a regular, regularly overbet her top pair while check-calling her draws. For example, if there were 5 limpers to the flop and she hit her top pair of Qs, she'd bet 25 into an 8 pot (1 for rake, 1 for jackpot). She even bet like this when she hit the nut flush on the flop! One of my friends said that 1/2NL in Vegas during the WSOP was probably more like .25/.5 online. One of the ways in which this was true was that preflop raises were all over the place. Raises of 12/15/20 were very common with a wide variety of hands and had a wide variety of hands call these big preflop raises.
In the end, the one tendency that really seemed to matter was an analysis of continuation bet patterns. The key things to know seem to be how often people continuation bet, how many more shots they were going to continue to stab at it, and how often they would call a raise of the continuation bet with two overs that missed the flop. I found that if you were playing against people who can play a little, clearly have read a book or two, you were better raising the continuation bet if you had a piece of the flop. On the other hand, playing against the cowboy or the truck driver, you were better placed to just call the bet.
Below are some hands and plays I made that I found interesting. Hope you do too. For all of these, I played 1/2NL and bought in for 300.
Hand 1.
Holding ♦K♣K in the cutoff, I raise it to 12. Button calls, and flop comes ♠Q ♠5 ♦2
I bet 20, button raises 20 more.
At this point I want to see where I'm at, so I raise it 30 more. I'm in no hurry to raise it too much. I find that especially on the flop, noone ever feels priced out to chase in a raised pot. But if I run into a monster, I'm willing to let go of it without committing too much. After considerable thought, she mucks her hand. If she had raised again after that length of thought, I would have folded easily. After I showed her my K's she said she had AA. From her tight play that I observed afterward, it would not surprise me at all if she did have AA.
Hand 2.
Holding ♦J♦7 in late position, I call an early position raise to 7. Heads up, the flop comes T 7 2 rainbow. Preflop raiser checks to me and I check. I'm not in a tournament trying to amass chips to survive blinds, so I don't feel a need to bet here. If it's clear he caught up by the turn, I can let this go. If not, I feel that I am vulnerable to a wide variety of plays back at me and dangerous turn cards if my flop bet doesn't get him to go away. The turn is another rainbow 5 and it's checked to me again. This time I'm fairly confident I'm ahead and bet 10. The guy now check raises 10 more. I'm still not convinced that his hand suddenly got better or that he'd been slowplaying the whole time, so I call to get more information. The river came a K. This is a very dangerous card. If he had just been making a play back at me with AK, KQ, KJ, he will have caught up. He bet 25. However, there was a wonderful tell that I caught here, something that you won't get online. He reached for his chips to bet BEFORE the K hit on the river and his motion did not slow or change in any way as the K hit the felt. This felt to me like he considered his hand purely a bluff and the river not to have mattered, so I called. He mucked his hand, saying, "You call, you win."
Hand 3
Holding ♦J♦8 on the button I call a raise to 12 from UTG. The flop comes ♦Q ♦T ♠3
The preflop raiser bets 20, and I did not sense a lot of confidence. I decided to raise here to 50 on the sense of weakness, knowing that I'm ok to call if we do get our chips in the middle. The preflop raiser thinks for a while then pushes all in for 100 more. I call and he flips up ♥J♣J. Unless he was very confident he was pushing me off the hand, his play was pretty atrocious. He's drawing extremely thin if I have a Q, and even on this hand that he caught me with, he's no better than 53% to win the hand. One extra inference, is that if I had ♦A♦K or ♦K♦J or even ♦A♦J I was not likely to want to chase him off the hand, to get my chance at $6k high hand jackpot. I think this makes his play even worse. Of course I missed and he won the hand.
The floor staff was friendly and most of them as well as some dealers knew me by sight by the third night. Unlike poker rooms on the east coast, most of Vegas seems to rake rather than count time. At the South Point, there was a high hand jackpot. This is hit when you use both cards in your hand (must have pair for quads) and hit quads, a straight flush, or a royal flush. These were then divided into suits or which quads you hit (2-A). The hand did not need to reach showdown, but there needs to be $10 in the pot to qualify (of which $1 went to the jackpot). During the time I was there, the diamond royal flush was the biggest draw, having reached over $6k from not having been hit for over a month. The comp system was time-based, with $1.5/hr for the first 4 hours, then $.75/hr after that, with a $9 cap per 24 hours. By the time I left I had $30 in comps (still there I never took them), and that didn't even include the times when I forgot to clock in or out. So you can imagine how much time I spent in that poker room.
Most of the tables were friendly, and whenever possible I tried to get onto a friendly table. There were players who were pretty blatant about their tendencies. One old asian woman, who seemed to be a regular, regularly overbet her top pair while check-calling her draws. For example, if there were 5 limpers to the flop and she hit her top pair of Qs, she'd bet 25 into an 8 pot (1 for rake, 1 for jackpot). She even bet like this when she hit the nut flush on the flop! One of my friends said that 1/2NL in Vegas during the WSOP was probably more like .25/.5 online. One of the ways in which this was true was that preflop raises were all over the place. Raises of 12/15/20 were very common with a wide variety of hands and had a wide variety of hands call these big preflop raises.
In the end, the one tendency that really seemed to matter was an analysis of continuation bet patterns. The key things to know seem to be how often people continuation bet, how many more shots they were going to continue to stab at it, and how often they would call a raise of the continuation bet with two overs that missed the flop. I found that if you were playing against people who can play a little, clearly have read a book or two, you were better raising the continuation bet if you had a piece of the flop. On the other hand, playing against the cowboy or the truck driver, you were better placed to just call the bet.
Below are some hands and plays I made that I found interesting. Hope you do too. For all of these, I played 1/2NL and bought in for 300.
Hand 1.
Holding ♦K♣K in the cutoff, I raise it to 12. Button calls, and flop comes ♠Q ♠5 ♦2
I bet 20, button raises 20 more.
At this point I want to see where I'm at, so I raise it 30 more. I'm in no hurry to raise it too much. I find that especially on the flop, noone ever feels priced out to chase in a raised pot. But if I run into a monster, I'm willing to let go of it without committing too much. After considerable thought, she mucks her hand. If she had raised again after that length of thought, I would have folded easily. After I showed her my K's she said she had AA. From her tight play that I observed afterward, it would not surprise me at all if she did have AA.
Hand 2.
Holding ♦J♦7 in late position, I call an early position raise to 7. Heads up, the flop comes T 7 2 rainbow. Preflop raiser checks to me and I check. I'm not in a tournament trying to amass chips to survive blinds, so I don't feel a need to bet here. If it's clear he caught up by the turn, I can let this go. If not, I feel that I am vulnerable to a wide variety of plays back at me and dangerous turn cards if my flop bet doesn't get him to go away. The turn is another rainbow 5 and it's checked to me again. This time I'm fairly confident I'm ahead and bet 10. The guy now check raises 10 more. I'm still not convinced that his hand suddenly got better or that he'd been slowplaying the whole time, so I call to get more information. The river came a K. This is a very dangerous card. If he had just been making a play back at me with AK, KQ, KJ, he will have caught up. He bet 25. However, there was a wonderful tell that I caught here, something that you won't get online. He reached for his chips to bet BEFORE the K hit on the river and his motion did not slow or change in any way as the K hit the felt. This felt to me like he considered his hand purely a bluff and the river not to have mattered, so I called. He mucked his hand, saying, "You call, you win."
Hand 3
Holding ♦J♦8 on the button I call a raise to 12 from UTG. The flop comes ♦Q ♦T ♠3
The preflop raiser bets 20, and I did not sense a lot of confidence. I decided to raise here to 50 on the sense of weakness, knowing that I'm ok to call if we do get our chips in the middle. The preflop raiser thinks for a while then pushes all in for 100 more. I call and he flips up ♥J♣J. Unless he was very confident he was pushing me off the hand, his play was pretty atrocious. He's drawing extremely thin if I have a Q, and even on this hand that he caught me with, he's no better than 53% to win the hand. One extra inference, is that if I had ♦A♦K or ♦K♦J or even ♦A♦J I was not likely to want to chase him off the hand, to get my chance at $6k high hand jackpot. I think this makes his play even worse. Of course I missed and he won the hand.
Hand 4
This hand caused a lot of laughs at the table and perhaps even made its way into someone else's story about playing poker in Vegas. I was bored and straddled to 4. A solid player raised it to 20 from early middle position and another called on the button and it was to me. The preflop raiser was not a random and so I put him on a range of 99 to JJ. I looked down at my cards and the first card I saw was ♠A. Well, I thought, this seems like a great time to make a squeeze play. As long as my read was right, even if I couldn't get the raiser to lay it down preflop, I still had a chance to hit my A. So I raised it 60 more. The preflop raiser thought for a while, tried to get some information by looking at me, and then decided to just make the call. I was pretty sure I could get him off the hand when all of a sudden, the button caller now went all in! To make it worse, his raise was only 25 more, so I didn't get another move. The flop came 853 with two hearts, and I decided that it must be easier to try to beat one person than two, so I pushed all in for 200 more. After much hemming and hawing, the preflop raiser mucked QQ face up. Everyone at the table was sure I had KK or AA. The turn and river came 7 and 2, so I was pretty sure I lost either way. The all-in guy turned up AK! I think that's an atrocious play for a cash game, so I wasn't really expecting it. So I look at my cards and turn over... ♠A♠2. Pair of deuces takes the pot! Everyone had a good laugh about it, and everyone else at the table still swore they thought I had KK or AA. Even the AK guy realized that if I hadn't made my play, he wouldn't even have had a chance to win against the other guy's QQ, so he took it in stride. Besides, the flop gave me a gutshot draw so it wasn't as horrible a beat as it might have seemed at first.
And yes, even that hand was still part of "the normal". In the next post, we'll get to "the weird".
Saturday, July 4, 2009
Categorizing when reviewing (random daily thought)
Often when you ask me whether I liked something, whether it be a restaurant or a movie or whatever, you will hear me say "it's good for what it is". I always find that it is more useful to rate something among a comparable subset of goods/services rather than just giving a blanket opinion.
For example, the NY Times reviews restaurants on a 4 star system. However, there are restaurants where a 2 star review would probably be the highest it could possibly achieve while a 2 star review would be devastating for certain restaurants. This is the same for the Zagat Survey. The only qualifier is usually a price range listed after this main review component. I think that every review site should have a value/worth rating. I've eaten at ridiculously expensive places as well as many cheap places. Personally, I often find good value at both ends of the spectrum and very little value at the places in between.
Another thing I try to avoid is comparing apples to oranges. My friend who saw O with me didn't think it was anything special, saying that he wanted more energy and that he would have a better time at a concert with high energy fans. While the prices are comparable for a night out, I wouldn't make this direct comparison. I understand that there are subjective preferences. I'm sure I have friends who would feel out of place at said concerts that my friend would love. So when I try to give my opinion on something, I try to qualify the event as best I can with as objectively comparable events as possible. And this is why you'll frequently hear me say that something is "good for what it is", and if you're not sure what I think "it is", then you should ask.
For example, the NY Times reviews restaurants on a 4 star system. However, there are restaurants where a 2 star review would probably be the highest it could possibly achieve while a 2 star review would be devastating for certain restaurants. This is the same for the Zagat Survey. The only qualifier is usually a price range listed after this main review component. I think that every review site should have a value/worth rating. I've eaten at ridiculously expensive places as well as many cheap places. Personally, I often find good value at both ends of the spectrum and very little value at the places in between.
Another thing I try to avoid is comparing apples to oranges. My friend who saw O with me didn't think it was anything special, saying that he wanted more energy and that he would have a better time at a concert with high energy fans. While the prices are comparable for a night out, I wouldn't make this direct comparison. I understand that there are subjective preferences. I'm sure I have friends who would feel out of place at said concerts that my friend would love. So when I try to give my opinion on something, I try to qualify the event as best I can with as objectively comparable events as possible. And this is why you'll frequently hear me say that something is "good for what it is", and if you're not sure what I think "it is", then you should ask.
Non-gambling Entertainment (VegasSummer 09, entertainment)
There are a lot of things to do in Vegas other than gambling, and with my early exit from the WSOP tournament, we decided to enjoy some of these other forms of entertainment. There was a bowling alley in my hotel and I had a coupon, so we bowled a few games. It was during this time that I checked my phone and found out that Michael Jackson had died. I knew about Farrah Fawcett earlier, but this was really shocking as it was unexpected.
Besides bowling, we watched Transformers 2 on IMAX at the Palms and two nights later caught O at the Bellagio. I thought Transformers 2 was all right though everyone compared it unfavorably to the first one. I don't know if the big screen helped at all during the fight scenes. With the mishmash of shooting, transforming, and kung-fu type fight scenes, it was hard to figure out what was going on. I often couldn't tell whether something was a punch or a kick. While we were waiting to watch Transformers 2, we rewatched Pelham 123. I thought it was ok the first time I saw it, but upon further review, there were just too many stupid plot points and characters. It just wasn't very good.
We were 15 minutes late to O, but I was still amazed. Everything worked, from the acrobats to the clowns, and some of the aquatic acts were truly spectacular. If you've never seen a Cirque du Soleil performance, I highly recommend it. And even if you have, I'm sure O would compare favorably. However, I suggest reserving your tickets online or preferably getting comped. It was my friend's last night in Vegas so we bought same-day tickets at full price for mediocre upper level seats. I don't know if I can justify paying $170 for that considering everyone else in the theater probably paid less than we did.
Besides bowling, we watched Transformers 2 on IMAX at the Palms and two nights later caught O at the Bellagio. I thought Transformers 2 was all right though everyone compared it unfavorably to the first one. I don't know if the big screen helped at all during the fight scenes. With the mishmash of shooting, transforming, and kung-fu type fight scenes, it was hard to figure out what was going on. I often couldn't tell whether something was a punch or a kick. While we were waiting to watch Transformers 2, we rewatched Pelham 123. I thought it was ok the first time I saw it, but upon further review, there were just too many stupid plot points and characters. It just wasn't very good.
We were 15 minutes late to O, but I was still amazed. Everything worked, from the acrobats to the clowns, and some of the aquatic acts were truly spectacular. If you've never seen a Cirque du Soleil performance, I highly recommend it. And even if you have, I'm sure O would compare favorably. However, I suggest reserving your tickets online or preferably getting comped. It was my friend's last night in Vegas so we bought same-day tickets at full price for mediocre upper level seats. I don't know if I can justify paying $170 for that considering everyone else in the theater probably paid less than we did.
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