Las Vegas has many restaurants and bars that cater to the city’s big spenders. But a new entry in the market is aiming for the upper, upper echelons of Sin City’s elites.
The Vault at Bellagio Resort & Casino is a speakeasy-style cocktail bar serving rare and vintage spirits, alongside mixed drinks that retail for $55 on average, Eater Las Vegas reported on Monday. Behind a discreet doorway right off the casino floor, you’ll find the dimly lit lounge, where you’ll also be able to snack on light bites that lean heavily on caviar.
“We have never created something of this magnitude,” Craig Schoettler, MGM Resorts International’s executive director of beverage, told Eater. “This is for our highest-end guests.”
Schoettler said that the Vault’s menu is more luxurious and expensive than those found at other MGM lounges. Signature cocktails include the Liberty’s Torch (whiskey, saffron and orange sweet vermouth, fresh lemon, vanilla tincture), which is served tableside after a bundle of rosemary and orange is set on fire atop a slice of oak to trap fragrant smoke inside the glass. Meanwhile, the Rosé Romance (rosé Champagne, vodka, dragonfruit, St. Germain, lemon) is a larger $90 cocktail meant to be shared by two.
The Vault’s vintage and top-shelf offerings are where the bar really shines, though. It’s taken more than two months to assemble a collection that includes 12 bottles of Bacardi from the 1960s, Rémy Martin Cognac from the 1930s, and Ricard vermouth from the ’60s.
“It’s like drinking liquid history,” Schoettler said.
More recent—although no less expensive—options run the gamut from O.F.C. bourbon, which sells for about $8,000 at the low end, to a $30,000 bottle of Highland Park 50 Year Old. While those are probably best served neat, the vintage spirits can be found in classic cocktails like an Old Fashioned or a Daiquiri, priced at about $135 each.
The spirits here are clearly the star of the show, but the Vault offers a minimal food service to accompany its quaffs. Gnocchi eggplant with crème fraîche, chorizo-and-goat-cheese-stuffed olives, and spiced peanuts are upscale takes on more classic bar bites. Or you can continue to live large by opting for croissant-shaped fried potatoes with caviar and crème fraîche, or gussied-up chips and dip featuring more caviar, crème fraîche, lemon zest, and deviled eggs with potato chips and toast points.
Whether you’re testing your luck at the casino or not, it seems like as good a bet as any that the Vault will become a go-to for Vegas’s spirits aficionados.
Click here to see all the images of the Vault.
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