We revisited Durango to take a closer look at the Eat Your Heart Out food hall.
EYHO is, actually, a hybrid space comprising both fast-food counters with common-area seating and sit-down restaurants with fairly expensive menus. The restaurants justify, we suppose, the description of the 25,000-square-foot food hall as “elevated,” the latest buzzword indicating fancier and more sophisticated than usual.
The fast food includes Irv’s Burgers, Uncle Paulie’s, Prince Street Pizza, Nielsen’s Frozen Custard, Vesta Coffee (with its own 10-seat counter), and the center bar, Drink. You order and pick up at the counters, like any fast fooderies, then sit in the common area or outside on the patio (it can be windy out there; we almost got blown away both times we visited in March).
The sit-down restaurants are Ai Pono Café for Hawaiian street food, Shang Artisan Noodle, Yu-or-Mi Sushi, and Fiorello Italian (which has a take-out window); the Oyster Bar is at an 18-seat counter (and is open 24/7).
We tried a burger from Irv’s and a sub from Uncle Paulie’s.
Irv’s traces its history back to 1946 when it opened in West Hollywood on Route 66, as Queen’s Burgers, one of the first roadside burger stands in the U.S. It was renamed Irv’s himself when Irv bought it in 1970; it was sold a couple times since then, though the name hasn’t changed, and the chain now has four locations in southern California and this one in Vegas.
Irv’s serves breakfast starting at 7 (till 11 a.m.) and continues with the burger menu till midnight, 2 a.m. on Friday and Saturday. The least expensive burger is the Just for You; at $4.50, it’s also the cheapest prepared food you can buy at Durango. Great L.A. reputation notwithstanding, you get what you pay for. It’s a sesame-seed bun, a patty, and a slice of American cheese; that’s it, folks. To us, the best thing about it were the sesame seeds.
To be fair, you’re supposed to build your ultimate burger from the Just for You and the add-ons: lettuce, tomato, pickle, raw or grilled onions, and/or hot honey mustard (.50 each), egg or hatch chile ($2), chili ($3), bacon ($3.50), even pastrami ($5), along with a choice of sauces (.50 to $4). But we wanted to go as cheaply as we could at upscale Durango.
The fries ($4), on the other hand, were the quality of In N Out and the quantity of Five Guys, making them perhaps the only bargain in a joint that proudly proclaims there are no bargains. With tax and tip, we were outta there for a bit more than $10. Next time, we’d probably try the Original Roadside Burger with lettuce, tomato, pickle, and Irv’s sauce for $8. That said, there’s an In N Out only a couple of miles away and we’d go there any day instead.
Uncle Paulie’s is another southern California brand with three outlets and this one at Durango. They call it a “deli,” but even an Italian deli is a stretch. It’s really a sub shop.
We got the cold Italian sub with unnamed cold cuts, provolone, roasted red peppers, lettuce, and vinegarn to compare it to the sandwiches at All’Antico right across the street. At $16, it was a buck or two less than All’Antico’s average price and it was a big sub, no arguing there, but that’s where the similarities end. It’s like the difference between Boticelli’s Primavera fresco in Florence and a velvet Elvis at the Bonanza gift shop. Why buy generic American at a casino when you can get celebrated Italian with just an eight-minute walk across Durango?
We didn’t try any Prince Street Pizza; frankly, it didn’t look like anything special. If we find ourselves at Durango sometime in the future, we’ll sample some Nielsen’s Frozen Custard, but don’t hold your breath for a review.
