Vegan in Vegas Hotel

October 8, 2012 5:06 PM

Family trip to Vegas. Mostly plan on lounging around the (downtown, not strip) hotel and environs. One member of the party is vegan, the rest happily eat everything. What's the dining outlook for the vegan?

There have been a bunch of similar questions, but they all seem to assume that the vegetarian diner is also calling the shots.

We'll be doing a big family thing in Vegas (Golden Nugget, downtown) in January, and my sister, a vegan, may be a bit stuck. The rest of us are planning a very low key, low effort kind of trip, probably with lots of meals in the hotel. None of the menus seem terribly vegan friendly.

Any advice/experience in this department? How likely is there to be much of the way in vegan options at the buffet?

Thanks

posted by colin_l to travel & transportation (6 answers total)

Do you like Thai food? Lotus of Siam has been called the best in the country, and it's likely to be vegan-accessible. About 3 miles away.
posted by supercres at 5:13 PM on October 8, 2012 [1 favorite]

Look for ethnic restaurants (Thai, Indian, Ethiopian etc). They almost always have vegan options.
posted by MaryDellamorte at 5:44 PM on October 8, 2012

Call the hotel and ask. Vegas is, by and large, extremely accommodating because they want you to stay and play. Time you leave to find food is time you aren't gaming. The hotel may not have vegan selections on the published menu but they probably have a vegan menu available. My husband has a soy allergy and we were in Las Vegas recently. Everywhere I called was ready and able to deal with it as long as they had some advance warning.

Buffets will be a bad bet - both for extremely limited vegan options and for low quality/high quantity food for the carnivores.
posted by 26.2 at 6:03 PM on October 8, 2012 [1 favorite]

The hotel should have options available; I didn't have any trouble getting vegetarian options when I was in Vegas and would second the recommendation to contact the staff directly. Granted, they were not super stellar, and were sometimes side dishes. If she is an easy-going eater, this should work. There are many, many restaurants in nearly every hotel and casino, though, so something both nearby and low-key should be able to pull something together. Would it be possible to get a mini-fridge for her room? Then she could get basic supplies (peanut butter, soy milk, whatever) to pull together a meal if need be. As an added bonus, you can always store non-vegan food too for easy and cheaper breakfasts and snacks for the whole crew.
posted by jetlagaddict at 6:20 PM on October 8, 2012 [1 favorite]

Some restaurants were more accommodating than others - calling would have been a good idea - but most of them knew what I meant by gluten- and dairy-free.

Surprisingly, the one buffet my group went to was the most helpful, with a whole pre-printed list of their items and check marks of common allergens. Granted, the food was terrible (I'm looking at you, Treasure Island buffet), but that was probably our own fault for going super low budget.

On preview: seconding jetlagaddict about supplementing with snacks.
posted by Mr Yak at 6:29 PM on October 8, 2012

All the Wynn properties have Vegan options since Mr Wynn went vegan himself. Chinatown also has some great vegan places and the Samosa factory off of Sahara i think has vegan Indian food. Downtown has a lot of new places opening right now, which is awesome and i'm guessing they will have more vegan options.
posted by yodelingisfun at 10:55 AM on October 9, 2012