When will we ever get over this red booze/blue booze divide?

Republicans will tell you to vote with your head. Democrats want you to vote with your heart. Us? We want you to vote with your liver.

SushiSamba at Palazzo offers up a two-party system of its own with the Maverick and the Obamarama — cocktails designed to grease the wheels of civic duty. Tonight, SushiSamba locations across the country will be keeping running tallies of which drink gets more votes. Although, much like in Chicago, multiple votes will not only be tolerated, but encouraged.

The Maverick is muddled strawberries and sugar with vodka, triple sec and guava juice shaken and poured into a cocktail glass. The Obamarama is muddled lemon and sugar with Pearl blueberry vodka, blue curacao and guava juice, shaken and poured on the rocks in a wine glass and topped with club soda. So you get two choices that are remarkably similar with a few subtle differences? Well this is nothing like an actual American election at all. Click for more words and pictures »

By Jason Scavone

Kevin Dillon with Entourage co-star Kevin Connolly, whose boobs look fantastic.

SushiSamba Strip made its official launch Friday night with drums, geisha girls, samba dancers and the guys from Entourage.

Adrian Grenier, Kevin Connolly, Kevin Dillon and Jerry Ferrara were all on hand along with Emmanuelle Chriqui, who played Connolly’s girlfriend Sloan on the show. They ate a selection of sushi and drank sake before retiring to Sugarcane, the adjoining nightclub. Mickey Avalon took the stage where he was joined by Superhero Movie veteran Simon Rex, who has to be either very foolhardy or very brave to get within 10 feet of Avalon. They stayed until about 3 a.m. before heading out to gamble.

Prior to the celeb arrivals, which also included Penn Jillette and members of the Jersey Boys cast, SushiSamba had the waterfall area roped off by the Palazzo shops. A parade of geishas led a banner for the restaurant to the front of the falls while drummers banged out a Brazilian rhythm and a slew of samba dancers, replete in feathered headdresses and sequined outfits shimmied for several minutes before a round of solo dances started. After the drumbeats were thoroughly lodged in everyone’s head, the parade broke and made its way upstairs to the restaurant where the girls danced their way through the crowd. Click for more words and pictures »

By Jason Scavone

Her favorite thing in the world is drinking sake? So, she’s the perfect girl, right?

SushiSamba boasts something not many places in America have: A female master sake sommelier. In fact, SushiSamba has one of two in the country. Not only that, but at 27, it has the youngest. Tennis has its phenoms and medicine had Doogie Howser, but Tiffany Soto comes correct when it comes to sake, dancing through a landscape of exotic appellations and flavor notes, like the most hardened jet-set Japanese businessman.

Clearly, the company knew what it wanted. SushiSamba sought Soto out, plucking her away from another restaurant. Not bad for a girl who got her start with a night of overindulgence.

“When I was in college I drank too much, and I drank too much one night in front of a master level wine sommelier. I was blind-tasting, and he offered me a job as a teaching assistant. I started as a wine sommelier, obviously. I got certified through the quarter master sommelier. His best friend was a sake importer. I started tasting sake with him. It didn’t take us long to figure out I blind-tasted sake efficiently compared to most people.” Click for more words and pictures »

By Jason Scavone

(Photo by Scott Harrison | Retna. Additional photos by Harrison, Erik Kabik | Retna)

Website BestOfVegas.com held its official launch party last night at SushiSamba inside Palazzo, drawing to the festivities baller Baron Davis, Miss USA 2007 Rachel Smith, reported Lindsay Lohan and Tila Tequila girlfriend and Yahoo! heiress Courtenay Semel, Rashida Ali CEO Brett Reizen, Nicky Hilton and Kourtney Kardashian — just to lend the whole affair the fine veneer of reality show legitimacy.

By Jason Scavone

Like the most exclusive Zen rock garden with the biggest wind chimes of them all.

Sugarcane, the boutique nightclub attached to SushiSamba inside Palazzo, opens tonight. It’s the first of three new clubs that are set to open there, including Lavo coming soon and ND’s Space next year. Sugarcanes also operate at the SushiSamba restaurants in New York and Miami. We’re just holding out hope that someone, somewhere will have the good sense to throw open the doors to the dulcet tones of Thurston Moore. If that’s not synergy, we don’t know what is.

By Jason Scavone

So … Pisco-y.

You know how the 12 hours of badminton video you watched is part of an effort to bring nations together through the power of competition in the Olympics? Well, imagine if the Olympics were only contested between Japan, Brazil and Peru. And there wasn’t any badminton. We know, we know: You’re crushed there’s no badminton, but there’s a silver lining to this cloud li’l buddy. There’s booze.

SushiSamba, Palazzo’s latest fusion joint that lets sashimi dance freely with gaucho steak, offers up a similarly cross-cultural cocktail menu. True to its Peruvian roots, Pisco — the national brandy distilled from grape juice instead of wine — turns up in the Pisco Sour.

This traditional cocktail that both Chile and Peru lay claim to is composed of Pisco, lime juice, simple syrup and topped with an egg white foam with a dash of bitters on the head. SushiSamba’s offering adheres to the traditional recipe, served in a rocks glass without ice. Click for more words and pictures »

By Jason Scavone

Dancing the rumba will not be tolerated at Sushisamba

The newest restaurant to join the Palazzo lineup is Sushisamba Strip, which officially opened its seventh location today and first on the West Coast. The restaurant sports an eclectic menu that fuses Japanese, Brazilian and Peruvian cuisine under the auspices of Executive Chef Jose Mendin and Executive Sushi Chef Koji Kagawa.

Among the offerings on their menu is a cocktail tree, which is three selections presented in a tree of 12 shots. We wholeheartedly endorse moving shots away from single-item purchases into more of an egg-buying model.

The restaurant was designed by ICrave and features a glass facade inspired by L.A.’s Mondrian Hotel — meaning you can bring a pillow and blankets and camp out near the sushi bar. They totally won’t mind.

The Sugarcane lounge is set to open in August.

By Jason Scavone

Her Pikachu costume was dirty.

Quick! Get to McCarran! Totally run that last red light if you have to. If you hurry, you can probably catch that last plane to Miami for Winter Music Conference. Make it in time, and you can keep good company as SushiSamba tonight hosts Marc Jay, Roger Sanchez and other notables from the Palms, N9NE Group, Blush, Prive, Jet and The Bank for its weekly Cosplay party.

Cosplay, for those not in the know, is where people dress up like characters from video games, anime, manga and movies. And no, this isn’t an offshoot of San Diego Comic-Con. We swear. We only know that because we looked it up, not because we were up at 6 a.m. to sew a Fist of the North Star outfit. Seriously. Stop looking at us like that.

Getting all of Vegas’ clubberati down to Miami to stare at a bunch of girls dressed like Sailor Moon is part of the effort to promote SushiSamba’s newest location, set to open along with its Sugarcane lounge inside The Palazzo in May. It will be only the second Sugarcane location for the group, which also has restaurants in NewYork, Chicago, Dallas, Miami and Tel Aviv.

By Jason Scavone