Restaurant Guy Savoy at Caesars Palace serves modern French cuisine in a contemporary setting in the hotel's Augustus Tower. Photos by Clint Karlsen. Restaurant Guy Savoy features "Colors of Caviar," consisting of layers of caviar, puree of haricots verts and sabayon.

It's one of those "only in Vegas" ironies. Guests at Restaurant Guy Savoy, located on the second floor of the Augustus Tower in Caesars Palace, 3570 Las Vegas Blvd. South, can see the Eiffel Tower, while diners in the original Guy Savoy in Paris don't get that view.

Otherwise, great pains were taken to replicate the look of the Paris location in Caesars Palace, says general manager Franck Savoy, the son of acclaimed chef Guy Savoy, who received the Legion d' Honneur, France's country's highest honor, from the French Minister of Agriculture in 2000. In 2002, he was awarded his third Michelin star and voted "Chef of the Year" by his French peers.

"We used a lot of natural elements. My father wants to have a lot of wood in his restaurants," Franck says. "It has a minimalist design so that the focus is on the food."

In fact, the Las Vegas restaurant, the first Guy Savoy restaurant outside of Paris, was designed by Jean-Michel Wilmotte, the French architect and designer who created the look of the original restaurant, which opened in Paris in 1980 on Rue Duret in Paris' 16th arrondissement. The restaurant moved to its current location, near the Arc de Triomphe, in 1987.

The restaurant's features include sliding glass windows in the patio area that looks out onto the Strip, plus stone, wood, leather and contemporary art.

In the kitchen, executive chef Damien Dulas served as Guy Savoy's right-hand man in the Paris restaurant, and executive sous chef Adam Sobel previously was chef de cuisine at Bradley Ogden, also in Caesars.

Chefs Williams Caussimon and Laurent Solivérès, who have been working alongside Guy Savoy for 15 years, travel back and forth between Paris and Las Vegas to ensure quality. And Guy Savoy plans to spend 70 days a year at the Las Vegas location.

"We always have to maintain standards," Franck Savoy says. "We have to think how we can be better and better."

The menu is 90 percent the same as the Paris restaurant. The other 10 percent is an accommodation to the U.S. market, Franck Savoy says. "The United States has great produce, oysters, fish and beef. There is no beef on the Paris menu, because beef there is inconsistent. This is the first time we've had beef on the menu in a Guy Savoy restaurant."

A wine wall at the restaurant's entrance contains 1,000 bottles, and there is a 15,000-bottle wine cellar in the basement built especially for Restaurant Guy Savoy.

The main dining room seats 75 and two semi-private dining rooms seat eight and 12 guests. A separate private dining room, available for parties, seats 30. There's also a chef's table in the kitchen that seats six.

Restaurant Guy Savoy is open from 5:30 to 10:30 p.m. Wednesdays through Sundays (731-7286).

Starters: Oysters in ice gelee ($40); blue fin tuna tartare "Toro and Maguro," with caviars, poached egg and scalding shellfish vinaigrette ($80); artichoke and black truffle soup, toasted mushroom brioche and black truffle butter ($68); roasted foie gras and red cabbage nage, Savoy cabbage with horseradish and mustards ($65); and potatoes and leeks ($30).

Entrees: Crispy sea bass with delicate spices ($75); Maine lobster, bouillon, root vegetables and onion rings ($85); escalope of wild salmon, parsley jus and Paris mushrooms ($55); roasted veal chop, black truffle potato puree and veal jus ($140, for two); squab, fava beans and truffle butter ($60); roasted duckling and citrus-scented turnips ($110); crispy veal sweetbreads, petite potato and black truffle sandwiches ($75); and a selection of cheeses ($20).

Extras: Menu Prestige, a 10-course tasting menu ($290).

Desserts: Avocado and pineapple; chocolate fondant, crunchy praline and chicory cream; grapefruit terrine and Earl Grey tea sauce; chocolate ganache infused with Tonka bean; and a dessert trolley with ice cream, sorbets, and traditional French pastries ($22 each).

Appetizers is a weekly informational column about new developments on the Las Vegas dining scene. Items should not be considered reviews or recommendations and none is a paid advertisement. Contact Ken White at 383-0256 or e-mail him at kwhite@ reviewjournal.com.