We just had a great trip to New Orleans, courtesy of Harrahs New Orleans.
They had a special Holiday Weekend with free cash on Friday, a party with
drawings on Sat., and free play coupons on Sunday. On top of that, both my
husband and I had received various coupons and coupon books from Harrah's, so we
had coupons for more free play, free food at partner restaurants, and free
airfare reimbursement.
Unfortunately a problem with Misplaced Points developed during the trip,
which put a damper on the situation. See further below for more on this.
Thankfully the points finally did show up.
Day 1 was Christmas, so we didn't play, instead just arrived late and ate at
Cafe Adeleide which is run by the same people who own famed Commander's
Palace. It is right next to the Harrah's Hotel in Loew's Hotel. The food is
always good. I especially liked the turtle soup. They also have a super creamy
"New Orleans" style cheesecake.
Day 2 started with the good Harrah's Casino buffet. It is $10.99 for
breakfast on weekdays, but the price goes up on the weekend, when it becomes a
brunch. Sunday brunch doubles the cost up to more than $26 a person, since they
add champagne, a band with a good singer, beef, crab legs, and other items.
The only flaw is that they have a skimpy choice for sweet rolls. They do
have a good omelette station with shrimp.
Then we went for the airfare reimbursement and found that some of the new
coupons require 2 hours of play first. So Mr.Craps and I started playing on
his card. We played the 10-play $1 NSU VP, which is actually a lot higher than
what I usually play (I prefer 3/5 play $1, and actually after the Stock
Market crash, our finances are hurting pretty good, so I've cut back to almost
zero play). But since we were getting over $1700 in total free play and cash
from both our coupons and the weekend and airfare reimbursement on top of
that, and since I had hit 2 quarter Royal Flushes in Vegas the week before so had
money to gamble, I figured I could try the 10-play. The 10-play and their
3/5 play machines are the best VP in the casino since they have 9/6 JB, 9/6
DDB, and NSU.
Fairly quickly I hit deuces ($1000) to provide enough cash to keep me
playing and playing and playing. Then deuces again to keep me going. Then 3 to
the royal came up. I sat and waited and waited before hitting the key. (This
is my new strategy when I get 3 to the royal, and it actually seems to be
working!). Held A, K, 10, and whammo - a Royal Flush -- yippie!! ($4000).
That let me breathe a lot easier - because 10-play $1 can suck your money
out fast, and I do mean fast, if you are not getting anything.
I switched to DDB and got nothing! No quads, no quads - and the money
started sucking. Back to NSU and again nothing nothing...
MYSTERIOUS LOST/MISPLACED POINTS....
Somewhere in here, I switched to playing on my card. While my husband and I
had played on his card we carefully checked to make sure the points
accumulated properly. Some of you may remember how back in 2007 I lost 9000 or so
points in New Orleans, which took over 3 months to finally be put back on my
account via a manual adjustment. This had caused my daily average to be lower
than it should have been, resulting in lower offers from N.O. So I am super
sensitive to lost points!
Now I had accumulated about 2500 base points on my card. I pulled my card
in and out to make sure it was accumulating properly -and woops --- NOOOOOOO
--- the points were not there. Only 5 base points showed up. Argh! I
contacted the slot supervisor, who pulled up the paperwork on the machine. It
showed all the play but the points weren't going into the account. No one could
figure out where the points were. Someone suggested a server was slow. I
blew a gasket after what had happened last time and demanded that any manual
adjustment be done now, today, not 3 months away. The slot supervisor said she
would "try" to get the points into the account, but no guarantee of if it
would be a day, a week or .... ARGH!
Well, my profit from the royal was just about gone, so I got up, disgusted,
and went to a nearby Top Dollar. My husband and I started playing it, and
checked his card. It was still registering all the points correctly. I
switched to my card. NO POINTS. So now the awful truth showed itself - his
account worked just fine, mine was blocked somehow, showing only 5 based points
for all day. Also it didn't matter which card I used - I tried several and in
fact had Total Rewards print a new card. No points no matter what machine I
tried or what card I used.
Then the slot supervisor came back with news - the points showed up at Total
Rewards. The missing points were in the account just fine. But for unknown
reasons they were not coming back to show up on my card when in the machine.
This was good news, but I was still worried that the points might not go
from the TR computer back to corporate headquarters since they weren't coming
back to me. So I kept playing on my husband's card.
Just then - whammo - the Top Dollar hit a jackpot -- $4500!! (Triple Triple
7 for 900 coins at $5). We were back in the profit column.
Time for dinner! We went to G.W. Fins - a very good seafood place. Their
best dish is the Lobster Dumplings appetizer. Next time I will get this as the
main course. Fabulously creamy and delicious. My husband's Trout was too
spicy for him, despite asking for no spice or pepper, so they replaced it with
a very good smoked salmon. Desert was warm bread pudding with chocolate,
pecans, Carmel - nice.
Back to the casino to run up some more points. I played on a $5 Spin and
Win reel slot for a long time, racking up about 2000 points, but slowly losing
money. Then I got onto the 10-play $1 VP machine again, and decided to try
DDB, since it had been sooo bad before. This time I immediately hit quad 3s
with a kicker ($800) giving me money to play with. I played and played and
played - it was giving me a quad here or there, enough to keep me going
without losing money. Then a ROYAL - again holding 3 to a royal and waiting and
waiting before hitting the final button.
I then spoke to my patient host, who said that my "misplaced" points were
still there in the system. He said I should play on my card, because if I
didn't, my 3 day stay would result in 3 different daily averages, and low play
would give me low averages and lower my mailers with offers.
It was now midnight. I gingerly put my card back into the machine - and
what-do-you-know. The missing 2500 (approximate) points now showed up!! So I
started playing on my card (now after midnight). And -- no points once again
for what I was now playing! Argh! But I decided that since they had shown
up finally from before midnight, hopefully they would show up after midnight
the next day. So I kept playing. I was still playing DDB, and starting to
lose, when I hit Aces with a kicker ($2000), putting me even again.
It was getting late, so I switched back to NSU and played and played, and a
ROYAL! Yeah!!!! I was now definitely in the black by about $7000 -- all
things considered. Time for bed.
Next morning -- my card showed Zero points for all the play after midnight.
But when I check with Total Rewards, they showed that I had all my points,
those before and after midnight, as being played on the previous day. Odd,
but at least they were in the system. My husband and I now started playing on
the Spin and Win $5 machine again, still using my card. Points showed up!
The card now worked normally. I don't get it!!! Unfortunately it turned
into a "Spin and Lose" machine, quickly sucking $3000 away in an extremely
short period of time. ARGH!
Switchover to another Top Dollar (Double Top Dollar) - LOSE. ARGH! Look
at the 10-play and 5-play machines - they are all taken. Try a $5 Deuces -
LOSE fast. Try a $5 DDB....no quads! ARRRRGHHH. Try a penny machine - LOSE.
Try a $1 VP - LOSE.....
Yikes!!!! Haven't won a cent all day, and I am back to even!! I've run up
a ton of points on my account now, so I am no longer worried about the
dreaded Daily Average. So I quit playing.
After all is said and done, when I add everything up for the trip including
all the free play and free cash (but not the airfare reimbursement or food
comps), I am now about $400 ahead! Yeah! That is better than losing. I'm
wishing I had quit after the 3rd Royal Flush, but it is too late. At least I
haven't lost anything. Airfare, limo to and from airport, room and all food
(except for about $10 plus tips) is paid for by Harrahs.
Before I describe our final, fantastic dinner (I'm going to go into great
detail on this one below), some final comments on the trip. The service from
slot personnel, hosts, hotel personnel, etc. is fantastically good in New
Orleans! They treat us far better than at any Harrah's property in Las Vegas.
The hosts and slot personnel were extremely patient and kind to me when I had
the "misplaced" points problem, because I was extremely angry to start with.
The VIP booth service is also great. The party with drawings was nice,
with a lot of food and drink, and even free 5-minute backrubs. (No we didn't win
any prizes.) The N.O. offers are a great incentive to go to N.O. Even
though I have lost money in about 4 of 6 trips, I will be happy to go back to
N.O. again. (In fact we are going for Valentine's Day).
The food in N.O. is terrific. The people are extremely kind and friendly
everywhere. The town needs tourists, and you should go if you haven't been
there!
I just hope that slot personnel/hosts will follow-up on the continuing
problems with "misplaced" points. I was told that other people had problems
during the week, and that problems apparently are randomly affecting some people's
accounts for no apparent reason. Corporate IT needs to check on what is
going on so that other people won't have problems trying to track down vanished
or misplaced/slow-to-show-up points.
Also, we noted that Bonus Points were extremely Low -- even on $5 Reel
machines. After playing about 2000 base points on a $5 reel, there were zero
bonus points. Eventually a meager 600 or so bonus points showed up on my
husband's account, despite over 9000 total Base points from both VP and reels.
Neither hosts nor slot personnel could explain what was going on, but said they
thought that there should be a lot more bonus points than we got.
Anyone playing at any Harrah's property is advised to keep track of exactly
how many points they are accruing before they remove their cards, and make
sure all points do show up in their account. Write down your machine numbers,
time of play, etc. Unfortunately I have personally had actual LOST points
from more than one Harrah's location. (I was told I played too fast after an
investigation at Las Vegas's Harrah's for example in one case). And I've had
the Misplaced Points incident now at N.O. I also know of other people who
have had lost and delayed point problems. Somewhere in the software code used
by Harrah's are 1 or more "glitches" that need to be fixed! People have
reported problems with missing points at other casinos as well, but Harrah's
properties seem to be the primary source of such problems. If you actually find
you have lost points - complain until you get a manual adjustment. It helps
if you notice the problem immediately so that slot personnel can pull the
records from your machine and thus you prove your play existed.
Now - time for dinner. We decide to eat at Restaurant August, run by Chef
Besh. It is French food. We've eaten there on other trips and the food was
always excellent.
Here is the menu for the 10-course Degustation menu with some comments. It
cost $135 for food only; $170 with wine pairing. This is far cheaper than
Caesar's Palace's Guy Savoy restaurant, which was the most expensive meal we've
ever eaten at $290 for a 10-course meal per person. It was also a far
better than Guy Savoy! (Of course we got comps for that one and for this meal too
--- we are totally SPOILED).
My husband had the wine tasting, I didn't, but had a few sips of his wines.
The meal actually started out with an "amuse bushe" of an egg inside of
which was a custard with seafood and a tiny bit of caviar on top. It was
exquisite, possibly the best of anything we ate. Everyone in the restaurant gets
this. They also have regular menu and another cheaper price fixed meal.
Since both my husband and I had comp coupons from Harrahs New Orleans, we
were able to pay for the entire meal with coupons (except for tips of course).
Harrah's N.O. has "partner" restaurants, which gives you the ability to use
these coupons not only at the restaurants in the casino or in their hotel,
but at a number of New Orleans restaurants.
Here is the menu with my comments....
December 26th, 2008
our “Degustation”
a taste of Louisiana “sushi”
blue crab, gulf tuna, white shrimp and lemonfish
WINE --Marquis de Perlade, Pierre Sparr, Brut, Alsace, Sparkling N.V
(interesting and good, and rather large portion of 4 sushi since this is a
10-course meal; in fact all the portions were larger than I expected, so it
was a lot of food - I was quite full by course 7, but of course kept eating!)
warm salad of pied de cochon and crispy fried veal sweetbreads
winter truffle and hearts of palm agrodolce
WINE PAIRING -- Chablis, Jean Marc Brocard, “Fourchaume,” 1er Cru, 2006
(I really loved this one! pied de cochon is Pig's Feet. Meat from pig's
feet sliced very thin. Mr.Craps thought this was "too fatty!" and didn't eat
it all - I quickly grabbed what was left. This was delicious. Probably the
best of all the dishes, except for maybe that egg before the meal!)
acorn squash “mezze luna”
with chestnuts, local satsuma and fennel
WINE---Viognier/Marsanne, Mer Soleil Vineyard “Treana”, Central Coast, 2006
(This was also excellent - squash inside of pasta with buttery sauce and
pieces of actual chestnuts. A little woodsy. Chef Besh changes the menu every
day depending on what is seasonally available).
crispy seared sablefish
with cauliflower, blacktrumpets and roasted seafood jus
WINE PAIRING --Mâcon-Chardonnay, Domaine Talmard, 2006
(Very good. Fish was crispy but not breaded. Cauliflower was actually a
creamed cauliflower that looked like mashed potatoes. Mr.Craps refused to
believe me that this was cauliflower, but I could taste it.)
Jäger suppen
French green lentil soup, caramelized onion and boar bockwurst
WINE-- Bourgogne Passetoutgrain, Domaine Digioia – Royer
(Probably our 2nd least favorite. But the lentil soup was excellent and the
more you ate, the better. The bockwurst was a 5-6 inch sausage, not spicy,
but a bit gamey. Also it came with a small pile of carmelized onion and also
mustard, and a roll (brioche?) so you could make kind of a sandwich?. The
soup was in a very very small cup, so not a large amount of it. A bit spicy,
but even spicy-hating-Mr.Craps ate it. It was the best thing. You could
kind of take a sip of soup, a bite of the sausage and roll if you wanted to.)
roast leg and braised belly of baby gulf coast sheep
herbed spätzle, roast beets and seckel pear
WINE --Merlot, Truchard, Carneros, 2004
(This was very good - my husband really liked it, and he doesn't like lamb.
The belly part was a bit fatty, but he ate the whole thing. I was getting
full by this point, so gave him part of mine, since I knew more courses were
coming. The pear almost had the texture of not-fully-cooked potato, and not
much fruit taste).
petite filet
with cherry reduction sauce
WINE-- Cabernet Sauvignon, Ehlers Estate, St. Helena, Napa Valley, 2005
(This was really really good. I didn't think I could eat all of it, I was
getting full - but it was so delicious I had to eat it. The Filet mignon was
cooked perfectly medium rare. The sauce was what really made it - apparently
cherry or cherry wine, cooked down? I wasn't clear on this and the menu
list was slightly different from what we got. All I can say is YUM.)
warm figs stewed in port wine,
point reyes blue with sweet and spicy bacon
WINE -- Zinfandel, Suhr Luchtel, Napa Valley, 2006
(Definitely our least favorite. Yet this was probably the most interesting
dish. The bacon was very very crisp, and a small chunk, not like a bacon
slice. The point reyes blue was blue cheese, inside of the fig. There may have
been another ingredient in the sauce too. The bacon was too hard to chew
and very odd in conjunction with the sweet figs. Yet you could see where the
chef was going in pairing the odd sweet and salty and fruit and bacon and
blue cheese. Very sweet overall actually. I only ate half with the bacon, half
without though - not to my taste. Overall an interesting mixture of
textures and tastes. Not unpleasant, but not to our taste.).
warm strudel of pear, apple, and quince
with toasted pecans, cranberries and nutmeg ice cream
WINE -- Orange Blossom Muscat, “Essensia,” Quady, Madera, 2005
(Mr.Craps liked this one, but I was full and didn't really like the
nutmeg/quince combo. The ice cream was good by itself, but I didn't like the total
taste. I will say this though, that wine was really good and interesting!
Very flavorful and light.)
warm chocolate torte with local strawberries
WINE--gluhwein
(Everyone gets the wine on this so it wasn't paired with another one. The
wine was the best thing - sort of like mulled wine - warm and fruity, almost
blueberry in taste. Delicious. The warm melted center type chocolate cake
was very good and fudgy, but by now I was pretty stuffed and only ate half.
Mr.Craps ate his up and my half too! We both thought the meal might have been
a bit better with a little lighter food toward the end, for example poultry
instead of lamb, a light type soufflee or ice cream or something instead of
heavy cake.
However, we really are nitpicking, since the meal was totally excellent and
probably the best we have ever eat. We think it beats a very good meal we
had in the Bellagio at Picasso Restaurant, but we aren't sure because that was
a long time ago.)
···
--------------------
At any rate, despite the points problem, we had a great time in New Orleans
and we are looking forward to going again soon. Meanwhile, Happy Holidays
to everyone. May you all enjoy a great New Year, with lots of royals, and
hopefully a stock market that goes back up to what it was before the crash in
the not too distant future!
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