8 Vegas food trends that need to die in 2024

This list was created with tongue, if not firmly in cheek, then certainly positioned there. At the same time, there’s no denying when food trends become ubiquitous, what was once compelling often becomes ho-hum (or, in the case of the first item, downright annoying).

Getting past trends makes way for what’s new, next, exciting. And that keeps a food culture vibrant. Here are eight Las Vegas food trends to move on from in 2024.

Flower walls

Flower walls are the Strawberry Shortcake of restaurant design: bright, often pink, juvenile. When did 8-year-old girls start deciding what to do with restaurant walls that need, well, something? These expanses of faux flora are also dust traps and spider villages. Adding some saying scrawled in neon doesn’t improve matters, either. Here’s an idea: Hang local art. Enough of these poxy posies! Hand me the weed killer.

Too many doughnuts these days are laden with silly ingredients. Whatever happened to classic gl ... — Too many doughnuts these days are laden with silly ingredients. Whatever happened to classic glazed? (Getty Images)

Overdone doughnuts

When it comes to doughnuts, less is more. That’s a lesson too many local bakeries haven’t learned. Otherwise, they wouldn’t send out confections variously burdened with cream fillings, drizzles, crazy-color icing, towers of piped ganache or whipped cream, gold flakes, marshmallows, cereal, lollipops and other excess. The result? Rococo disasters that are too sugary and are frustrating to eat. Glazed doughnuts — you’re looking better than ever.

Immersive experience

Every bar and restaurant these days is an “immersive experience.” The phrase is aggressively meaningless. To be alive is to be immersed in the world, so every experience is by definition immersive. Sipping Champagne, taking the LSAT, removing a hangnail: all immersive. “Curated” and “bespoke” — massively pretentious and wildly misused — need the garrote, too. And “epic,” aka food bro speak on Yelp circa 2010, has long deserved a shiv.

Party brunches

Who are all these people who can get drunk on Sundays? Weekend party brunches have conquered Vegas with bumping music, off-the-rails Benedicts and bottomless mimosas. One famous party brunch boîte on the Strip pistol-whipped me with the worst service I’ve ever received in a lifetime of eating out. Can we agree that not every brunch needs to be a party? That, sometimes, the best brunch is a crab omelet, an icy flute of Bolly and juicy gossip?

Branzino

Ah, me. I’m not picking on branzino. I like branzino. Its mild flaky flesh takes well to many ingredients and cooking techniques. And it has very few small bones. But branzino has become pervasive in Vegas. That omnipresence makes it feel obligatory, a dish that appears on the menu just because. Like the cheesecake of the sea. It’s time for a new fish to be everywhere (at which point, branzino will seem distinctive). Fagri, you’re up.

Hot chicken

Take a beloved regional specialty like Nashville hot chicken (which should never die) — the original inspires other broods, not necessarily Nashville style — and a trend is born. Eventually, hot chicken will become a menu filler, like seared ahi still is, and a mainstay of fast food, the graveyard of trends. But hot chicken doesn’t just mean frying up thighs and tossing them in spicy seasoning. Hot chicken is like pho: Leave it to the experts.

Cocktails bathed in smoke, a technique first introduced to lend aroma and flavor, has become a ... — Cocktails bathed in smoke, a technique first introduced to lend aroma and flavor, has become a default way to create drama. Would you like wood or herb smoke for that Papa Smurf? (Getty Images)

Cocktails in smoke

When they emerged in the Aughts, smoking cocktails were authentically cool. Herb or wood chip smoke caressing a cocktail covered by a glass cloche, then escaping as the dome lifted, offered a visually striking way to add aroma and flavor. The technique is especially suited to brown or agave spirits. It’s evolved, alas, into easy drama that doesn’t always make sense for the cocktail under glass. It’s time to retire the liquid smoke.

Restaurant and bakeries — especially bakeries — can't lay off ube, the purple yam. Pro tip: ... — Restaurant and bakeries — especially bakeries — can't lay off ube, the purple yam. Pro tip: The subtle flavor (never mind the color) doesn't work in every dish. (Getty Images)

Ube in everything

In just a few years, this purple yam has taken the city. It’s found everywhere: in breads, cookies, cheesecake, cupcakes, pancakes, ice cream, milk teas, oozing out of doughnuts and more. The yam certainly lends a striking color. And sometimes, it supplies a gently nutty vanilla flavor. But if ube isn’t used in the right dish, you can’t taste this flavor, and then the yam just becomes another hype-y Instagram ingredient. What’s next? Ube rigatoni? Please, no.

Contact Johnathan L. Wright at jwright@reviewjournal.com. Follow @JLWTaste on Instagram and @ItsJLW on X.