What it's like to eat Nobu in New Orleans

Zoom in: My brother Josh and I sat down to dinner there last week, intending to spend more than we would for a typical night out, or even a special occasion. Lucky for us, the restaurant kindly comped a few items we ordered.

• Call me naive, but I didn't expect to still end up spending twice as much as I'd planned.

The intrigue: To be fair, within moments of our server offering suggestions and leaving us to strategize, Josh looked me straight in the eye and said, "We're just gonna have to go for it."

• So, we did. We really, really did.

The vibe: The trip to Nobu revealed to me for the first time the extent of the makeover the casino property has gotten since transforming from Harrah's. Walking the casino floor, gone was Harrah's Crayola-color branding, replaced by soft golds, warm ivories and glam detailing.

• The renovation isn't done yet, so the smell of drywall still hung in the air as I trekked around Octavia, the revamped club space at the casino's center due open this week.
• Once in the restaurant, the space is dimly lit and filled with natural textures, deep red and olive, a lively bar and an open kitchen, where chefs calmly line up colorful pieces of sashimi, nigiri and sushi.
• Oversized basket structures, which serve as dining booths, line the wall separating Nobu from the casino, so you can nearly forget you're in one except for the occasional flash of neon lights.

Catch up quick: Nobuyuki Matsuhisa, a chef so popular he's known by the same mononym his restaurants bear.

• He opened his first eponymous restaurant in Los Angeles in 1987, which quickly became a celebrity magnet and deeply influenced Japanese cooking.
• Dozens of Nobu outposts followed around the world, and a growing hotel brand, which has a location inside the new tower going up now at Caesars New Orleans.

The restaurant menu features several dishes invented by Nobu and often copied elsewhere, like the rock shrimp tempura ($32), yellowtail jalapeño ($32) and black cod with miso ($48).

• About 80% of the menu is dedicated to Nobu standards, Caesars New Orleans vice president of hospitality Miles Tully Jr. tells me, leaving the rest for local interpretation.
• During our visit, the local flavor came from tempura-fried soft shell crawfish ($34), which are served over a stunning watermelon salad in a pool of a vinegary serrano pepper dressing that left my lips tingling, and giant pieces of texturally perfect okra ($14) in another tempura dish.

Dig in: We mostly followed the advice of our server, who — because this is New Orleans, was a friend I went to middle and high school with — suggested we order three dishes from the menu's cold section, three from the hot and then finish off with some sushi.

• Soon, we chomped into enormous, miso sauce-drizzled shishito peppers ($15) and dug tiny spoons into a caviar-topped toro tartare ($44), and used our chopsticks to lap up the tiradito ($32), a Peruvian-style ceviche with salty, crunchy chili and cilantro served with a whitefish so lovely it shines silver in the low restaurant lights.
• The house special sushi ($23) was Nobu's take on a rainbow roll, with five kinds of fish, and we sampled uni (sea urchin, $16 each piece), deciding to revisit the dish because Josh and I have a shared memory of absolutely hating it the first time we'd had it years ago.

• If anyone was going to get it right, we figured, it was Nobu. And they did. The seaweed-wrapped delicacy looked like yellowish tentacles stretching out from its center, and it disappeared in our mouths like a vaporous cloud of butter.

We sipped on Nobu sidecars ($22), which are made with Iwai Tradition whiskey and yuzu, then shared a small serving of Nobu Junmai Ginjo ($28), a Hokusetsu sake exclusive to the restaurant.

• And for dessert, because by then we knew that we were just leaning all the way in, we ordered the baked Alaska ($26), a vanilla cheesecake with ginger cinnamon crust, guava gelato and a meringue flambéed tableside with Bourbon.

The bottom line: Hooooo-boy.

• The meal was exquisite, the service friendly and well-paced, and I'd love to return, but this just might be New Orleans' most expensive restaurant.
• On the low end, if you follow the server's advice about how many items to order for two people, each have two drinks and split dessert, you'll spend at least $300 before tax and tip.
• So, for me and my bank account, that would take a big win at one of the casino tables just beyond the restaurant doors. And maybe, just maybe, that's exactly the point.

If you go: Nobu is open five nights a week, with reservations opening 30 days in advance for now.

• For now, reservations are limited to guests 21 and older because the only entrance is through the casino. But once construction is complete on the valet portico, likely in mid-October, Nobu will have an all-ages entrance, as well.
• Caesars New Orleans is also now taking reservations, beginning Nov. 1, for the new hotel tower, which includes two floors dedicated to the Nobu Hotel brand.