Let's start with the room. Done in cool and swank colors and furnishings, the place most resembles those super-trendy ultra-lounges that are popping up everywhere. Everything feels low to the ground with cushy booths ringing the dining room done in dark wood tones, gray, and eye-popping red. It's a success from a visual perspective and a welcome relief from most upscale restaurants that make you feel like you should've dressed up a little even if you already did.

There are a couple of windows looking outside toward The Strip but you really need to move outdoors to the small dining patio for the full effect. You'll get a terrific view of all of Caesars Palace with places like Imperial Palace, Flamingo, and Barbary Coast across the street.

Start your experience out with one of their signature cocktails. I sampled the BOA Fusion, a mix of Montecristo Rum, fresh pineapple, vanilla beans, and cinnamon and was in heaven. I'm not much of a mixed cocktail drinker (I'm more of a beer and shots kind of guy) but this was fantastic, strong enough to let you know you're drinking booze but not so strong that you're drunk before the appetizers arrive. The other drinks on their specialties list were equally special, including one that mimicked the popular Italian dessert of strawberries with vinegar and cracked pepper. I know, it sounds wrong but if it is then cocktails shouldn't be right.

The menu is not going to win any awards for experimentation - this is, after all, a steakhouse - and so you'll find lots of seafood based appetizers, the de rigueur onion soup and Caesar salads, plenty of steaks and chops (mostly beef but a couple of veal and poultry items thrown in for good measure), and lots of seafood entrees. It's nothing you haven't seen at a dozen other steakhouses but there are a couple of noteworthy originals.

Although not on the main menu, ask if you can get the chef's special version of nachos, homemade potato chips made daily from Yukon gold spuds covered with melted cheeses and accompanied by a subtle salsa style dipping sauce. They were delicious and we scrubbed the plate clean.

Other starters worth mentioning are the goat cheese "beignet," an oven-roasted ratatouille with basil evo, and the BLT salad. Yes, you heard me, a BLT salad - applewood smoked bacon over lettuce, tomato, and avocado with a creamy bacon dressing. Say it with me… mmmmmm, bacon.

For entrees, my dining companions and I went in three very distinct directions. One sampled the jumbo prawns, done "scampi" style with white wine, garlic, lemon, parsley, and butter. Longtime readers will know I'm not much of a seafood fan, but I tasted them and declared them "not bad" while the person who actually ordered them had a couple of eyes-rolling-back-in-her-head moments so they were judged very successful.

We also brought on the roasted free-range chicken, which was a succulent delight. Roasted chicken is one of those dishes that seems easy but is actually easy to mess up, often winding up dry, but this one had juiciness to spare and was done to a perfect golden, crispy brown on the outside so kudos.

Finally, if you're eating at a steakhouse you gotta have a steak so we ordered the petite filet mignon. On it's own it was probably only "good" but one of the unique twists offered at BOA is that you get to specify a rub, a sauce, or a mustard with any selection. Options include peppercorn, blackened, blue cheese, herbed butter, and foie gras butter rubs and crusts; cabernet, worchestershire, béarnaise, chimichurri, creamy horseradish, or caramel soy and ginger dipping sauces; or whole grain, Dijon, horseradish, or violette mustard.

You get to choose one for free but being the important food critic guy that I am (stop laughing), the chef very kindly sent out ALL of them for us to sample. It was obviously a bit overwhelming and after awhile I kind of lost track of what I was tasting but I can say for sure that the cabernet and peppercorn were runaway hits and the caramel soy and ginger was what I will refer to as an acquired taste that I didn't acquire. The bottom line is that this is a fun way to spruce up a meal of what would otherwise be just a boring hunk of cow.

Desserts showed some flair with standards like cheesecake mixed in with more adventurous fare including cinnamon sugar doughnut holes with a trio of warm dipping sauces; "s'mores all grown up," a combination of Kahlua chocolate cake, marshmallow sauce, and dulche de leche ice cream; cappuccino semifreddo with warm cookies; and more.

Throughout the meal service was impeccable and it was not just because I was there to review the restaurant. I pay attention to stuff like this and the luxury level attention to detail was evident at every table in the room. You'll feel pampered and special here.

So then of course we get back to those prices. We were eating light that night so our bill included two of the specialty cocktails, one soup and a house salad, the entrees (which fell on the lower end of the scale), tax, and tip and came to roughly $220 for the three of us. If you're doing it right, figure about $100 per person on average which is a heck of a lot of money to spend for dinner but not in this town anymore.

The restaurant is open for lunch and you can often get less extravagant versions of the same things (plus sandwiches, pasta, and more) for less money so if the place sounds good but the prices are out of your reach, that is a good alternative.

Of the high-priced restaurants in Las Vegas, this one is definitely one of my favorites so if you've got the money to throw around I highly recommend BOA. There are other successful and significantly cheaper steakhouses in the city but for a special night out you'd have a hard time doing better.