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Las Vegas just can’t get enough of celebrity restaurants, and a new one brings Italian fare from celebrity couple Giuliana and Bill Rancic. The couple along with Lettuce Entertain You Restaurant partners R.J., Jerrod, and Molly Melman plan to open RPM Italian at the Forum Shops at Caesars in early 2022. The company filed a construction permit for an estimated $1.5 million remodel for the restaurant, taking over the very short-lived Slanted Door space at the front of the shopping center on Las Vegas Boulevard, diagonal from another Lettuce Entertain You restaurant, Joe’s Seafood, Prime Steak & Stone Crab.
Pasta — with dishes from Guiliana’s mother Mama DePandi, who appeared often on Bill and Giuliana’s reality show — makes up a bulk of the menu with more than a dozen made in house daily; think Mama DePandi’s bucatini, Maine lobster ravioli, spicy king crab with squid ink spaghetti, and lobster fra diavolo.
The menu also features antipasti such as provolone-stuffed peppers, imported burrata, and big eye tuna bruschetta, as well as steaks, including a prime dry-aged bistecca Fiorentina; grilled fish and seafood, such as Ora King salmon and grilled giant prawns; and a spritz program paired with a wine list from RPM wine director Richard Hanauer.
The former E! News host and former co-host of Live from the Red Carpet star and her The Apprentice husband, who star on Giuliana & Bill, opened their original RPM Italian in Chicago in 2012.
RPM Restaurants will once again join forces with Rockwell Group, who also designed RPM Seafood in Chicago, to create the look of the space. RPM Italian will feature an indoor lounge, a dedicated sommelier bar, and two intimate private event spaces.
The couple has talked about opening RPM in Las Vegas since 2012, when Bill Rancic told Us Weekly, “So we decided we’d open another one called RPM Steak. It’s going to be in Chicago as well. It’ll be about two blocks from RPM Italian, and then we’re eyeing Vegas for the next RPM!”
The restaurant marks the sixth from the RPM brands including RPM Italian in Chicago and in Washington D.C., RPM Steak, RPM Seafood, and RPM Events and the first for the RPM brand to open in Las Vegas.
RPM Italian will be Lettuce’s sixth restaurant in Las Vegas joining Mon Ami Gabi, Eiffel Tower Restaurant, Joe’s Seafood, Prime Steak & Stone Crab, El Segundo Sol, and Stripburger & Chicken.
The Slanted Door opened briefly before the pandemic started in 2020 after a prolonged construction process, and then never reopened at the Forum Shops.
• All Coverage of The Slanted Door [ELV]
