text: I can't believe all the great reviews, because I was so disappointed with this place.  \n\nMy boyfriend and I went there for our anniversary, thinking the tasting menu would be worth saving up for.  We're fine dining lovers but also students, and while I certainly realize there are much more expensive places in Vegas, Sage isn't cheap at $79 for a tasting menu plus $39 for the wine pairing.  It's certainly expensive enough that we expected exceptional food and wine.  \n\nUnfortunately, that's not the case here.  Each dish was underwhelming at best and completely unfortunate at most.  On top of that and sadly, even if they had been delicious, they were so TINY it barely mattered.  We understand that tasting portions are supposed to be smaller, and we've been to enough really high end restaurants to know, but these plates seemed like a satire of the tiny plates in fancy restaurants.  After spending almost $350, we left talking about ordering grilled cheese from room service later that night.\n\nSo, details.  To be fair, let's start with the good stuff.  The restaurant was pretty.  The waiter was attentive.  (The busboy was actually even better--a nice guy who was totally on top of everything.)  The bread, butter and pink sea salt were all tasty.  The menu was creative, which is the reason we chose Sage in the first place.  \n\nAnd....well, that's about it.\n\nBecause...that inventive menu?  A mess.  Almost every single dish we had took what might have been a beautiful main ingredient and ruined it by throwing it entirely out of balance.  We started, for example, with lovely oysters.  But those oysters were drowned in a hot sauce foam that completely killed the briny goodness.  Too much!  We also had that famous fois gras brulee, which was served cold (on purpose, but it was kind of unsettling) and which they decided to throw a sweet, sticky spoonful of marmalade on top of, turning it cotton-candy sweet.  The wine pairings were no help.  For example, yes, it's common to pair rich fois with a sweet wine like a Tokaji, which they did.  But how does that make sense when one is already dealing with a mouth full of marmalade?  Sweet on top of sweet on top of rich.  Straight up gross.\n\nThe second course was the best, only because it was okay as opposed to outright bad.  We had the scallops, which were decent.  Small, and not particularly exciting, but okay.  The oxtail in the dish was superfluous, but that's fine since there was barely any of it on the plate, and the salted caramel reduction was, again, a little too sweet.  But it was passable.  The pork belly was tiny and not as succulent as pork belly usually is, and the corn tortelloni was meh; maybe some more pancetta and mushrooms would have made it better (because they make everything better.)  Anyway, it was okay.  The wine pairing was also the best of the three, though not exciting...a domestic pinot noir, for example, that I could have found for $10 a bottle at Trader Joe's.\n\nThe main course was a complete disaster.  The pork loin was sliced too thin and was completely dry.  The beef belly, which I was totally excited about, was a lovely, juicy cut (though, again, was absolutely minuscule).  Imagine the fatty end of a texas-style bbq brisket.  Yum.  Or...yum until you drown out any semblance of flavor with a bunch of hot jalepeno-like peppers.  Then, not yum.  Not at all.  Where a little heat would have been nice, this was a mouth full of pepper in every bite, killing all other flavor.  And wines that were too sweet for both, all around.\n\nThe very best dish we had was the chocolate and peanut butter tart at the end.  But who could mess up chocolate and peanut butter?  It was served with a Madeira wine that made me cringe.  My boyfriend's desert was so unmemorable that I actually don't remember what it was...though it was served with a delicious port, so at least they got one wine right.\n\nAll in all, we were completely sad that we made the choice we did.  I'm actually a lover of food from places high and low, and I'm as happy getting delicious $8 ramen from a hole in the wall as I am with a gourmet menu.  However, when you're paying over $350 for a meal, it's fair to expect that the dishes have, at the very least, a nice balance of flavor.  These didn't.  \n\nMaybe we came on a bad night.  But we won't find out, because there's no way we're ever going there again.