In fact, I mocked those as "claw-for-crap" machines in a post in December about an outing with my niece, Allyson, on Long Island. Here she is with said machine:
Well, last night at the Las Vegas Club Hotel-Casino, I discovered this:
Yes, people! It is as it appears. You give them $2 and you try for your very own 1-1.5-lb lobster! If you catch it, Tinoco's Kitchen at the Las Vegas Club will prepare it for you as you like it. Sides and drinks are extra.
Here's a closer look:
What a concept, right? I took a little video of Enrique Tinoco, the owner, showing me how it works. It's only 30 seconds and here it is:
Tinoco says people catch 4-5 a day. They do seem easier to get a grip on than some stuffed animal, huh?
As it happens, Las Vegas is somehow NOT on the forefront of this gambling cruelty-to-animals concept. It's been around in the lobster-rich regions of the northeast for as far back as 2007 and evidently originated in Japan. Not surprising, animal-rights advocates are appalled, as seen by this piece from South Florida in May.
Meanwhile, here's some dude explaining how this is actually a path to liberation for some lobsters:
And the blogger at SeriousEats.Com last year wrote it up, too. One of his commenters responded: "We have this machine at a bar down the street from us. A couple of the puny lobsters have money rubberbanded to their claw to entice someone to go after them."
If they tried that in Vegas, would they need to get it approved by the Gaming Control Board first?
