Inside The Encore Resort Casino: $68 Lobster Rolls And Alexa In Every Hotel Room

What do you get when you cross Boston with Las Vegas?

A $68 lobster roll, for one thing.

The Vegas-ified version of a signature local dish is just one of many ostentatious offerings at the Encore Boston Harbor resort and casino, which opened its doors Friday for highly choreographed press tours ahead of Sunday's public ribbon cutting.

Chef Taylor Kearney listed some of the lavish ingredients piled atop a pound-and-a-half of lobster meat: "Black truffle aioli, tons of shaved black truffle, black truffle zest, gold leaf, beautiful osetra caviar."

Kearney said the brioche roll is "amazing," by the way.

For two hours, Encore's executive vice president of operations, Brian Gullbrants, led reporters down marble-and-gold hallways — dotted with ATMs and scratch-ticket vending machines — through slot parlors and restaurants, and even into the "chairman's villa," the resort's top-line hotel suite that starts at $15,000 per night.

The villa, like each of Encore's 671 guest rooms, is equipped with an Amazon Echo device, featuring the personal assistant, Alexa.

Unlike the MGM Springfield casino, which opened last summer and aimed to blend in with its surroundings, Encore is designed to feel like an escape.

"It's hard to believe we're still in Boston, isn't it?" Gullbrants said, after showing off a carousel adorned with 83,000 flowers, some of which are real. "Actually, it's hard to believe we're in Everett."

Publicists told journalists in advance that no photography or video recording would be allowed. Wynn Resorts would supply all images.

It would have been difficult to capture clear pictures inside the Memoire nightclub, anyway. Though the dance floor was empty, Encore turned on the smoke machine and cranked up the music, for effect.

The cover charge at Memoire is $40 — not exactly a cheap night out. But visitors willing to shell out on Thursday can party with a special guest DJ: Shaquille O'Neal, who played his final NBA season in Boston.