Name: Dan, aka "Native"
Web Site: http://www.swampbots.com
Bio: I'm a system administrator who is considering going back to school. I enjoy playing music, learning to cook new cuisines and eating delicious foods.I contribute to http://www.halftonreviews.com and http://www.swampbots.com is my personal blog for music, art, and daily life.
Posts by Native:
ElOhEl @ El Oasis
June 11th, 2010El Oasis
North-East Corner of:
Foster Rd. and Michigan Ave.
Lansing, MI
I’ve been coming to El Oasis for several years now and am just now getting to a review, what’s that about? Anyways, I remember going to El Oasis for the first time… My friend Jacob’s place was just up the street and a group of us were all hanging out around dinner time and he said “Hey man, we should go get some street burritos”. Street Burritos? In my Lansing? That moniker stuck for quite a while. This trip however was after a bout of unlucky fishing and spending $30 on cheap plastic and sharp metal.. (lures). The Dunham‘s is just east of El Oasis so Jacob and I opted to go hit up some street burrito.
You can’t go wrong with street food. I feel like a vendor who is selling out of a truck or a trailer, or whatever the venue might be, really needs to have stellar food. There is no real scenery, or decor, or a vibe beyond the neighborhood that the vendor is at. El Oasis is no exception. Whatever you get will be excellent. I love sandwiches so I lean towards the Torta , that said.. the tacos are excellent as well. There are a variety of meats and you can’t go wrong with any of them… however I prefer to get things that I can’t get at other restaurants. For instance, Barbacoa which is shredded beef cheek and slow cooked to a tender roast beef-like status. The Carne asada is also ridiculously good.
The sandwich is a fairly simple affair. Crusty bread with onions, shredded lettuce, fresh avocado slices. They also have an assortment of hand crafted salsas, I like spicy so I go with the hot salsa. Drizzle the salsa on and then dig into the mouthwatering sandwich. My only beef with El Oasis is that there isn’t any type of seating. So you’re going to have to eat on the car, or in the car.. or take it home. A picnic table would be pretty righteous. Another bonus is that they sell Jarritos and Mexican Coca Cola (with real cane sugar!). Also this is the first time that I’ve gotten food from the big truck. Normally there’s just the little cart when I drop by.
**EDIT** I have been informed by reliable sources that there are places to sit. A couple of stools and a bar around back? Thanks Phil!
Rating: Rating: 
. Just shy of 5 stars. The food is always excellent.
Michael’s BBQ in Lansing, MI
May 28th, 2010Michael’s BBQ or Michael Southern Style Jack Daniel BBQ . The name is quite a mouthful, and so is the food.
South east corner of:
Mt. Hope and S Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd
Lansing MI, 48910
I recently moved back to Lansing, and kept driving down MLK and seeing this corner BBQ stand called Michael’s. I eventually stopped by with Matt but we were both too gluttonous and hungry to take pictures and form coherent sentences. Anyways, I decided to drop by for some Lunch. I’m not sure the exact hours they keep but it seems to be around the lunch window, maybe early dinner too. The BBQ chicken and ribs are slathered in a rich and robust BBQ sauce. There is absolutely no shortage of the BBQ sauce when you order the ribs or the chicken. It’s neither too sweet nor too smoky, great balance and a consistency that stays on the meat without being too thick. There is a little kick to it as well. It’s a truly righteous BBQ sauce for the perfectly cooked ribs and chicken. I could go on describing his BBQ sauce, but words do not do the sauce justice.
Since I had not had the Jamaican jerk chicken yet, I opted for that. And boy, lemme tell ya, Michael does not disappoint. The cost of a 1/4 chicken and 2 sides is $6.50 . The chicken is rubbed down with a homemade Jamaican jerk rub. It’s spicy and delicious, at first you don’t notice the heat you just get the flavor blasting your face.. and then the spicy catches up. For my sides I went with the Macaroni & Cheese and Potato Salad. The mac and cheese is home made, real cheese in there. For you vegetarians you could get his sides and be happy. The potato salad was a new choice for me as well, not too much sauce on the potato salad, potatoes cooked perfectly and was a perfect balance to the spicy Jamaican jerk rub.
I have had the chopped pork sandwich, the pork spare ribs, and bbq chicken. None of the chicken is boneless, so if you get a chicken sandwich you will need to tear the chicken apart for it. Everything is delicious. The other sides I have had were the collared greens and his cooked cabbage. The collared greens aren’t too oily or salty, the cooked cabbage is cooked with sautéed garlic and onions.. mellow and full flavors. If you’re on I-496, hop off on the S. Martin Luther King Jr exit and drop by Michael’s. Your taste buds will thank you.
Rating: Everything served is excellent, and is easily deserving of 5 stars. Come enjoy some of the best BBQ in Lansing.
New Home
April 27th, 2010Howdy everyone, I ended up migrating halfton to my http://liquidweb.com VPS. Apparently it’s good I did this before transferring the domain to my godaddy.com account because after the domain transfer finished the 1and1.com dns got completely fucked. Thanks 1and1! Also, their support is a joke. Very basic questions that are outside of their script parameters completely stump them. Time to cancel my hosting completely with them!
Anyways, now that I have some more control over the hosting I’m thinking about trying some new things. Either way, we’ve all been lazy assholes and not uploaded content lately. I know that all of the contributors have been eating too :-X
Late Summer in Ann Arbor
November 16th, 2009Mediterrano
http://www.mediterrano.com/
2900 S. State St.
Ann Arbor, MI 48104
(734) 332-9700
It has been a while since I’ve written anything for the site. I’ve been working on the theme and some backend stuff for the website. This is a bit of a throw back (aka I should have written this thing months ago), which is a nice reminder of summer. I ended up running errands with my father in Ann Arbor and we were going to stop by the University of Michigan admissions while we were there. My Dad asked me to find somewhere to eat while he opened a bank account or something for his business. Anyways, I ended up wandering around looking for places to eat nearby. I was a little leery of this place because I thought the prices might be too high. My options were Cottage Inn or Mediterrano, and there is no way I was going to chowzer down on some pizza before meeting with admissions.
I decided to order some coffee while waiting for my Dad. I opted for dining outside. Nothing beats eating outdoors on a beautiful day.
The coffee was pretty decent, I’m not really sure what the stuff on the plate was. I think it was some spread for the bread, ya know… olive oil poured over it then smash it all over your bread. I was starting to get a little antsy, 10 minutes turned into 20 or 25 minutes, while waiting so I gave my Dad a ring and decided to order for the both of us. I went for the Greek Style Baked Summer Vegetables; It had Semolina orza pasta, tomatoes, feta cheese and Kalamata olives on top. I ordered the Grilled Chicken Kebabs for my Dad. The Summer Vegetables were absolutely fantastic. They were perfectly baked, and the melted feta added a nice little punch. It was full of textures, the soft artichokes, the green beans still had some snap. The tomatoes didn’t seem to be overly acidic nor over seasoned. The chicken kebabs looked pretty delicious too.
While eating I spoke with my Father about how I feel that good Vegetarian dishes are the hallmark of good restaurants. Even when I’m not eating purely vegetarian, I like the option for a vegetarian dish just to try new things that I wouldn’t cook for myself. I can make a damn fine steak or an amazing hamburger, however making something like these tomato baked vegetables? It just wouldn’t cross my mind to put those things together since I grew up with meat as the protein for most of our meals.
While you do pay for the dishes your wallet won’t be too much lighter; my Greek Veggies cost $11 and the Chicken Kebab was $12.99. Not terribly expensive considering how much food you get and a great atmosphere for a dining experience. Most of the dishes were between the $10-$20 range, with the majority around $15. If you’re looking for a casual dining spot, with some great Mediterranean inspired foods, give Mediterrano a shot.
Rating: Decor and atmosphere were great and really fit the mood of the food.
Rating: 
Price of everything was reasonable.
Rating: Food was perfectly cooked and all of the flavors really went well together.
Rating: Overall. Definitely deserving of 4.5 stars, if you’re in Ann Arbor give it a shot.
The next day we went to the UofM football game. It was one they actually won too!
New Skin
November 10th, 2009Well, after 8 hours of messing around with php and css I have managed to come up with a new look for Half Ton Reviews!
Big thanks to Cincinatti over @ http://www.cans-crew.com for the 1/2 ton truck image!
Huuuuuge thanks to Tung Do @ http://www.wpdesigner.com/ specifically for his Word Press Theme tutorial.
I have the stuff I need to write a review, hopefully I’ll get on top of that and get it done tomorrow. I’m also adding a page that will list the restaurants we have reviewed.. sorted by region.
Cheers!
School! The ultimate time sink
September 27th, 2009It’s that time again, school has picked back up for me. I have two reviews waiting to be written. I need to get my application into UofM before October 1st, and hit the books some more. Once I get caught back up, I’ll keep the contributing rolling!
Fusion Cafe
August 10th, 2009Fusion Cafe
919 Winchester Rd
Lexington, KY 40505-3947
(859) 246-1500
Semi-late start to the day and we’re driving through Lexington trying to decide whether or not to go on the Bourbon Trail. Although the Bourbon trail was nixed in favor of a more expeditious trip, I spotted this little gem on the way to find some Bourbon bonbons. I was a little skeptical at first, mainly because I hadn’t seen many Asian-themed eateries in Kentucky. The inside is fairly stark, it was a nice comfortable little spot. Plenty of seating, clean floors and tables.
Since my phone was dead, I took this from some realtor's blog
Their Pho is supposed to be the bee’s knees, but I wasn’t feeling soup. They didn’t have much (or any?) vegetarian food, so I decided to try out a Shrimp Po’ Boy sandwich. Lemme tell ya, fried shrimp on a hoagie bun with tomato, lettuce, onions, and mayo? Delicious. You get the choice of fries or a side salad. I opted for the fries, which were standard fare.. but good. I mean, unless they’re hand cut it’s probably sysco or some other food distributer’s frozen potato goods. Anyways, the sandwich was pretty decent and didn’t set me back too much. Unfortunately the whole debacle with my phone kept me from taking pictures, fortunately I have a picture of their avocado shake. You can get it with tapiaco bubble things like bubble tea. I thought it was mainly a novelty drink, but it’s kinda hard for me to get over the thick, fatty, semi-salty and sweet, cold avocado drink. It’s good if you’re really into that sort of thing, but good god.. I like my avocado on tacos, or on tortillas. Anyways here’s a picture of the avocado shake tea whatever they called it.
Sarah sampling the shake/tea/avocado concotion
Rating: Decor, nothing fancy. Clean, and plenty of windows for some light to come on in
Rating: Everything was fairly reasonably priced.
Rating: Food was pretty delicious.
Rating: I’m feeling too lazy to do the math, but I liked the place and it was something different than burgers and fries in Kentucky. So, enjoy your 3 and a 1/2 stars Fusion Cafe. Keep on bringing a little bit of the rest of the world to Lexington
