The world is your oyster at Cask & Co.

I spend a fair amount of time on the clock conferring with my coworkers as to where I should get food. Cask & Co. has come up often — not only in these discussions but also in my Google searches for new places to get pho or pad Thai in Lansing. This is what has always given me apprehension about this establishment: Whether I’m craving Thai, Vietnamese or wings (or Indian … or Japanese), Cask & Co.’s menu has me covered. Is it possible for one restaurant to do so many diverse options well? As there aren’t that many restaurants I haven’t tried yet, it was time to find out what Cask & Co. has to offer. 

I intended to try one of the restaurant’s international offerings to really test my bias, but a craving for a cheeseburger reared its ugly and difficult-to-ignore head. From the extensive menu, I chose the bison burger, which comes with aged white cheddar, pickled onions and a dijon slaw. They had me at aged white cheddar. 

Bison meat is known for being leaner and generally “better for you” than beef, so if you have guilty feelings about eating cheeseburgers, as I know many of us do, then a bison option is a welcome sighting on a menu when the burger urge has struck. This one was perfectly cooked to my medium-rare preference, and the cheddar was a sharp and creamy compliment to the peppery meat. The slaw, full of crunchy red cabbage and tangy mustard dressing, was an excellent topping, and I think it should be added as a standard option across all menus. 

The fries, though, deserve their own paragraph. There are many options for sides, but for me, a burger requires fries. Garlicky, fried to a toasty golden brown and covered in a generous sprinkling of parmesan, they were the best I’ve had in a while. The portion was generous, and I wish I’d asked for a side of barbeque sauce because that would have been the perfect way to round out the array of flavors represented in my meal. 

Other intriguing menu options include Mediterranean chicken tacos, a smoked-elk sausage and pepper po’boy and a watermelon-and-peach salad. Is the menu all over the place? Absolutely. But if the quality of my first meal was any indication, I would give Cask & Co. a try next time you’re eating with others and can’t agree on where to go.