Cuban cuisine made simple.

We're still workin' the crowds at the 2009 North American International Auto Show, and while  we've been a little underwhelmed at the amount of truck-based new products being shown off this year, we always find smething of interest amid all the cool concepts and production models.

The Kia Soulster debuted here yesterday, essentially an open-top SUT version of the Soul Scion-fighter that premiered in L.A. ls November. Our first impression of the little thing was "X90 on steroids," but with a spacer lift, a more aggressive tire, and some sort of limited-slip in the rear end, we think this mini fun-machine could be a cool little runabout in the dunes.

Our good friends at Hummer met up with us at their booth, where tech editor Holman (right) presented our exclusive 20009 Pickup Truck of the Year award to James Taylor, CEO of Hummer and a genuinely nice guy. We know that the brand has taken a lot of P.R. hits from both the lefties and from a lot of wheelers as well, but as far as we're concerned, they make a quality product, and we're glad to  present them their richly-deserved trophy for the H3T.

A bit later, one of our pals in Hummer P.R. took us to a way-cool Cuban restaurant in downtown Detroit for lunch, and if you're ever in this burg, you don't wanna miss a chance to dine at Vicente---it's a real find. I had the ropa vieja (slow-cooked shredded beef and a traditional Cuban staple), and this was as tasty and authentic as anything I've eaten in any Cuban restaurant in LA, Miami, and parts in between.

Forget all the doom and gloom---every year, somebody trots out a car that is soooo over-the-top, youi've gotta love it, This year, it was Mercedes with their SLR McLaren Stirling Moss, named in honor of the legendary English racer. It's powered by a 5.4L V-8 that's somehow been tuned to crank out 640 hp, it goes from zero to 60 in three and a half seconds, and it has a top speed of 217 mph. Mercedes is making a limited run of 75 vehicles, and you can have one, too, for a cool $1 million.

It doesn't more Old-Skool Beautiful than this vintage Bug on display at the VW booth. Why post it here? Well heck, because it's my blog and I used to have one of these things (a '65) back in my salad days, and from a reliability standpoint, it was the best damn car I've ever owned. I'd probably still be driving it if it hadn't been stolen after I'd sunk about $5 grand into a frame-off resto for it. Oh well, no good deed goes unpunished, as they say.