danalwyn: (Default)
danalwyn ([personal profile] danalwyn) wrote2011-01-28 08:05 pm
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Burrito

Every day I try and learn something new; usually through perusing the internet. Today, I learned why I tend to be confused by Chipotle.

The problem comes from the answer to the question "What's in a carnitas burrito?". Of course I always knew that the answer was "Carnitas", which is sort of a "no, duh" kind of reaction. Everyone knows that a carnitas burrito (the standard by which any burrito joint should be judged) has carnitas in it. But this left me endlessly confused when I started eating burritos in other parts of the country.

"Hey," I would say, having bitten into it, "What's all this rice and beans and stuff doing in here? I didn't order that." Because a carnitas burrito is supposed to have carnitas in it; carnitas, some pico de gallo, some guac, and that's it. All this rice and beans stuff was foreign to me, and looked suspiciously like a way to pad out a burrito on the cheap.

Today I finally bothered to look this up on Wikipedia and found out my answer. Apparently, the burrito that Chipotle and others serve is a San Francisco (or Mission) style burrito, a foil-wrapped burrito loaded with a dozen different ingredients. Meanwhile I learned to eat burritos in San Diego, which has its own style related to that of Northern Mexico, where the main difference between a burrito and a sausage was consistency rather then content.

So that's what I learned today: the rest of the country is doing it wrong. That's what you get when you trust Mexican food that comes from San Francisco.

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