1 day Ago By [email protected] (Brian Boone)
There's more than one way to eat a burrito — whether that's on a plate with a knife and fork, held in one hand with foil around it, or utilizing by sucking its contents out from one end. There are also lots of ways to make a burrito. Traditionally and historically, the burrito is an unfussy, simple food, and a way to inexpensively get in a lot of calories and carbohydrates.
"Its name, meaning 'little donkey,' is thought to refer to how the tortilla wraps around its fillings like a pack on a burro's back," said renowned Latin-cuisine chef in an interview with The Takeout. "Early versions were simple — flour tortillas filled with staples like beans, meat, or cheese." Mexican migration brought burritos into the United States, and variations sprang up based on the influence of many cultures, regional tastes, and the availability or preference of particular ingredients.
The burrito started out simple, but has grown complex over the last century or so, to the point where "burrito" is an umbrella term for a whole matrix of related dishes, and refers not just to beans and cheese in a tortilla, or to the overstuffed style of this delicacy that was invented in San Francisco's Mission district and is now sold at Chipotle. To learn all about varied burrito styles, we sought out a few experts. Helping us out are Sandoval, LA Times columnist and author Gustavo Arellano, and Ohio State University cultural anthropology doctoral candidate , whose studies focus on Mexican food in American cities.
Wet burrito Approximately , and many of them offer the wet burrito, which differs from other styles in that it's not easily handled as a type of street food, but instead requires a knife and fork. This burrito variety is stuffed with beans, rice, sour cream, salsa, guacamole, meat, and cheese, and is then covered and soaked with tangy tomato-based or green salsa, similarly to enchiladas. Some food historians trace the spread of the wet burrito to Mexican workers who moved further into the U.
S. from Texas and eventually settled in Midwest cities like Detroit and Chicago. However, some experts attest that the wet burrito can be clearly traced to the Southwestern United States.
It's likely the most far-reaching example of New Mexico's pervasive burrito culture, according to Gustavo Arellano. "The iconic New Mexico burrito is the smothered burrito, which the rest of the country would know as a wet burrito," Gustavo told The Takeout. It also stands to reason that this burrito style would emphasize ingredients that are popular in the Land of Enchantment.
"New Mexico's Southwestern version highlights hatch green chilies and local cheeses," says chef Richard Sandoval. California burrito Whoever invented what came to be known as the California burrito sure thought so. As the SoCal counterpart to the Mission-style burrito of the Golden State's northern region, a California burrito is similarly massive and packs a load of different ingredients.
Carne asada usually serves as the foundational protein, and it's also made with pico de gallo, cheese, and guacamole, all concealed inside a tortilla that can barely hold everything together. But instead of pinto beans and rice bulking up the dish and adding a hefty amount of starch, the California burrito gets its high carbohydrate count from the addition of french fries, inserted when they're as hot and as crunchy as possible. San Diego gave the world the California burrito, which initially became popular among the city's surfers.
This handheld meal provided them with plenty of energy, and it was convenient to bring to the beach for a bite when hitting the waves. Roberto's Taco Shop is credited as the first eatery to specialize in California burritos, which are now served at countless Mexican restaurants in the San Diego region. The California burrito "probably does come from Roberto's or a similar type of spot in San Diego," Andrew Mitchel told The Takeout.
"Their focus is really on the combination of an emphasis on carne asada steak filling, and also the fries instead of rice and beans." Hollenbeck burrito Thousands of food trucks sell Mexican food in the Los Angeles metropolitan area. With an aim of standing out from the competition, many vendors have differentiated themselves by creating new burritos.
Inspired by older burrito styles pioneered in Mexico, while also employing innovative techniques and nontraditional ingredients, proprietors have built burritos that — while only a few years old — have become quintessential contributions to the Los Angeles food scene. Traditional burritos from Mexico are usually small, with only two or three ingredients slathered into a flour tortilla. El Tepeyac, a Mexican restaurant in the Boyle Heights neighborhood, introduced Angelenos to gigantic, meal-sized burritos in the 1950s.
Named at first the Hollenbeck — because officers from the nearby police station of that name often dined at El Tepeyac — this burrito could weigh as much as 5 pounds, incorporating hefty servings of beans, rice, guacamole, cheese, and pico de gallo. A spicy pork-and-tomato stew called chile rojo went inside the burrito, and also on top. The Hollenbeck, sold under many names, can still be found in restaurants around predominantly Latino neighborhoods in East Los Angeles.
Bacon-wrapped burrito , but since it's so tasty in all of its fatty and salty goodness, it long ago became incorporated into other meals and foods that originated outside of the United States. The bacon-wrapped burrito has similarities with a street-food specialty from the Mexican state of Sonora, which shares a border with Arizona. The Sonoran hot dog is wrapped in bacon and topped with beans, salsa, and onions — ingredients commonly found in Mexican and Mexican-American foods.
The same fillings can also be enjoyed in the bacon-wrapped burrito, though a particular version popular in the Sonoran city of Hermosillo adds distinctively zesty and creamy touches. The whole thing begins with a chili pepper stuffed with cream cheese, which is then loaded into a tortilla to make it a burrito. Then all of that is carefully wrapped in strips of bacon, and griddled until the tortilla is hot, the burrito ingredients are cooked, and the bacon is crispy.
While this is a Mexican delicacy, the bacon-wrapped burrito can be found at eateries in Southwestern U.S. communities, such as Tucson, Arizona, and Moreno Valley, California.
Dorado-style burrito A second burrito-construction method supposedly got its start in the U.S. in the Mission district of San Francisco: making this delicacy in the dorado style.
Prepared similarly to taquitos, the dorado — which is Spanish for "golden," — also involves an overstuffed Mission-style burrito, which can be filled with rice, beans, meat, sour cream, and more, depending on the diner's preference. Then the entire burrito is heated on a flat-top grill so that the tortilla becomes lightly browned and crispy. "This is a more traditional interpretation that is a little smaller" than Mission burritos, Andrew Mitchel told The Takeout, while noting the similarities of this burrito style with tacos dorados, which "in the U.
S. we would call taquitos." However, Mitchel emphasizes that dorado-style burritos should not be confused with chimichangas, though they both have a crispy exterior.
A chimichanga is essentially a burrito that is deep-fried — you can even — while dorado burritos are seared with a little oil. But not all Mexican food aficionados are in agreement that the dorado-style burrito counts as a bona fide specialty. "There's no such thing as a 'dorado burrito' — all that means is cooks crisp up the tortilla," Gustavo Arellano told The Takeout.
Mexican hamburger burrito Many contemporary burritos can be traced directly back to their traditional Mexican forebears. However, one entry on this list — which isn't always categorized as a burrito — is a true hybrid of Mexican-American culture, and is primarily found far north of the border, in Colorado. When asked by The Takeout for his favorite regional burrito variety, Gustavo Arellano said that the "Mexican hamburger from Denver is definitely the winner.
" Arellano writes in "Taco USA" that the Mexican hamburger is "a bean-and-meat burrito with a hamburger patty inside, smothered in Colorado-style gravy, and served on a plate and eaten with a knife and fork." While Arellano notes that New Mexico's culinary culture influenced many of the dishes created in Colorado, he adds that the Mexican hamburger is widely believed to have originated in a Chicano district of Denver during the 1960s. Nowadays this specialty is easily found at Mexican and non-Mexican restaurants throughout Denver — but according to Arellano, this dish hasn't traveled far beyond the Mile High City's borders, much to the confusion of traveling Denver residents.
Burritas mixtas Puerto Vallarta — the coastal city in Mexico's southwestern state of Jalisco — is considered as a culinary haven for mixed seafood burritos, known locally as burritas mixtas. The community's proximity to the Pacific Ocean means fish and other seafood are longtime staples of the diet there, but burritas mixtas is likely a fairly contemporary development. This is because Puerto Vallarta is "in Jalisco, and flour tortillas weren't part of the culinary traditions there until recently," Gustavo Arellano told The Takeout.
Seafood varieties that are abundant in and around Puerto Vallarta include octopus, shrimp, and marlin, and these are often used in the locally made burritas mixtas. Chopped and combined into a mélange, the varied seafood is cooked up almost like how fajitas are prepared, heated and stir-fried in a pan with green bell peppers and onions. Into the tortilla it all goes, along with lettuce, tomatoes, cheese, and other ingredients that can vary depending on different tastes and regions.
Chef Richard Sandoval told The Takeout that Baja California's seafood burritos are frequently "paired with fresh avocado and lime." Once rolled up and sealed, burritas mixtas are often given a little bit of time on a flat-top grill to give the tortilla a golden-brown finish. Chile colorado burrito Before it was a burrito filling, chile colorado was (and still is) a style of rustic Mexican stew, prepared and served in large amounts, sometimes with tortillas on the side for dipping or scooping up the meaty, spicy specialty.
It's commonly made by families to use as the basis for a variety of meals. Gustavo Arellano told The Takeout that chile colorado is a borderlands dish, meaning that it was developed in the region that covers what is now the American Southwest and northern Mexico. "Chile colorado is definitely something traditional, and rolling it up in a burrito certainly preserves its origins as a stewed/braised dish of pork or beef," added Andrew Mitchel.
Making a chile colorado burrito only requires the simple act of adding the meat, cooked in a red chili pepper sauce — "colorado" means "colored red" in Spanish — into flour tortillas. Then, other ingredients can be added in, including traditional Mexican sides like rice and frijoles charros (beans stewed with pork and spices), before sealing it all up into a saucy burrito. Oregon burrito As the standard among American-originated burritos, the Mission-style burrito was invented in San Francisco, not too far south of the state of Oregon — which has added its own related entry into the burrito canon.
Mission-style burritos often incorporate beef prepared in the carne asada style, and that's a main element of the Oregon burrito, too, meaning that it was likely inspired by its Northern California neighbor. It may also represent a spin on the California burritos of Southern California — the ones made with french fries — as Oregon's version also require potatoes. Those root vegetables are a big part of the Pacific Northwest economy and diet, and they're represented in the Oregon burrito by way of grilled potato chunks.
The Oregon burrito, as found in Mexican restaurants around the state, is a revered offering at Muchas Gracias, a rapidly growing West Coast chain. Along with the grilled potatoes, an Oregon burrito typically comes with meat, cheese, salsa, and roasted vegetables like onions and bell peppers. Korean burrito The Los Angeles area has large populations of Korean-Americans and Mexican-Americans, and that demographic arrangement led to a burrito that incorporates ingredients historically associated with both cultures.
"Korean-Mexican hybrids had actually popped up in Los Angeles restaurants during the mid-1990s, most notably at José Bernstein, a dive near the University of California at Los Angeles, where they sold burritos stuffed with kimchi and bulgogi," Gustavo Arellano wrote in "Taco USA." As chronicled in Arellano's book, the Korean burrito remained a hyper-local phenomenon until the late 2000s, when food blogger Dylan Ho shared a story about a party where he drunkenly realized that barbecued Korean short ribs went well with tortillas, kimchi, and sriracha. Reader Alice Shin connected Ho with her brother-in-law Mark Manguera, who was thinking of opening a Korean-influenced taco truck.
They got together with acclaimed chef Roy Choi and opened the Kogi BBQ Truck. The menu consisted almost entirely of tacos and burritos made with Mexican-style tortillas, shredded American cheese, and Korean-style meats. Korean-Mexican fusion restaurants and food trucks have since popped up all over LA, selling burritos among its main offerings.
Instead of Mexican-style seasoned rice, Korean burritos use white rice. The other main ingredients in this kind of burrito are , including a protein such as chicken katsu or beef bulgogi, and kimchi instead of salsa. Recommended.
