Educate me about burritos, please

Cafe Society
101

Just some random observations because I feel like writing today:

The Spanish-language Wikipedia entry has some interesting information on the word tamal: It comes from Nahuatl, as pointed out upthread, and means “wrapped” (I recall “packet” being another translation), but other words are used for the same food throughout Central and South America, sometimes different words within the same country.

As Pulykamell pointed out, masa is made from corn treated with lime in a process known as nixtamalization (notice tamal is right there in the middle of that word). The process has several benefits, one being that it allows us to absorb the niacin in the corn, thus avoiding a disease called pellagra that results from using untreated corn as a staple food. Apparently, the nixtamalization process didn’t make it across the Atlantic, and the untreated forms of corn are what you’ll find in Europe to this day (unless you go looking for masa harina).

I was in the habit of making tamales a few years ago. It’s not too much work once you get the process down and assuming you’re not feeding an army. My method was to fry pork ribs, scrape the meat off the bones, chop it into small pieces and season it, spread masa over squares of parchment paper (which works fine) and roll ‘em up. I wouldn’t call that authentic or anything, but I think it’s not too far off the mark, either. I kept them in the freezer and steamed two at a time in their wrappers in a pressure cooker, and it was very convenient and really hit the spot. I stopped because it’s too much of a calorie bomb for dinner and because I usually have other things for lunch.

In the early 1980s, there was a burrito place in Chicago that was well known for serving good, cheap food in a very bad neighborhood. Wish I could remember more. It was north of downtown, a small venue like a bar, with a grill that always had a huge mound of chopped meat cooking away. The burritos were foot-long monsters wrapped in flour tortillas, and it took a long time to finish eating just one. Our Hispanic friends used to laugh at us gringos, saying, “Oh, you went to that place? Man those things are gross! You don’t know what kind of meat that is, and it’s all cold by the time you finish eating it!” Actually, there was something a bit peculiar about the meat, and, many years later, I was reminded of those burritos when I tried horse meat. I didn’t really care about the grief our friends gave us because they’d obviously eaten at that place many times. :smile:

102

Apparently yes.

https://old.reddit.com/r/chicagofood/comments/s342xu/pov_youve_been_blessed_by_the_tamale_guy/

I’ve bought and enjoyed tamales from bar-to-bar vendors but I can’t be sure it’s been from Claudio.

103

I like bean & cheese burritos. Beef burritos are good too. I get the frozen burritos from Kroger. Melt Velveeta for a cheese sauce and add a dab of sour cream.

There’s a lot of calories but I don’t make them very often.

104

RE: Burrito vs Enchilada

A burrito is generally hand / finger food often wrapped in foil for easy take-away portability.

An enchilada is served on a plate, covered in sauce, and eaten with a fork; the tortillas are often stacked rather than rolled.

Years ago a waiter in a good Mexican restaurant I used to frequent taught me to order a burrito enchilada-style with sour cream for the best of both worlds.

And no, frozen burritos and Taco Bell compared to a good Mexican food place aren’t great but they are cheap, easy, fast, reasonably tasty, and filling. More often than not I have a bag of them in my freezer for convenience.

105

Looks like you’d need a fully grown donkey to heft that bad boy. Si, por favor! The wikipedia article says:

At a Mexican restaurant called Percheronisimo, there is a challenge of a burrito that is one meter long, with 8 tortillas of flour and 1800 g of meat that has to be eaten by one person. As a prize the winner does not pay for the burrito and receives four free dinners. There are others up to two meters long.

8 tortillas x 400 calories = 3200 calories just for the tortillas. 1800g…@454g/lb, it’s 4 lbs of meat. And there are bigger ones? Yikes!

I’ve always wondered what horse tastes like. I visited France many years ago but didn’t find it on our tour. IIRC that’s what they used (use?) in Alpo canned dog food?

106

Store-bought frozen burritos are to burritos as Chef Boy-ar-dee Beefaroni is to pasta, or as Totino’s frozen Party Pizza is to pizza.

107

I think that’s what we call a “wet burrito”. It’s also usually bigger than the hand-held ones. In addition to the sauce and sour cream, it usually has melted cheese on top.

108

There wasn’t anything objectionable about the taste or texture of the burrito meat. It was a little chewy, which I attributed to it being a cheaper cut prepared in a decidedly downscale place. Also, the horse meat I remember trying was sold at a supermarket on just a few shelves in a corner of the meat section. I thought it was some kind of grass-fed beef or maybe regular meat approaching its date of expiry, and I sure as hell wasn’t expecting it to be horse! The point I’m trying to make is that there was enough of a demand for it to be in the supermarket, so it couldn’t be all bad.

I’ve just noticed there’s a Wikipedia entry on horse meat. It says “many consumers allege not being able to tell the difference between beef and horse meat,” and it indicates that Mexico was the third biggest producer worldwide in 2018 and was among the top consumers in 2005.

About Alpo, the entry also says:

A misconception exists that horses are commonly slaughtered for pet food. In many countries, such as the United States, horse meat was outlawed for use in pet food in the 1970s. American horse meat is considered a delicacy in Europe and Japan, and its cost is in line with veal, so it would be prohibitively expensive in many countries for pet food.

109

I don’t know about “often” outside an area of the Southwest US. That’s the only place I’ve ever encountered stacked enchiladas. The usual is rolled.

110

Right, I saw the Wikipedia article as well. There are a lot of Americans weirded out by the concept, but why? There are lots of animals you could eat (save the dolphins, but to hell with the tuna!) that are cultural issues.

I didn’t realize it was outlawed but I thought they had to state it on the label. Rationale: poor folks, like senior citizens on a strict budget, sometimes ate dog food because it was cheap.

Found this:

Actor Lorne Greene and his wife Nancy, who are both on the board of the A.H.P.A., were on hand to present awards to two senators, Tom Eagleton (D-Mo.) and Harrison Williams (D N.J.) and to film producer Charlie Thompson (ABC) and writer Hope Ryden.

Greene was asked how his commercials for Alpo dog food - two brands of which use horsemeat - square with his efforts toward saving horses.

111

I’ve also heard them called smothered burritos.

112

I kind of hate it when people cast doubt on Wikipedia references, so I’ll do it to myself here before someone else does. :grinning:

ETA: Kind of hate it when it’s obvious that the source of the information is Wikipedia. We all know it’s not entirely reliable/accurate.

113

If horse meat is used in dog food or even human food, there has to be a process of getting the horses from ranches, farms, etc to slaughterhouses and then they have to be processed in sufficient volume to make the process worthwhile. That seems unlikely compared to the massive system set up to raise, transport and slaughter cattle and pigs.

114

Horse meat and Alpo remind me of two things:

  1. The episode of All In The Family where Gloria cooks horse meat;
  2. An episode of SCTV where Lorne Greene parodies his Alpo commercials, using the trop of elderly people eating dog food. ‘Maybe [elderly man’s name] has been around so long because Alpo’s been around so long.’
115

Dammit. I was going to be good today, eat sensibly, get some exercise. Now I think my exercise will be walking to one of the hole-in-the-wall taquerias down the street and eating until I can’t see straight.

116

We’ve had a tamale vender in local neighborhoods for some years now. He and his wife and kids walk up and down the streets with his heated cart shouting TAMALEEEEEEES! BEEF AND CHICKEN AND CHEESE TA—MAAAAA-LEEEEES! I think the guy could probably have success in the opera.

117

Yes, here is the listing (as tamalli, is “tamal” a variant?)
https://nahuatl.uoregon.edu/content/tamalli

Did you try the supermarket? :slight_smile: Or a meat restaurant…

As has been pointed out, though, it is doubtful that horsy dog food would be any cheaper than beefy or lamby dog food; the question is, do dogs like the flavor?

More to the point, is it a popular burrito filling in France or in Mexico? The same could be asked regarding other meats that show up in France like ostrich, zebra, kangaroo, frog, bison, you name it.

118

Finished breakfast about half an hour ago. Mrs. L.A. had scrambled eggs and cheese and bacon. I had scrambled eggs and cheese and bacon and Tapatio wrapped up in two Carb Balance tortillas.

119

I just image-googled enchiladas, and the vast majority of pictures are of the rolled kind.

120

Taco Bell has nearly 7,600 restaurants in the United States and will deliver to you.