Plaidophile

There are a lot of Mexican restaurants around here. One of them is called Fresh Taco, which I'd been putting off going to because I didn't want to find out how bleak the Mexican food situation was around here. A week ago I finally tried them out and had a couple of chicken tacos, which weren't horrible but weren't amazing, but they were definitely Mexican in nature, even though everyone working at the restaurant is Chinese. (But, hey, it's not like ethnicity dictates what kind of food you can make.)

Today I was jonesing for Chipotle but didn't want to spend 30 minutes and $2 each way to go to Manhattan for the privilege of paying the McDonald's holding corporation $9 for a mediocre-at-best burrito. So I went back to Fresh Taco, and ordered their steak burrito.

What I got back was quite definitely the most amazing Chinese-Mexican fusion cuisine I've ever had.

Americans tend to see Chinese food through tunnel-vision; fried rice stirred with a random assortment of vegetables, dowsed in soy sauce, and served with fried egg rolls and chopsticks. Because that's what Americans expect of Chinese food, that is what Chinese restaurants tend to provide, ignoring the rich tapestry of soups, dim sum steamed dishes, spring rolls, dumplings, and so on.

Well, Americans aren't the only ones who see other cultures' cuisine through blinders. Every non-Mexican interpretation of Mexican food I've seen has had a superficial similarity to a small subset of Mexican food, and involved sour cream, lettuce, tomatoes, rice, beans, cheddar cheese (never mind that traditional Mexican food uses a wide variety of cheeses, none of them cheddar), and, of course, tortillas.

So, apply the Americanized concept of Chinese food to the superficial notion of Mexican food, and you will probably end up with this burrito I just had.

It was steak stir-fry - as in, steak, bell peppers, onions, carrots, and celery, covered with rice, black beans, and cheddar cheese, served on top of a toasted vaguely tortilla-esque flatbread, with lettuce, sour cream, diced tomatoes, and something vaguely guacamole-esque. Not wrapped (or wrappable). I asked for hot sauce, and was given a little cup of Chinese-style chili and garlic sauce.

It was neither Mexican nor Chinese. But it was quite good.

Definitely not a burrito, though!

And that is what made it so awesome.