A burrito is a Mexican dish originally from Northern Mexico. It consists of a soft flour tortilla, typically filled with beans and meat, typically ground or minced beef, and rolled up so the filling is enclosed inside the tortilla. Other common meats are shredded beef, pork, chicken, or sometimes tongue, and other ingredients often included are salsa, fried beans; fried rice; shredded lettuce or cabbage; diced tomato; sour cream; guacamole and shredded cheese.
Burritos are common mainly in the cuisine of Northern Mexico. They are called tacos de harina (="wheat tacos") as you approach the east coast, and burritas (feminine, with 'a') in Northern-style restaurants outside Northern Mexico. In Mexican-American cuisine, crispy fried burritos with just one or two ingredients in the filling are called chimichangas, and a long, thin similar dish is prepared in Sonora and vicinity called chivichangas.
The name burrito comes from the Spanish diminutive of ''burro".
- ''For other uses of the word burrito, see burrito (disambiguation)
Source: Bayless, Rick and Deann Groen Bayless, Authentic Mexican: Regional Cooking from the Heart of Mexico (1987), p. 142.
