As previously reviewed on this blog, The Mission Mexican Grill is a three strong burrito chain with two restaurants in Oxford and one in Reading. The first time I tried a burrito from The Mission I was quite impressed and gave them a 7/10 after an enjoyable lunch in Reading. Back in early June I headed up to Oxford to meet the owner Jan and also head chef Victor. It was good to meet yet another enthusiastic burrito aficionado who seemed genuinely excited about bringing high quality burritos to the UK. The inspiration for The Mission is Pancho Villa in The Mission district in San Francisco and homage to the 'mother burrito' is paid through photography on the restaurant walls. There is real enthusiasm at The Mission and this certainly translated in to the quality of the burrito that I enjoyed in Oxford. That got an 8/10 from me and so The Mission remains, in my opinion, the best burrito outside of London. A few weeks later I popped in to the Reading restaurant on a Saturday evening whilst on my way back to London from Cardiff. Possibly not the best time to visit but the consistency of quality was almost there so Reading retains it's 7/10 rating. If you're in Oxford or Reading do make sure that you check them out. With a bit of luck we should see some more The Mission restaurants soon...
I can now claim to have visited all 4 Tortilla restaurants in London having finally gotten round to checking out the original restaurant on Upper Street in Islington. Overall my most frequented burrito place in London is the Bankside Tortilla on Southwark Street and I have been working my way through the others... Tortilla now have locations at Southwark Street, Market Place, Canada Square and the original restaurant on Upper Street in Islington. A little while ago I visited the original store to sample a burrito and to meet up with Brandon Stephens, the man behind Tortilla. Brandon is an ex-pat Californian who, like most people who have spent time in the Bay Area, greatly missed the lack of good Mexican food whilst living in London. His answer was to start Tortilla which started with the explanation Mexico > California > London. Tortilla do good burritos with the benefit of two size options and a choice of rice. It's always a large burrito with Spanish rice for me. The hot salsa tastes good and save for the occasional problems with consistency I do recommend Tortilla.
The comparison with Chilango always comes up when talking about Tortilla. The two places offer a similar product line but go about it very differently in terms of branding and promotion. Chilango has a more vibrant and 'exciting' brand whilst Tortilla is much more relaxed and conservative. The arguments about which one is better are sure to continue. Now that I have been to all for Tortillas, my next challenge is to try each burrito from the menu for review on the blog. This, over the next couple months, will be my Tortilla challenge.
It's not a place I particularly recommend, nor is it a chain that will feature much in this blog, however I thought it was worth mentioning that Taco Bell are to return to the UK at the end of this month. Opening at the Lakeside shopping mall in Thurrock at the end of June it would seem that this could well be the first of many Taco Bell outlets in Britain.
I find it quite appropriate that high-end Bluewater has a Chilango whilst lower-end Lakeside gets a Taco Bell.
Monday, May 10th, 2010 saw the opening of the first Chipotle restaurant in the UK and Europe at 114-116 Charing Cross Road in London.
There is quite an incredible amount of hype around Chipotle. It has a cult following in the United States where they have opened in over 900 different locations. My experience of Chipotle has been limited to a few visits to the two restaurants in downtown San Francisco on Market and New Montgomery streets. The chains entry in to SF was a little controversial given that city's burrito heritage, however I very much enjoyed the burritos from both places. Chipotle is now on an expansion drive in to the UK and onwards in to Europe. The first restaurant is thought likely to be followed by additional sites in London and possible new openings in Paris and somewhere in Germany. Speaking of Germany, I read on Twitter that one guy actually came over from Germany just to eat at Chipotle! There's a photo somewhere on the web of an unwrapped and uneaten Chipotle burrito in Deutschland after a flight from London. Wow!
Ok, so London has a Chipotle. Great, let's investigate...
On opening day I headed up to the new London Chipotle to check it out. Getting there I wasn't surprised to see that many others - mainly Americans - had the same idea. When I arrived the line was almost out of the door and getting longer! It took something like 20 minutes to reach the counter from where I could place my order. Unfortunately there were no staff around to take payment from customers in line like on weekday lunchtimes in SF.
I went for my usual favourite of chicken burrito w/ guac and the obligatory hot salsa. That together with a lemon and lime This Water came to a total of £9.85. Ouch!
Chipotle Burrito #1
So what of the burrito? Well, it was ok. I found it too small in terms of filling and it was very poorly rolled. The tortilla itself was quite nice (though others report different experiences) and taste wise it was reasonably good overall. Not anything like the Chipotle in San Francisco, but not too bad.
It was certainly no better than some of London's established places despite all the hype. Most importantly Chipotle is far too expensive. Despite doing ok on taste, the poor construction of the burrito and the meagre filling made it a pretty poor showing overall. And so I left for home rather surprised that after more than 900 openings, Chipotle still haven't worked out how to get it right on day one. With that sort of experience you'd have thought they'd have cracked it by now.
Based on opening day I would give my first UK Chipotle burrito a rather uninspiring score of 5/10.
But it would be unfair to judge even a place as big as Chipotle just by opening day, what with the busyness and all, so...
Back I went the following Sunday...
This time there were just 10 people in line ahead of me when I arrived. There were plenty of people about but plenty of seats too so it was much less hectic than opening day. A good sign I thought.
Upon reaching the counter I decided to deviate from chicken and order a barbacoa burrito. This with guacamole and hot salsa and as usual, black beans.
The filling was a lot more generous this time round with the staff actually washing people if they wanted a little more. I got given a huge dollop (too much!) of guacamole which almost justified the rather outrageous additional cost of £1.40. Yes, that's right... £1.40.
But then things started not to go too well. My burrito was sitting on the counter for a good few minutes whilst people were bunching up by the counter waiting to pay. What caused this exactly I'm not sure but I have seen similar reports from other web reviewers. When I eventually got to the cash register I had to hand over MORE THAN ten quid for a burrito and a soft drink! I hope that Chipotle's high prices are because it is in the West End and that any future less prominent locations will be cheaper, but I doubt it.
So off to a window seat looking across at Foyles book store on the other side of Charing Cross Road to eat my second Chipotle burrito in London.
Chipotle Burrito #2
Oh dear. Although it was much better constructed than the first, the taste this time round was very bland. A burrito way below standard and by Chipotle US standards - terrible!
Where do I start? The tortilla was cold, the overall taste was bland and the whole thing was drowned in the massive amount of guac! I was genuinely disappointed with this meal. Actually the best thing about it was the Smoked Tabasco suace... it's great that they have that (also have it in their US restaurants) but I'd rather be pouring that over a tastier burrito!
So despite a promising start the end result was actually worse than on opening day. What a shame.
Taste test verdict number two... 4/10.
Hopefully this is not the end of the story. There is a tremendous amount of hype around Chipotle but that's not without any basis. They are a highly successful company that has been part of the trend for much healthier fast food. They take the well sourced, sustainable food thing seriously (as do the likes of Chilango) which is of course a great thing. Also, my experience of Chipotle in the US has been positive.
So what's wrong in London? That I do not know. Certainly price is one thing. I guess that they do have some leverage due to their brand awareness and also their very prominent West End location. That still doesn't justify a hugely inflated price for guacamole though. And if they are truly planning to replicate their American success, why no soda fountains or tap water?
But the big disappointment for me was the taste and construction. After hundreds and hundreds of store openings I would expect that these guys would be experts at getting it right - straight off. But maybe my expectations were too high... Hopefully everything will improve over time but sadly it doesn't seem that this restaurant will reach the standards of its US equivalents any time soon...
I will conclude with South Park's take on Chipotle. Still laugh at this every time I watch it...
London has come a long way. Today, I was stopped on the street and asked if I would like to try a sample mini-burrito! It turned out that the people out giving away food were the guys behind Poncho No.8, funnily enough, the very place that I had popped up to town to visit...!
My first sample of Poncho was back in November of last year and I was pretty impressed. Back then I said...
"I had my burrito to go and it was raining so the actual eating experience wasn't as great as it could have been. The burrito? Pretty damn good. Could have been a little more hot salsa but the flavour was good and it had a nice 'kick'. The best thing though was the filling. This was a proper CHICKEN burrito! No messing about with Nineteen-Ten size portions of meat. Let down by smaller amounts of rice and beans but meat wise, this is how it should be done. The prize for amount of meat is now shared between Poncho and Daddy D. This place is up there on quality. They're pretty new so things can (hopefuly) only get better. I will be back."
So my first impressions were good but opening hours have been limited to weekday daytimes only. As Spitalfields is not at all convenient for me to get to from deepest south London I wasn't able to get back as soon as I had hoped.
Last week however, Poncho No.8 announced on their blog that they were extending their opening hours to include Sunday lunchtimes. I was on holiday in Cornwall at that time but realised that the second Poncho opportunity had finally arrived, so I headed up today to sample them once again. Sunday sees a different crowd in The City which would explain why Poncho are trying to spread the burrito word to a whole new leisure audience.
It was really good to meet the people behind the brand, London's burrito entrepreneurs really are a great bunch! It was also good to be able to check out if my initial impressions from my first visit were correct.
They were. Although the only option today was pinto beans (uncertainty about Sunday busyness meant that my usual choice of black beans was not available), the burrito was good. I opted for the chicken though I did also try a sample of the pork. Both were very good indeed and whilst not perfect, this is very high quality stuff. I fully expect that if I returned on a busy weekday instead of a (new) slow Sunday, it would have been even better.
Moving on to the 'heat factor' I am very pleased to report that 'hot' does actually mean hot! Not stupidly tastelessly hot but the picante tasted good whilst giving me the 'kick' that I wanted. Getting that right is crucial for me and so on the salsa front Poncho are firmly in Daddy Donkey and Chilango territory.
And so to conclude, this place is excellent. It was particularly good to hear about the focus on properly sourced and quality ingredients, which is of course very California! To me, that is what cal-mex cuisine should be about and the more awareness of that the better. I rate Poncho among the best of the London burritos and it'll be moving up on the eat section on this website soon. I should also add that the interior of the small restaurant is fantastic!
Work on the first Chipotle restaurant in the UK continues on Charing Cross Road. I've been following tweets about this opening and there seems to be an almost feverish excitement about the prospect of Chipotle coming to London.
The big question is WHEN? Originally planned for April, the opening was then rescheduled to 'sometime in May'. The latest from the Twitterverse suggests that the possible opening date is May 10th.
This post is off topic, it's not about burritos, but I feel that the brilliant little Soho restaurant Mooli's deserves a plug.
If you're in London and don't fancy a burrito (and yes, that even happens to me sometimes!), check out Mooli's. There is actually a sign inside the restaurant reminds you that a Mooli is "not a f***ing burrito"!!
What is a Mooli? They are described as "Mooli’s are warm flavoursome fillings, zesty salsas, vibrant chutneys & crunchy salads all rolled in a fresh homemade roti".
Following loads of buzz on Twitter I decided to go check them out. I went for the Goat (an off-menu item) and was very impressed. I wish they were bigger (I think there might be plans for that) but it was a taste sensation. I mean that! It's rare that a place lives up to hype but this place certainly does.
I plan to return over time to sample the entire menu!
I went back to Burrito Gourmet yesterday as I was starving and wanted to see how things had improved. Sadly, they hadn't. This burrito was really bad. Sloppily put together and utterly tasteless. Quite honestly, if this was my first ever burrito I would never ever eat one again.
It is not my intention to make this a negative blog but I do need to voice my opinion. Following on from the mediocre first burrito, this joke of a burrito has put me off the place for good.
That's a shame as Putney is convenient, but the food is simply not worth it.
Another burrito place has opened up in London and this time it's not in the centre of town! Burrito Gourmet is the name of the new establishment and it has set up in the hub of south-west London... the one and only Putney.
I only heard of this place about a week ago through an unrelated Google search. Investigating further I first came across their Facebook page and then their website. Putney is an easy diversion for me to and from work meetings and so I headed across last Thursday lunchtime by train to investigate.
Burrito Gourmet is located at 220 Upper Richmond Road, SW15 6TD and is only a couple of minutes stroll away from Putney rail station. Simply take a left out of the station, cross the road and take the next right. You're there.
The place is quite small and feels more like a quick-in, quick-out sort of place rather than somewhere where you'd linger. There are a few perch seats up against the window through. In the interests of fairness I ordered my usual chicken burrito from the menu with all of the usual extras. Unfortunately there is no option for black beans here. It's pinto or pinto for you!
Following the burrito construction process was fine, except I did have to make sure that I would get hot salsa. Otherwise I would've ended up with just pico de gallo. I do have to have decent heat in my burritos so that would not have worked. Hearing me make sure I got my hot salsa, the person behind me in line did the same. Burrito Gourmet could definitely do with a better salsa line up in my opinion.
I took my burrito to go, and walked back to Putney station to eat whilst waiting for a train back to Clapham Junction. And the verdict? Hmm, not brilliant, not bad, but mediocre. I would be quite happy to eat this if I was particularly hungry or if I was in Putney, fancied a burrito but didn't want to travel anywhere. Unfortunately I wouldn't recommend travelling a long distance just to try this place out. It does the trick for your hunger but it doesn't offer anything special.
Me, I will be back - but that's because Putney can easily be reached and because I hope that Burrito Gourmet will improve over time. They are new and hopefully only at the start of a learning curve. Black beans and a better range of salsas would go a long way here.
