Ari's Picks

The Smothered Burrito at the Roadhouse

a smothered burrito topped with fresh herbs

Pulled pork, real Monterey Jack, fluffy eggs & more!

One of the best things on the Roadhouse’s regular breakfast menu is this remarkably good Smothered Burrito!

What makes it so magical? The Smothered Burrito is another example of combining a series of super-high-quality ingredients into one amazing assemblage. When you take a bite … the burrito leads with the nice liveliness from the fresh cilantro. Then there’s a bit of spice from the Roadhouse’s Salsa Ranchero (chopped Bianco di Napoli tomatoes, cilantro, cumin, coriander, New Mexico fire-roasted green chiles, and minced onion) that’s ladled over top. You bite through the feathery light flour tortilla into the fluffy scrambled eggs, then find the great smoky softness of the pulled pork. Last but not least, there’s a generous bit of the milky mellow Monterey Jack from Vella Cheese in Sonoma (one of only two or three dairies in the country that still make REAL Monterey Jack the old-fashioned way). It all comes together in this blend of creamy, slightly spicy, super smooth, savory goodness.

The pulled pork, which has been terrific for 21 years now, became even better six weeks or so ago when head chef Bob Bennett made a connection with a farm about 90 minutes west of here to source a regular supply of Red Wattle hogs. An old heritage breed that’s particularly full flavored, the Red Wattle had become so deeply endangered around the turn of the century that Slow Food put it on their Ark of Taste, “a living catalog of delicious and distinctive foods facing extinction.” Happily, a half dozen or so farms are raising them and the population has risen to roughly 3000. In the burrito, the pulled pork is particularly terrific—Eastern North Carolina-style, whole hog, smoked for about 15 hours over oak logs, dressed with a vinegar sauce that’s based on that amazing barrel-aged cider vinegar I wrote about last month from Gingras up in Quebec!

One of the Smothered Burrito’s biggest fans is nationally known poet, Ken Mikolowski. Given the overlay of two of his passions—poetry and this smoked pork-stuffed burrito—a few years ago I asked him for a poem. Here is what he composed:

“Roadhouse Burrito”
tasty when eaten
with relish

The Smothered Burrito is on the breakfast menu, Monday through Friday. It’s also the Friday morning Blue Plate special at a particularly special price!

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