Does Sarasota’s New Chipotle Deserve the Crowds?
November 18th, 2008 by Brian Ries in Food and Drink
Chipotle Mexican Grille
3.5 stars
1707 S. Tamiami Trail, Sarasota, 957-6406 or chipotle.com
The Subway model of dining has its appeal. It gives you the freedom to choose whatever bizarre combination of ingredients and toppings your hunger fever dictates. And those ingredients are usually, if not quite fresh, then fresh-esque. Plus, you get to watch some poor schmoe assemble your meal as if it was actual cooking. As fast food goes, it’s a fine choice.
And it works even better when that template is tacked onto the simplicity of Tex-Mex food. That pseudo-ethnic cuisine has already been distilled by big chains into a dozen or so ingredients stuffed in different combinations into fried, grilled, or soft flour or corn tortillas. That simplicity allows the Subway model to do Tex-Mex better than it does the deli sandwich.
Tex-Mex fast food built on the simple combine-it-yourself premise has been around for decades out West, but didn’t make it to Sarasota until Moe’s moved in last year. Then came Chipotle, one of the darlings of the chain-dining industry. And when it opened last month across from the Sarasota Memorial on Tamiami Trail, the crowds came too.
Chipotle was a little thing back in 1998, with a puny 14 locations, when it was acquired by McDonald’s. Ten years later, it is now an independent, publicly-traded company with over 800 franchises nationwide. And, amidst a dozen other rapidly-expanding burrito chains, Chipotle manages to set itself apart in ways that are miles ahead of most of the fast food industry. Miles ahead of most local and independent restaurants, for that matter.
All of Chipotle’s dairy products are rBGH-free. All its pork, most of its chicken and much of its beef is humanely raised and hormone- and antiobiotic-free, which makes Chipotle the largest buyer of naturally raised meats in the country. Thirty percent of the beans used are organically grown, with more in the pipeline. The chain also makes valiant efforts to work with smaller suppliers when possible, vowing that each restaurant will source at least 25 percent of one of its produce items from small- and medium-sized farms. When in season, that’ll be local, too.
That commitment to forward-thinking food practices shows in the final product, especially when it comes to the meat. Chipotle’s beef and pork are hands down the best protein you’ll find in any fast-food chain, and in most casual restaurants. The chunked and shredded barbacoa beef is luscious and tinged with enough garlic, cumin and oregano to remind you of its roots. Carnitas pork is redolent of thyme and bay leaf, the moist, herbacious meat holding up to any number of added veggies and salsas.
Like all chains that follow the trail blazed by Subway, the process at Chipotle is simple: Pick a style, pick a meat and tell the guy behind the sneez-guard what veggies and extras to throw in to the mix. Chipotle has kept the menu simpler than most, with just tacos, burritos and bowls as options to hold your goodies.
Simpler, here, also means stripped-down to the bare minimum of options for burrito stuffings. The necessities are represented — pinto and black beans, rice, sour cream, cheese, salsa, guac and lettuce — with sauteed veggies and corn as the only vaguely value-added ingredients. While the options are basic, that limited selection is exactly what makes it easy for the restaurant to keep its food fresh.
I might beg for some lime and cilantro to up the flavor, and the workers at our local Chipotle need some more practice at wrapping the burritos into a tight and coherent package, but there’s no disputing this chain’s appeal: fresh ingredients combined on the spot, and it’s all powered by an eco-conscious heart.
The only real drawback is the price. Sure, a filling burrito might only run you $7, but that’s all you get. Add on some chips (which are fried in house, but still surprisingly stale on a couple of visits) and you’ll pay more. Drinks are more. Extra salsa, guac or sour cream pads the bill even further. That means that a family of three who sits down with a kids’ cheese quesadilla, a couple of burritos, chips and a few drinks will easily approach $30.
Not cheap for such simple fare. But if you’re willing to pay a premium for natural meat, an innovative commitment to better growing practices, and the convenience of creating your own burrito, Chipotle is difficult to beat.
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November 18th, 2008 at 11:12 am
Thank you, Brian, for mentioning the freshly fried, yet nevertheless stale chips. That is one of the oddest things about my couple meals at our Chipotle. I wonder if it’s a company-wide issue, or if our local folks are just mucking things up.
November 18th, 2008 at 12:58 pm
The chips at Chipotle, regardless of location, have never been especially good. I think it’s a company-wide issue.
The staff at the new location still needs a lot of training. The speed, accuracy, and product knowledge is noticeably less than in Tampa or St. Pete.
November 18th, 2008 at 1:46 pm
Clearly, we must rise up and demand finer chips from our Chipotle masters.
November 19th, 2008 at 11:57 am
Unfortunately, Chipotle’s much-lauded “commitment to forward-thinking food practices” is woefully inadequate, and some would say even hypocritical. Chipotle has recognized that its purchasing power and influence allows it to demand changes in the way that vegetables are grown and animals are raised for consumption in this country, as this article refers to and as Chipotle itself mentions whenever it can. Yet, when presented with the opportunity to partner with an internationally-recognized farmworker’s human rights organization (ciw-online.org) to improve the wages and working conditions of the *human beings* who harvest Chipotle’s tomatoes, the company has refused and dragged its feet.
Apparently, making sure chickens and pigs have space to walk around before they are slaughtered (in the same meatpacking factories that everyone else uses) is of utmost importance, but making sure that human beings are not being held in modern-day slavery, well, not so much… at least to Chipotle.
For more info, check out these links:
ciw-online.org/scholars_letter_to_Chipotle.html
youtube.com/watch?v=qificTp5HTA
ciw-online.org/slavery.html
thenation.com/blogs/actnow/340332
denver.yourhub.com/Boulder/Stories/News/Activism/Story~463163.aspx
November 19th, 2008 at 1:00 pm
Thanks for the tip, Catarina, and for keeping us on our toes.
November 19th, 2008 at 5:47 pm
Great post Caterina. It’s interesting that Chipotle can make sure its animals have rights and jump on the Green bandwagon when it gives them great press coverage, however, when it comes to making sure that the people in their supply chain are not being exploited, well, it seems it’s just not fashionable enough of an issue for Chipotle. Yum Brands! (which includes Taco Bell, KFC, Pizza Hut, etc), McDonald’s, and Burger King, have all already agreed to work with the Coalition of Immokalee Workers to address human rights abuses in their supply chain, yet, as mentioned above, Chipotle has thus far refused. It seems they are quickly setting their own trap as they hypocritically tout their “food with integrity” slogan while refusing to seriously address the exploitation of tomato pickers right here in Florida.
November 19th, 2008 at 9:27 pm
I think the last thing Sarasota needs is another fast-food restaurant no less the “crowd” it draws. We need to stop letting big corporations and the construction companies that tag along invade our community. Sarasota is a forward-looking place with real alternatives to capitalism popping up. We still need to ride the bandwagon further. Portland, Oregon is a great example of a health conscious city with lots of vegan and vegetarian cafes. Asheville, NC is another great example we can learn from. What Sarasota needs is more commUNITY. We need to let our politicians and their sidekicks (aka developers) know that we won’t stand for the de-personalization and alienation of our most basic need:food. We should be sitting at a table with our family and friends when we eat. We should not be feeding the military-industrial complex when we waste money at a stupid fast food chain just like the one they built last year.
November 19th, 2008 at 9:42 pm
I’m extremely impressed by Chipotle’s eco-conscious business ethic. It puts them a step ahead of most other restaurants. As several other posts have pointed out, however, Chipotle could improve its ethic even more by considering the rights of all living beings involved in its food production. The CIW is asking for a minimal increase in salary, and numerous other fast food chains that lack Chipotle’s commitment to animal rights and the environment have signed on to work with them. If it wants to maintain its reputation for ethical food, it will have to take human rights into account as well.
November 19th, 2008 at 10:58 pm
In the story section in the Chipotle website they state:
“Food With Integrity” isn’t a marketing slogan. It’s not a product line of natural and organic foods. And it’s not a corporate initiative that will ever be finished or set aside to make room for other priorities. It’s a philosophy that we can always do better in terms of the food we buy. And when we say better, we mean better in every sense of the word- better tasting, coming from better sources, better for the environment, better for the animals, and better for the farmers who raise the animals and grow the produce.
It is extremely ironic that Chipotle has realized its collective bargaining power as their numbers grow and their consumers change. Supposedly, they are revolutionizing the way we grow and eat our food by demanding the right practices from their suppliers; they believe that now they can call for “food with integrity” with respect to farmers, animals, and the environment because of the inherent ethical power in their initiative. However, it seems that farmworkers — those people who slave day in and out to pick our vegetables — are completely left out of Chipotle’s revolutionizing equation. (http://sfalliance.org/resources/Chipotle/CHIPflyer0808.pdf)
The realization that their collective power can create a product that is “socially responsible” and fundamentally better is fundamentally ironic and distressful because farmworkers have been fighting for their right to collectively bargain since the 1930’s and their collective social consciousness has been ignored and repressed. Alas, the plight of the farmworker is and has always been one of a neglected and exploited racialized-minority. This has been obvious since the passing of the National Labor Relations Act in 1935, which was an initiative to protect the rights of workers to unionize and organize collectively; unfortunately, agricultural as well as domestic workers (that at that time were predominantly black) were excluded from this act. This is for me one of the symbols of our country’s hypocrisy and racism. We believe that everyone deserves to be equal and that our rights are protected by our government; however, we are not equal and our country to this day has only supported or protected the interests of white and dominant, interests groups. They can make full use of their collective power, but when people of color or poor people try to do this, our efforts are shut down and ignored. And the worst part is that we celebrate our progress and our commitments for a better future, while overlooking (if not erasing from history) our inabilities to deal with an all-too-important present.