Braving two distinct near-halves, plus an overtime period of sorts, plowing our way through this foiled monster was like having some kind of major team sporting event for lunch. Its top part featured a championship-caliber grilled tortilla and enough deliciously smoky, piping-hot steak to feed a half-dozen linemen — and little else, other than some no-harm / no-foul Spanish rice and cheese that was so melted, we pretty much couldn’t even spot it. Fair enough...at least everything was on the mark enough at this point. Then came a cliff drop into a sea of unmelted Jack cheese micro-grates amid a sudden temperature drop, shrug-inducing guacamole, and refried beans that slipped in and out of relevance with every bite. Even the tortilla seemed to lose its epic grilled-ness around this point. We endured a severe case of the mustache-bends until the final four bites of the slab, at which point the burrito finally became a (mostly) fully realized product. Still, its lack of vegetables and spice, not to mention its half-assed intangibility, guaranteed an unimpressive rating in the end. Such weird food.

Skepticism rained down like hail in the uncomfortable moments between ordering and receiving our breakfast slab, but despite its less than stellar rating, this burrito was hardly a humiliation-in-foil. Since chicken was, sorrily, the sole meat La Parrilla’s kitchen had available in late morning, we went the meatless route, swapping in a set of pale Spanish rice instead. Other than the MIA cheese and a creeping deficiency of salsa accompaniment, there was much to enjoy here: the respectably grilled tortilla; the tactilely searing overall temperature (a condition indebted to the fluffy scrambled eggs); construction work deserving of some kind of Slab-Architect of the Year honor; refried beans which, though somewhat low-profile, did all the right things; green and red jalapeño cuts that added perpetual kick; and, an interweaving mix that didn’t allow any single ingredient to dominate. Slightly short length and a lack of guacamole were minor annoyances, but the two-mustache intangibility bonus told the story better here.