Swish: vegetables (10); size (9); tortilla (9); meat (9); cheese (9); spiciness (9); temperature (9); burstage abatement (9)
Shrug: beans (7); sauciness (7); rice (6); ingredient mix (6)
Clang: no elements clanged
Intangibility bonus: 2 (of 2)

Our crusty judges panel forgave a few mildly frustrating elements of this enormous, 21-bite slab – namely, a bunch of unsexy rice and an ingredient mix that seemed to say, Let’s just stick all this unsexy rice together over there where maybe no one will notice it. Well, we noticed. But hats off to some exceptional roasted pork, a wonderfully grilled tortilla, and a Slabby Award-worthy contingent of vegetables, which took in heaping helpings of grilled onion and sliced avocado for no additional fee. And how about that booming spice and melted jack? We noticed all that, too. Minimal demerits went out to sauciness and burstage abatement for pork grease and slabular floppiness, respectively, but it wasn’t nearly enough to sully the mustache-fortunes of this delicious lunch.

Swish: burstage abatement (10); size (9); vegetables (9); temperature (9); meat (8); cheese (8)
Shrug: tortilla (7); spiciness (7); beans (6); ingredient mix (6)
Clang: rice (5); sauciness (5)
Intangibility bonus: 1 (of 2)

We’d heard rumors that burrito quality at this particular El Farolito tends to improve once evening rolls around. So, given that our first on-the-record visit here had occurred in the afternoon, we heeded the call of the dinner slab our second time through. Our dusky visit resulted in a .08-mustache boost. Sized to bloat and infallibly constructed, this burrito’s fortunes were compromised by an unfortunate ingredient mix, which resulted in minimal elbow-rubbing between the overabundance of rice and most everything else – especially Farolito’s life-giving salsa. Mid-slab rice-outs are becoming a regular occurrence on our visits here, as at one point about halfway into the food-blimp, rice must have composed 90% of all visible ingredients within the politely grilled, but ultimately average tortilla. Spice ebbed and flowed throughout, while the avocado-anchored vegetable squad provided reliable enhancement whenever its components could poke through all the grainy dominance. The grilled chicken performed admirably, if unspectacularly; as with the refried beans, the chicken chunks were another victim of the bunch-happy ingredient mix. We arrived hungry, we departed hrumphy.

Did El Farolito really back up the rice truck and dump its payload into our lunch? Or did it just seem that way? Whatever the cause behind this burrito’s grain fetish, it was as dry as the L.A. River, albeit with a much more tactical display of burstage abatement deployment. As a sad result, refried beans – the other half of any self-respecting burrito’s foundation – were buried in the blinding rice-out. So, which ingredients were stars-by-default in this long, slender, indifferently mixed, grilled tortilla-swathed, cylindrical foodpiece? (Insert shrug here.)