How The French Fry-Filled California Burrito Became A West Coast Staple

When outsiders think of the California culinary scene, plant-based diets, fluorescent smoothies, and over-priced salads often come to mind. However, anyone who has spent time soaking up the rays and calories in The Golden State knows that California has a rich, multicultural food scene that spans beyond the confines of veggies. Like many places with thriving immigrant enclaves, California offers a smattering of food joints that simultaneously rival the motherland and evolve authentic staples into a whole new thing.

Take the California burrito, for example. Burritos are, of course, a hallmark of Mexican cooking, but the California burrito is stuffed with a fistful of french fries — a decidedly American invention. For those of you who haven't had the pleasure of stuffing your face with the creamy, cheesy, starchy goodness, a California burrito features a toast-til-it's-flaky tortilla housing carne asada, cheese, and your choice of moisture-adding sauce: guacamole or sour cream — or if you're feeling really bold, you can order both. 

The California Burrito is said to have been invented in San Diego, just a hop, skip, and a 20-minute drive away from the Mexican border. But that's where the clarity on the origin of this beautiful cultural marriage of crispy french fries and juicy carne asada ends. Many food journalists have dedicated years of their lives trying to track down the inventor of this Cal-Mex treat only to find themselves bashing their skull against dead end after dead end.

In murky times like these, we like to look to early media mentions of the dish we're researching, and all of the ones we can find come from the early 2000s. However, none of them point out a creator of the California Burrito. Anecdotal internet lore has people claiming that some version of the California Burrito has been around since the '80s and '90s. According to real-deal San Diegans who grew up in the beach-bordered city, taco shops were slinging fries-in-burritos as a cheap and simple calorie stuffer to ravenous surfers.

The closest we can get to an answer comes from a San Diego institution, Lolita's (which landed on our list of the best french fries in America), a spot that's been serving Mexican food, including the California Burrito, to San Diegans for the past 40 years. Dolores Farfan runs Lolita's with her husband, Juan, and comes from a long line of culinary legends in the San Diego area. In a 2023 interview with YouTuber Jaycation, Dolores Jackson, the daughter of Dolores Farfan (yes, another Dolores), told the YouTuber that it was an out-of-state vendor of theirs who seeded the idea of adding fries to a burrito. Shortly after, Jackson says, her siblings started running to the local grocery store to buy fries to add to their carne asada burrito, and the rest, as they say, is history. Whether Lolita's was the originator or not, one thing is for certain, it has been keeping the popularity of the California Burrito alive and thriving for decades.