12 Chipotle Secret Menu Items Revealed
There's a lot to love about Chipotle. For starters, the fast casual Mexican food chain is adamant about doing good for the planet. Chipotle's values in sustainability and using fresh ingredients are proudly stated on the company website, where they also boast about keeping things "real" with a definitive ingredient list of only 53 items.
From wheat flour to pork and chicken, those 53 ingredients make up one hugely popular menu across the globe. For decades, Chipotle has been a Mexican food mecca for its customers, offering not only quality ingredients but the option to build your meals — a feature that most other fast casual eateries don't have. At Chipotle, the customer wields the creative power, building their own burritos, tacos, salads, and burrito bowls to their hearts' content.
Despite the nearly endless combinations of ingredients to order together, there are some culinary creations swirling around that Chipotle menu makers haven't even thought up. The Chipotle secret menu is a list of mouthwatering (yet slightly unconventional) ingredient combinations and money-saving hacks created by various fans and employees. Before you order, don't forget that the secret menu isn't a menu formally acknowledged by Chipotle or its staff, so have a good idea of what you're ordering and consider throwing those hard-working staff a tip for their service!
1. Quesarito
Arguably one of the most talked-about Chipotle secret menu items, the quesarito is an indulgent Mexican food dream. As if Chipotle's burritos weren't already a handful, fans created the quesarito craze wherein a regular burrito is wrapped inside a cheese quesadilla. The finished product makes for a crispy, melty, cheesy mouthful in every bite of the (humongous) burrito.
While that sounds pretty amazing, we've got potentially bad news. Since it's not on the menu and hard to make, not every Chipotle will allow you to order the quesarito. However, where there's a will, there's a way. If an employee looks at you like you've got four heads when you say the word "quesarito," try this instead: Order your burrito how you normally would. Then, order a quesadilla but ask for it to be uncut.
Unfortunately, Chipotle makes their quesadillas with one tortilla, folding the whole thing into a sort of hexagonal shape, so you won't have a nice flat quesadilla to roll your burrito in. But if you gently unwrap the quesadilla and place your burrito on top, you can wrap it as best you can. You'll probably wind up with a sort of wonkily-shaped quesarito, and you'll have to hold onto it pretty well so that it doesn't fall apart. Also, the cheese won't be completely evenly distributed, but for the most part, you'll enjoy a yummy bite of cheese with each bite of your burrito. Our verdict? It's worth the extra work!
2. Nachos
When you've made your way down the spread of ingredients at Chipotle and find yourself at the cash register, it's almost impossible not to add chips to your order. Wonderfully thin and crisp with the perfect balance of salt and tangy lime, Chipotle's chips deserve to be eaten with every one of their meals — or as a meal of their own.
Surprisingly, Chipotle doesn't have nachos on their menu, even though they added queso (a nacho's best friend) to their menu. Secret menu sleuths have found a way to enjoy nachos at Chipotle, but again, you might have to do some building of your own. To get nachos at Chipotle, order a burrito bowl but ask for chips as the base rather than rice. After that, load them up however you want, protein, veggies, and all. After noshing on this ourselves, we'd suggest opting for queso rather than regular shredded cheese.
If you're trying to order online or if you're told that you can't have chips in your bowl, there is a simple solution. Order your burrito bowl how you like it and order a side of chips. Ask for an extra bowl or use the takeout cover to pile your toppings onto the chips, and viola, hearty loaded nachos. The only downside to this secret menu item is that it's pricier than you'd think. You'll end up paying the full price for a bowl, the chips, and the queso. Of course, we believe this one's worth it!
3. Double-decker taco
When a burrito feels too hefty and a bowl too inconvenient, a perfectly-portioned hand-held taco is always a safe order at Chipotle. Whether you order a singular taco or an order of three, there's a secret menu hack to take your tacos to the next level.
The double-decker taco is similar to Taco Bell's famous cheesy gordita crunch — a regular taco with a soft-shell cheese taco wrapped around the outside. To order, ask for whichever kind of taco you'd like (crunchy or soft), and then order a soft-shell taco with just cheese. Then, you can layer the cheese taco over the shell of your regular taco, and bam, you've made a double-decker taco. You might wonder if a regular taco with plenty of cheese has the same effect, but we think not. The extra layer of the tortilla sandwiches the melty cheese to the other taco making for an extra doughy, cheesy bite.
After tasting this cheesy creation ourselves, we only have a few qualms. Building this item with two soft-shell tacos can leave you with a slightly soggy, albeit cheesy, taco. On the flip side, the soft-shell cheese taco doesn't really stick to a hard shell, so you'll have to hold it together pretty well. Ultimately, this secret menu item is good — not bad, not great.
4. Burritodilla
The famed Chipotle quesarito isn't the only way that burritos and quesadillas become one on the secret menu. Enter: the burritodilla. The burritodilla is a quesadilla stuffed with half the toppings you'd order on a burrito. Compared to a quesarito, the burritodilla is less filling and more cheese-forward since it's only got half the ingredients.
It seems like the burritodilla is similar to the quesarito in that not all Chipotle locations will serve it to you. When ordering a quesadilla at Chipotle, you can choose up to two proteins to include inside (or fajitas) and three side dishes. A build-your-own burritodilla is doable, but don't expect it to be pretty. We'd suggest asking for your quesadilla with whichever protein you'd like and three sides that you'd normally put inside a burrito, like rice, beans, and pico. We also suggest asking the employees not to cut the quesadilla for you. Once you've got your order, gently open up the tortilla as best you can, and stuff your burrito ingredients inside.
The burritodilla is packed with lots of greasy cheese and tasty burrito flavors, but it's a messy one. The whole thing gets soggy pretty quickly and might even fall apart. We love the idea of this secret menu item, but if the staff doesn't make it for you, we'd suggest skipping over it.
5. Copycat elote
Everyone's got their go-to Mexican food favorite, and those of us who salivate over Mexican street corn (known on the cob as elotes or off the cob as esquites) always feel incomplete whenever we order from Chipotle. Of course, Chipotle has corn in the form of their popular roasted chili-corn salsa, but elote is nowhere to be found.
According to Tasting Table, traditional elote gets its distinct taste from tangy Mexican crema (similar to sour cream), mayonnaise, lime, salty cotija cheese, cilantro, zesty chili powder, and Tajín. When all of this is mixed and slathered on the corn, you wind up with bites of sweet corn complemented by a creamy, cheesy, salty, spicy, slightly-citrusy flavor. If it sounds mouthwatering, that's because it is!
As per the company website, Chipotle's corn salsa is made with cilantro, jalapeño, lemon juice, lime juice, onion, poblano pepper, salt, and corn. On its own, it doesn't have the tangy, creamy taste that traditional esquites would, but TikTok user @Babydumplingg shared their hack for making "queso elote." They mixed Chipotle's warm queso in with the roasted chili-corn salsa, so we tried it. Warm cheese and corn salsa are delicious, so this mixture didn't taste bad. However, we wouldn't compare this to traditional street corn — it's missing the distinct saltiness from cotija cheese and could use a little more tang. Next time, we'd try using half sour cream, half queso, and maybe a squeeze of lime.
6. Dragon sauce
Sour cream is one of those condiments that seems to divide crowds — you either have to have it when you order a burrito or absolutely hate it. Dragon sauce is a Chipotle secret menu item that's made by mixing sour cream with Chipotle's tomatillo-red chili salsa. Sour cream lovers will probably like it, and we'd venture to say that sour cream haters might actually like it, too.
As spice and sour cream lovers, we were excited to try this. To start, we'll note that we didn't mix equal parts salsa and sour cream; we poured about one-quarter of a side of salsa into a full side of sour cream, and it was still almost unbearably spicy. Rather than a spicy sour cream, this tasted more like a slightly creamy salsa.
If you're not a big spice person, we'd suggest trying this with Chipotle's tomatillo-green salsa. If you like spice, this sauce is fine, but we found it to be a bit too liquidy. Ultimately, we'd probably stick to ordering our burrito with sour cream and salsa separately to maintain the flavor and texture of the sour cream while still getting a bit of a spicy kick.
7. Spicy queso
If you're a Chipotle fan, you probably remember all too well when the chain famously (finally!) added a queso dip to their menu back in September 2017 (via CNBC). You probably also remember, as CNBC reported, how that queso was generally hated and later replaced with a brand new recipe. And boy, are we glad Chipotle did that.
Flavored with white cheddar, Monterey jack, chipotle chilis, onion, tomato, garlic, and serrano and poblano peppers, as per the Chipotle site, we'd expect the queso to be a little spicier than it is. Don't get us wrong, we think Chipotle's queso is perfectly cheesy and creamy, but when we discovered a secret menu item called spicy queso, we realized that something was missing.
We mixed about equal parts of Chipotle's queso and tomatillo-red salsa to make the spicy queso. Ultimately, it was really good and pretty much exactly what you'd expect queso to taste like. The sharp, creamy cheese taste was still present while the bold spice was, well, impossible to miss — that stuff is super spicy. Because of the texture of the salsa, the mixture was a little too far on the liquidy side for us, but we'd still eat it again. Pro tip: order the secret menu nachos and use spicy queso instead of regular queso. Another pro tip: add your salsa in gradually — it's really spicy!
8. 2-for-1
Despite reports that Chipotle's prices are slightly lower than their competitors, orders can still be on the pricier side, often upwards of $10 per meal (via Tasting Table). Moreover, the portions can be huge!
There are some nifty money-saving hacks on the secret menu that can help you get some extra bang for your buck at Chipotle. The 2-for-1 hack involves ordering a burrito bowl and splitting it into two (semi) full-sized burritos. For this hack to really work, you'll have to order your bowl with double everything and two tortillas on the side. This means you'll be paying around thirty cents per tortilla and up to five dollars extra for double protein — you won't be charged for extra toppings like rice, beans, salsa, or lettuce (via Chipotle).
After you've ordered, you can split the contents of the bowl into two separate tortillas, wrap them up, and there you have it: two (slightly small) burritos for the price of one (plus five dollars)! Depending on how hearty your Chipotle employee makes their scoops, your burritos will be decently sized; they'll be enough to enjoy a satisfying meal but not quite as large as if you'd ordered a burrito from the get-go. Overall, if you're on a budget dinner date, we think this secret menu hack is pretty nifty!
9. 3-pointer
At Chipotle, you're given many options when you build your burrito. Typically, you'll first choose your rice, protein, and then various other toppings like beans, salsas, cheese, lettuce, and, if you're feeling extra, guacamole. Did you know that each of these items contains a certain number of "points"?
The Chipotle secret menu features a cheaper burrito option called the 3-pointer, which contains only two or three ingredients that add up to three points. According to Chipotle's comment on a Facebook post, items that contain two points are proteins and guacamole, while one-point items include fillers like rice, beans, and cheese. Therefore, a 3-pointer is a burrito made with a protein and one other topping, or three one-point toppings like rice, beans, and cheese.
We were a bit skeptical of the legitimacy of this secret menu item. Still, when we ordered a burrito with only chicken and rice, the cashier rang it up as a 3-pointer — it is a secret menu item! Our "chicken 3-pointer" rang in at $6.70. For comparison, a regular chicken burrito at this location would cost $9.15, as per the Chipotle website. Even if you decided to throw in a side order of guac, queso, or sour cream for extra flavor, you'd still be saving money. Also, despite only having two ingredients, we were pleasantly surprised at how big this burrito was. We expected a flimsy, barely-full tortilla, but we left with a fairly hefty meal!
10. Taco salad
Often thought of as one of the healthier fast food options, Chipotle has made an effort to include various health-conscious items on its menu over the years. From cauliflower rice to Whole30-friendly salad bowls, there are plenty of ways to keep things healthy even when you're craving a more indulgent meal.
Salads at Chipotle can include pretty much whichever toppings the customer would like, and the only thing that makes it really different from a burrito bowl is the inclusion of romaine lettuce. So, when we discovered that there was something called a "taco salad" on the Chipotle secret menu, we wondered how it could be so unique. Blogger HackTheMenu reports that a version of the secret menu taco salad, which is served inside of a fried tortilla bowl, is "extremely rare" and basically impossible to find.
However, Chipotle shared a taco salad recipe on their TikTok account that seems to be a bit more accessible, made by ordering a salad with chicken, black beans, guacamole, mild salsa, corn salsa, extra cheese, vinaigrette, Tabasco, and chips. With a few modifications, we ordered this salad and loved it! The only thing is, we don't feel like it's a super "secret" menu hack. The chips make this salad standout, and we'd suggest crushing the chips yourself and mixing them in or leaving them whole and using them to eat the salad instead of a fork.
11. Mix and match
Did you know that you don't have to include the word "or" in your vocabulary when ordering at Chipotle? You can get white and brown rice, black and pinto beans — for no extra cost! This secret menu hack, dubbed "mix and match," can help you spice up your regular order for no extra cost. Similarly, you can order double ingredients, like extra beans or salsa, for no extra charge!
You can also go halfsies to mix and match your protein, ordering half chicken and half pork, or half steak and half carnitas for the price of one protein (you'll wind up paying for the more expensive half, but still only for one protein portion). Double protein or guac, unfortunately, costs extra. The next time you're extra hungry, go ahead and let your appetite and creativity run wild, using this mix and match hack to order an over-the-top, flavor-packed burrito.
12. Free cilantro
Sure, there are plenty of clever ways to manipulate the Chipotle menu and save a few dollars, like splitting your burrito bowl into two burritos. However, one ingredient you can order from Chipotle completely for free is a side of cilantro!
Okay, so this might not be the most exciting secret menu item, but who doesn't love free stuff?! Sprinkling a bit of cilantro on top of your bowl or rice can make for a refreshing, subtly citrusy kick that enhances each bite. However, there's no judgment here if you're one of many people who can't stand cilantro. In fact, Tasting Table reports that the reason many people find cilantro bitter or unpleasant has to do with genetics, not just personal preference. If you like cilantro, go stock up at Chipotle. If you don't, we're sorry there are no freebies for you — you can always grab an extra stack of (sustainable) napkins!