Burritos @ La Mesa (in Lower Haight)

So I was in need of some mezzican food to fuel my body as I moved residences this weekend.....so I slid on up to this new joint (I think it opened this weekend) on Lower Haight called La Mesa. I’m not a really big SF foodie, but trust me, the kid likes to eat. The kid also likes Mexican food. So my accomplice and I dined at La Mesa for what would be possibly one of the more forgettable meals I’ve had in a while...

The restaurant is a counter service joint, basically meaning that you place your order at the counter and they `bring the food out when it's ready. So, I saddled up to the counter and ordered the steak burrito...fine...sounds good. It was priced a little higher than most burritos in the area (cause I eat a lot of burritos...huney, god doesn't just *give* you a figure like this), but whatever, it wasn’t priced that much more. My accomplice ordered a burrito of the chix persuasion. After placing our order, we grab a seat to wait for our food...and wait we did...I dunno how it took these guys 30 minutes to make a steak and a chicken burrito when there are 6 other people in the restaurant, but they managed to do it. I also dunno how they managed to put only two pieces of steak in the entire burrito, but they did that as well...and at the risk of sounding like a really cheap bastard, I also didn’t appreciate having to pay for a refill on a $1.50 fountain drink after finished my drink waiting 30 minutes for my burrito.…(A little food science for those of you @ home...it usually costs a place about half a cent to serve a fountain drink...which includes the cost of the dishwasher to wash the glass and amortized cost of the glass out over it’s average life span...yes, we bring the geek like that.)

In all fairness, I’ve worked in restaurants most of my college life, and I know it takes time to shake out the kinks when opening up a new place. The place is super clean (which, in Lower Haight, is worth mentioning)...they’ve also apparently spent quite a bit of money getting set up. My suggestion would be that they ditch the counter order and go for more a finer dining experience since the food takes a little longer. Getting in the burrito game in San Francisco is a tough bid, especially since there’s two places on Church St. (across from Safeway) that knock out some great, cheap burritos. In all fairness, they had a lot of interesting marinated veggies with the burrito and the whole menu had quite a gourmet twist to it, which I appreciated. And to be completely forthcoming there seem to be are some people who really liked it (assuming those posts aren't for promotional purposes)...as for me, I’d probably pass next time.