enchilada vs burrito

The core difference

• burrito — flour tortilla, wrapped and sealed, filling inside, sauce optional and usually inside too. Hand food.
• enchilada — corn tortilla, rolled, covered in sauce and baked. Fork food.

Corn or wheat is not arbitrary

The split follows geography. Wheat grows in northern Mexico, so flour tortillas are a northern tradition; corn is the older staple across the centre and south. Burritos are a northern dish and enchiladas are found much more widely, which is exactly what you would expect from the grain.

The name means it is sauced

Enchilada is the past participle of enchilar — to season with chilli. The name says the defining feature is the chilli sauce, not the filling. An unsauced rolled tortilla is not an enchilada.

Burrito means little donkey. Why is not settled: possible references include the shape of a bedroll, the packs a donkey carried, or a specific vendor. All the confident origin stories are folk etymology.

The rest of the family

• Taco — folded, not sealed, and never baked in sauce.
• Chimichanga — a deep-fried burrito, from the American Southwest.
• Flauta and taquito — tightly rolled and fried, crisp rather than sauced.
• Wet burrito — a burrito served under sauce, which is the point at which the categories deliberately blur.

Size, and a note on authenticity

The oversized foil-wrapped burrito with rice inside is a specifically Californian development, generally traced to San Francisco's Mission district in the 1960s. Burritos in northern Mexico are typically small, with one or two fillings and no rice. Neither is more correct; they are different dishes with the same name.