87 TIRITITRAN: philly steak, brie cheese, crispy onion and mustard

Wait: I've tasted this before. Yes, it's obvious.

Cheap gray beef? Check.
Onion? Check.
Mustard? Check.
Small, softish square white bun? Check.

It's White Castle!

Now, the What You Crave cheeseburger would come with American cheese, not brie, but no matter. The brie works here -- as it does pretty much everywhere else, in one of the biggest surprises of my 100 Montaditos adventure.

You could also call this a Krystal cheeseburger, and indeed you could argue that the mustard-without-ketchup points not to White Castle but to its Southern counterpart.

In case you're still wondering, all this White Castle talk is to praise the Tirititran, not to bury it. I love White Castle. I love Krystal. I could see this sandwich making my playoffs.

Not sure about that name, though. It sounds like something  Beavis would shriek. "Tirititran! Tirititran!" And, really, if this is going to be a named sandwich, what's wrong with Harold or Kumar or Haroldkumar?

Montaditos down: 87
Montaditos to go: 13
Next: 88 TORERO: lomo (dry cured pork loin), manchego cheese and green pepper

51 BBQ pulled pork,manchego cheese, crispy onion and mustard

Again the pulled pork is good, and again it doesn't much matter what you add to it. The mustard, as we established with No. 48, is a surprisingly nice touch, but between it and the main ingredient, the manchego cheese barely registers.

Montaditos down: 51
Montaditos to go: 49
Next: 52 Garlic pork loin, fresh tomato, lettuce and mayo

48 BBQ pulled pork, cheddar cheese, lettuce and mustard

I have to admit, I didn't "get" this one. I wouldn't put anything other than cole slaw on barbecue pork. Cheddar cheese? Yellow mustard? And that's not the first weird use of yellow mustard I've encountered at 100 Montaditos -- maybe them Spaniard types have a different relationship with yellow mustard than we do?

But the darn sandwich was pretty good. And then I had an epiphany: chili dog. We put yellow mustard, improbably, on chili dogs. Cheddar cheese, too, at least sometimes, sometimes, for that matter.

Against my better judgment, I really liked this sandwich.

Montaditos down: 48
Montaditos to go: 52
Next: 49 BBQ pulled pork, crispy onion and chipotle alioli

43 Chicken,manchego cheese, fresh tomato and mustard

This is an odd choice of ingredients. You got your chicken. We're fine so far. But with mustard? Not honey mustard or Dijon, but regular old French's-style yellow mustard? And tomato but no lettuce.

Whatevs, 100 Montaditos.

Meanwhile, this chicken is different in both quantity and quality from the chicken I had on montadito No. 42. Much better -- like the grilled stuff you'd find in fajitas -- and much more of it.

This is a weird sandwich, but it's not a bad one.

Montaditos down: 43
Montaditos to go: 57
Next: 44 Chicken, lettuce and chipotle aioli

41 Hot dog, ketchup and mustard

I'm not sure why the move from hamburger to hot dog puts us in the "premium" category, but there you go. We are now in the "premium" section of the menu. As far as I'm concerned we're also still in the "children's section."

Having said that, and having panned the so-called burger, I am here to praise the more-than-so-called hot dog. This is one tasty hot dog, whether it's geared toward children or not. One thumb up! (The other one is holding the hot dog.)

Tubular meat is universal, of course, and even the good old American hot dog works well cross-culturally. I have vague but fond memories of eating le hot dog on my first trip to Paris, back in the 1980s -- they reamed out a baguette with a red-hot poker and stuck in a ... red-hot. A hot dog. Le hot dog. It was bon.

(New to the menu with No. 41: Hot dog. Ketchup. Mustard. The Premium designation.)

Montaditos down: 41
Montaditos to go: 59
Next: 42 Chicken, crispy onion and ali oli