Father and son Kensington pizza joint braces for the arrival of the big burrito

Chipotle Mexican Grill was founded in 1993, in Denver. Continental Pizza was founded in 1967, in Kensington.

There are now 1,000 Chipotle locations across the country. There is still one Continental Pizza.

Chipotle has two board members who used to be executives at McDonald's. Continental Pizza has no ex-McDonald's executive on its board of directors, or, in fact, a board of directors.

So, Chipotle and Continental Pizza do not have much in common. But the two eateries will soon be fighting for stomachs in the Kensington Shopping Center, at Connecticut and Knowles avenues. In the next couple of weeks, the nationwide fast-food burrito chain will open a new location a few doors down from the venerable neighborhood pizza joint.

"We don't know what's going to happen," an aproned Lou Manos told me the other day in the lull between lunch and dinner at Continental. "About half my customers who come in ask me how it's going to affect us. I tell them the same thing I'm telling you: I don't know."

Lou's dad, Mike, opened the pizza and sub shop 43 years ago. Mike, 81, still comes in most days.

"I've got two small children and they come in on the weekends and they help out also," Lou said of daughters Georgette, 8, and Natalie, 6. "They always ask me if they're on the schedule for Fridays."

That's how Lou got his start: folding pizza boxes in grade school. "It's a classic mom and pop shop," he said.

Chipotle's stock trades on the New York Stock Exchange.

Chipotle has plenty of fans, especially among teenagers who can wolf down its zeppelin-sized burritos in seconds. We Americans crave what places like Chipotle offer: ubiquity and uniformity. And to be fair, the food is pretty good.

So's the food at Continental said a guy in a white Duron paint T-shirt who came up to ask Lou for a refill of his Coke.

"It's one of the best places," the house painter said. "Good prices. Good food."