Coxinha

As tradition built it

Coxinha

Yield: around 25 coxinhas . more than 2 hours

Ingredients

• 2¼ cups plain flour
• 2½ cups chicken stock (for the dough)
• 2½ cups shredded chicken
• ¾ cup chicken stock (for the filling)
• to taste seasoning
• 2½ cups home-made breadcrumbs

Method

1. Work plain flour with chicken stock to form the dough.
2. Simmer the chicken for around twenty minutes, then shred and combine with the further stock and seasoning; cook the filling mixture for a further ten minutes.
3. Shape the dough around the filling, coat in home-made breadcrumbs.
4. Fry at 180°C for about a minute until golden.

Notes

The popular origin story crediting Princesa Isabel's son does not survive fact-checking: Isabel and her children lived in Rio de Janeiro, not on any São Paulo fazenda, until the monarchy fell in 1889. The better-evidenced account has coxinha emerging as a cheaper, portable street-food substitute sold at factory gates during the 1920s and 1930s.

The whole process runs to more than two hours.

What a modern chef changes

A true panade, not a bread dough, for the shell

Rung 2: roux, not bread dough, for the shell

Method

1. Build the roux dough from stock passed through a chinois first for full clarity, cooked out the full ten minutes over direct heat until the starch is completely gelatinised.
2. Poach a free-range or heritage-breed chicken sous vide before shredding, for a filling with real moisture and structure rather than the drier result stock-poaching alone gives.
3. Season the filling with cumin seed, white pepper and fresh ginger ground to order in the spice grinder.
4. Fry at a controlled 175°C, monitored rather than guessed, for consistent colour across a whole batch.