The
coxinha is based on dough made with wheat flour and chicken broth and optionally mashed potato, which is filled with shredded spiced chicken meat or a whole chicken drumstick. The filling consists of
chicken,
catupiry cheese or
requeijão and
onions,
parsley and
scallions, and occasionally
tomato sauce,
turmeric. The
coxinha is coated in
batter, then in
bread crumbs or
manioc flour and
deep fried. It is shaped to roughly resemble a chicken drumstick. The dough used to coat the filling is generally prepared with the broth of the chicken, enhancing the flavor of the coating.
Variations Different variations of the original are becoming more prevalent today – for example, the
coxinha mineira, for which the filling includes maize, so named because
maize is deemed a culinary tradition in the state of
Minas Gerais, as well as areas where the caipira and sertanejo dialects are spoken. Cheese
coxinhas are also very common in snack bars. In
Curitiba, chicken
coxinhas filled with
cheddar and
Araucaria nuts can be found in local restaurants. To mark the cheese, they usually have a toothpick where the bone would be in a chicken
coxinha. Other unconventional ingredients, generally used for home-made
coxinhas made by aficionados, include
peas, chopped
button mushrooms,
heart of palm,
carrot, cooked and seasoned
cashew apples, unripe
jackfruit or unripe
breadfruit, as well as
whole-wheat flour batter or even a
vegetarian version of either
textured vegetable protein (soy meat) or
falafel with appropriate seasonings so its taste resembles a traditional coxinha more closely. These variants are rarely found in snack bars. ==Related foods==