This recipe for chicken empanadas (empanadas de pollo) is for deep fried empanadas (empanadas fritas). Bolivians also made baked chicken empanadas, an alternative recipe we will feature at another time. Deep fried chicken empanadas are like a little pocket of dough sealed with a juicy meaty filling inside. This doesn't mean the chicken is fried though, it means the dough is deep fried. Bolivians normally enjoy empanadas as a mid-morning snack with coffee or tea or as a mid-afternoon snack at tea time, which is usually around 5 p.m.

Ingredients

Dough:

8 cups of white flour
2 eggs
1 Liter of lukewarm boiled water
3 tablespoons of white sugar
1 teaspoon of salt
3 tablespoons of melted shortening

Filling:

1 Kg. (2 pounds) boiled, shredded chicken breast
2 white onions, finely chopped
1/2 cup consomé (chicken stock)
2 hard boiled eggs, sliced
8 large boiled potatoes, cubed
2 tablespoons of dried chili peppers, ground
black olives or calamatta olives
salt
pepper
oregon
parsely
1/2 Liter of oil for deep frying

Instructions

Prepare the dough:

Mix all the dough ingredients together in a bowl, kneading it with your hands until you obtain a soft dough. Sprinkle some flour onto your work area, form a ball with your dough and place it onto the floured area, cover it with a clean cloth, and leave it to rise until it doubles in size (about an hour).

Prepare the filling:

Boil the chicken until it is fully cooked. Drain and allow to cool. Then with your hands, shred the chicken separating it from the bones. Discard the bones.

Peel the potatoes and boil them in a separate pot. Drain, cool, and cut into cubes.

Fry the onions in hot oil along with the pepper, salt, oregano, parsley and ground dried chili peppers.

Mix all the ingredients (the chicken, the potatoes, and the fried onion mix, along with the chicken stock), then allow to cool.

Assemble the chicken empanadas:

When your dough has finished rising to about double its size, divide it into small pieces the size of ping pong balls. Flatten each with a rolling pin until you have an oblong (oval not round) flat piece of dough.

Place onto each piece of dough 2-3 full tablespoons of filling. Add on top a slice of hard boiled egg and an olive to each.

All along the entire inside edge of each empanada, moisten the dough with a pastry brush dipped in milk. Fold one half of each empanada over the other, forming a pocket, seal and crimp all around the edges. Moistening the dough prior to sealing and crimping ensures the two sides of the dough will stick together and won't burst open when you fry them.

Deep fry each empanada in hot oil, deep enough to cover half of the empanada. When golden brown on one side, flip over until golden brown on the other side. As you remove your chicken empanadas from the oil, set them onto a paper towel to drain the excess oil. Serve hot as is or sprinkled with sifted confectioner's sugar (powdered sugar).

Children should NOT prepare this recipe without adult supervision as it requires a large amount of extremely hot oil.