Coxinhas (Chicken Ball) 

To make coxinhas
3 chicken breast fillets
1L chicken stock (cube is fine)
1 small onion (chopped)
2 clover garlic (minced)
2 tablespoons olive oil
375ml milk
50g butter
450g plain flour
1 small handful fresh parsley
3 spring onions(green part only)
salt to tast
pepper to taste

To fry
2L vegetable oil
250ml milk
200g very fine breadcrumbs
1 large egg

Method

Poach the chicken breasts in the chicken stock in a saucepan until cooked; this will take around 15 minutes, but do check they are cooked through. Remove from liquid and let cool.

While the chicken is cooking, fry the chopped onion and garlic in the 2 tablespoons of olive oil for about 10 minutes, until soft.

Remove some of the chicken stock, so that only 375ml / 1½ cups remains and then add the 375ml / 1½ cups milk along with the butter, and melt the butter in the liquid in the pan then slowly beat in the flour and cook just for a few minutes until the dough begins to come together and also come away from the sides of the pan as you stir. Turn the dough out onto a plate and leave until it's cool enough to handle comfortably.

While you're waiting for the dough to cool, finely chop the chicken, parsley and spring onions, add salt and pepper to taste and leave this finely chopped mixture while you get on with the dough.

Do not flour a surface, but simply knead the dough until it is smooth and bouncy (about 10 minutes), and then pinch off walnut sized lumps of dough, roll them into a ball and then flatten into discs with a slight lip at the edges: I think these resemble fine artichoke hearts.

Take these rounds and add a scant teaspoon of chopped chicken and bring up the edges, all around, so that you have a ball, which you coax with your fingers into a bulbous pear shape. Place on a lined baking sheet and get on with the rest.

Heat the oil over medium heat in a large saucepan. You need to start frying when the oil is about 180ºC/350ºF. You don't really need a cooking thermometer: simply add a tiny ball of dough and if it starts fizzling straight away, and rising goldenly to the top of the pan instantly, the oil is hot enough. But while you wait for it to heat up, dip the coxinhas.

Beat the egg with the 125ml / ½ cup milk in one dish; tip the very fine breadcrumbs into another. Dip the coxinhas first into the egg mixture then into the sandy breadcrumbs, making sure they are well covered, then leave on a lined baking sheet.

When the oil is hot enough, deep-fry the coxinhas, about 5 at a time, until they are gorgeously golden, in about 2 minutes' time. Remove to a baking sheet lined with kitchen paper

If you wish, you can keep your cooked coxhinas warm in a 120ºC/250ºF oven while you continue with the rest.