Easy Baked Beef Chimichanga Recipe (2024)

FAQs

What is the main ingredient in chimichanga? ›

Traditionally, a chimichanga is filled with a combination of rice, beans, meat and cheese, similar to a burrito. You can opt for seasoned Mexican-style rice or yellow rice or even plain white rice. As for the beans, refried beans, black beans or pinto beans are traditional.

A chimichanga is a flour tortilla wrapped around a flavorful filling usually consisting of meat, beans, a tasty sauce and a bit of cheese. Everything is deep fried giving it a delicious crunch. It's really a deep fried burrito, but saying chimichanga is so much more fun!

Roll tortillas up on end, then sides and then other end; seal by wetting with a little water. NOTE: Hold together with wooden toothpick or by tying (I prefer) with kitchen string. Heat oil in deep fryer; fry until golden brown and drain on paper towels.

A chimichanga is a deep-fried burrito. The Tex-Mex staple usually features a flour tortilla filled with rice, beans, cheese, and meat – but you can get as creative as you want with specific ingredients.

How does a burrito differ from a chimichanga? Burritos contain rice and beans and tomatoes in addition to the meat, and they're wrapped but not fried. Chimichangas typically contain only the meat in sauce, and are deep fried, so they are crisp and crunchy on the outside.

While historians agree that the chimichanga is not an authentic Mexican food, the exact location of its origin is disputed. Both El Charro in Tucson, Arizona, and Macayo's Mexican Kitchen in Phoenix, Arizona, claim to be home to the first chimichanga.

Chimichangas invariably fall into two basic categories: dry and wet. The former is crisply fried, topped with sour cream and guacamole and perhaps a little cheese. The latter is smothered with a sauce or salsa.

A chimichanga can be a rich, occasional treat, rather than a diet staple. Chimichangas are high in calories, saturated fat and trans fats. According to the American Heart Association, eating a diet high in saturated fat puts us at higher risk for type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure and obesity.

To keep your chimichangas crisp, drain as much oil as you can from them! Store them in an airtight container on a paper towel to help soak up any excess oil that could potentially make them soggy. Leftovers will keep for 2-3 days stored in the fridge in an airtight container.

All that extra sauce and melted cheese on top of a chimichanga make it much harder to eat with the hands, so you'll probably need a knife and fork to get the job done!

What's the difference between fried burritos and chimichangas? ›

Less filling means that the chimichanga can be rolled more neatly, leading to less of a mess in the fryer. Another difference is that burritos aren't usually topped with anything, while chimichangas are frequently smothered with ingredients like melted cheese or salsa.

At Tijuana Flats, our chimichangas are made with a choice of protein, rice, beans, and cheese, all wrapped up in a warm tortilla and fried to perfection. It's then topped with even more cheese, guacamole, sour cream, and pico de gallo, making for a mouth-watering flavor explosion.

El Monterey's posts

Effective immediately, El Monterey will discontinue production of all Chimichangas. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause. How to have a great 1st day of school (including a checklist!) (Answer3) Chimichanga #DayOfAppetizers twitter.com/AxisBank/statu…

Both El Charro in Tucson, Arizona, and Macayo's Mexican Kitchen in Phoenix, Arizona, claim to be home to the first chimichanga. El Charro claims the chimichanga was created when a burrito was accidentally dropped in a deep fryer.

Many foreigners think of taco shells, burritos, chimichangas, and chili con carne when they speak of Mexican traditional food. However, almost all those dishes belong to the Tex-Mex regional cuisine, that is prepared in some states in the northern part of Mexico but is not at all popular in the rest of the country.

Burritos might also have vegetables, eggs, or condiments like guacamole or salsa, whereas a chimichanga won't be filled with any cold ingredients. Instead, a chimichanga parades them on top or to the side of it.

The most popular theory dates back to the 1920s, in which Monica Flin, the founder of Tucson's famous El Charro restaurant, accidentally dropped a burrito into the deep fryer and instinctively began to mutter 'chingada,' a Spanish swear roughly analogous to the f-word.