I always had weakness for savory pies, especially empanadas. I used to get these savory pies from this cute little shop in town. They had about dozen different types of empanadas and all of the empanadas with different fillings were so delicious. The shop went out of business so now I make my own version using a puff pastry dough that I stuff with yummy mixture of meat, spices and herbs.
Empanada Filling
There are many versions of empanadas in Latin America, and you can find these pies stuffed with:
Chicken
Ground Turkey
Ground Beef
Ham
Cheese
Potatoes
Fruit
I like my empanadas to contain ground pork, boiled eggs, olives, plump raisins, spices and herbs. I just love the combination of savory, sweet, salty and spicy flavors.
Some people don’t like raisins in their empanadas but I think they give you wonderful sweetness to savory, salty flavored filling. Best way to enjoy the raisins in your pie is to rehydrate it first with hot water. This way, you’ll have plump, juicy sweet fruit, instead of clumps of hard, dried out fruit which won’t do much for your filling.
Making the filling for empanadas is quite easy and you can even make it ahead of time. Just sauté onions, cumin seeds and Fresno chilies first then add ground pork and cook the pork until it’s lightly browned. Next, add chopped parsley, olives and raisins and don’t forget to add ground nutmeg. Nutmeg adds lot of flavor to ground meat that filling doesn’t taste quite right without it. I actually use ground nutmeg for savory dishes lot more than I do for sweets.
Last thing to add to your ground meat mixture is chopped boiled eggs. It’s best to add the eggs after the meat mixture has cooled down, so it doesn’t turn into a dry, chalky mess.
Puff Pastry
Traditional empanadas are made with simple pie dough, but instead of making the dough from scratch, I’m relying on my go to (favorite) puff pastry from Trader Joe’s! I adore the taste and texture of delicate buttery, flaky puff pastry and it’s perfect with the savory-sweet filling .
Assemble & Bake
I want my empanadas to be a good hefty size, so I cut the dough into 5 inch squares. Don’t be afraid to stuff your pie with your filling! I placed two large spoonful of filling on the middle. You don’t want some sad pie with lots of dough and hardly any filling. When you bite into an empanada, you want to enjoy the delicious filling with every bite.
After you place your filling, just fold over the dough to make a triangle and crimp the edges with a fork.
Brush on some egg wash, and bake in 400 degree oven for 15 minutes and you will get buttery, meat filled golden empanadas! These are so good the only down side to them is that you can’t just eat one empanada.
Take puff pastry out of freezer and keep in fridge until ready to use.
Add water to small pot and bring to a boil. Add eggs into pot and boil for 8 minutes. When done, cool eggs in cold water, then peel off shells. Rough chop boiled eggs and set it aside.
Place raisins in a small bowl and pour enough boiling water to cover the raisins. Leave raisins in water for 2-3 minutes, then drain and set it aside.
Heat large skillet over medium heat and add olive oil. When olive oil starts to sizzle, add onions, cumin seeds, and fresno chilis. Combine ingredients together and sauté onions until soft.
Add ground pork to the onion mixture and break down large pieces with spatula or wooden spoon and cook until pork pieces are lightly browned. Sprinkle salt to ground pork and stir in nutmeg, parsley, olives and raisins. Once ingredients are combined, turn off heat and let the pork mixture cool. When pork mixture has cooled down, stir in boiled eggs.
Turn oven to 400°. Take puff pastry sheet and roll out dough on a floured surface. Roll pastry dough large enough to cut out 5 inch x 5 inch squares. 1 pastry sheet should be able to produce five squares.
Place two spoonful of filling on the middle of each square. Fold dough to make a triangle and crimp edges with fork to seal triangle. Line the pastry on baking sheet with parchment paper, brush with egg wash and bake for 15 minutes or until golden brown.
Enjoy homemade recipes with the delicious and convenient GOYA® Empanada Dough-Puff Pastry for Baking. This flaky round pastry comes ready to make wonderful empanadas, cakes, tarts, and endless recipes.
Both cooking methods produce delicious empanadas. If you want a healthier merienda, bake them in the oven.If you're working with less time, frying them is the way to go. Try both and ask your loved ones to vote on their favorite.
Lightly roll out the puff pastry: Dust the top of the puff with just a little flour, then use a rolling pin to very lightly roll across the seams and bumps from the packaging and make the pastry even.
What Can You Substitute for Empanada Dough? If you're looking for a shortcut, store-bought pie dough can be used to make empanadas. You may need to roll the dough out slightly thinner—it will produce a flakier result than typical empanada dough and is better for baking than frying.
Use a floured surface to roll out your Puff Pastry sheet, but be sure to brush off excess flour before filling, cutting or folding, since flour will prevent layers from sticking together.
Empanadas Argentinas are always baked instead of fried, so your family can enjoy them regularly, too. Make them in no time with authentic, pre-prepared GOYA® Empanada Dough-Puff Pastry for Baking.
Oil that is too cool will make your fried empanadas greasy and sad. I normally use canola oil for fried empanadas because it's flavorless and has a high smoke point. Lard tastes better, but you end up frying very close to lard's smoke point, which is tricky; when oil gets too hot it will taste acrid.
The best way to keep fried foods crispy? Just place them on a cooling rack set over a baking sheet. If you're frying multiple batches, throw the whole setup into a low oven to keep everything warm as you keep frying and adding to the rack.
Pastry being soggy in the middle is a result of the pastry being undercooked. Don't place the pastry on too high a shelf in the oven. One way to prevent soggy bottom pastry is to blind bake the pastry – This means partially or completely bake the pastry before adding the filling. Also, avoid over-filling your pastry.
You can brush an egg-wash glaze (1 egg plus 1 tsp.water) over the Puff Pastry to create a rich, golden sheen when baked. Use an egg wash to help seal filled pastries and connect Puff Pastry pieces: mix 1 egg plus 1 tsp. water, brush between layers, then pinch or press together.
Puff pastry must be kept as cold as possible - otherwise the small chunks of butter (which make the pastry flaky after it's baked) would simply melt into the rest of the dough.
While all-purpose flour is fine and can be used successfully for homemade puff pastry, we recommend using strong bread flour like this for best results. Bread flour has a higher protein content than all-purpose flour, and therefore, contains more gluten.
A book fold multiplies layers by 4 whereas a letter fold multiplies layers by 3. For puff pastry the more layers the better. But always stop at 7. Way too many layers will stretch the butter layer a little too much making it disappear.
While pie dough is designed to be flaky, empanada dough is meant to be more tender. Pastry for empanadas has a higher flour-to-fat ratio, making it sturdy and perfect for wrapping around meaty fillings. Some recipes use lard or an additional egg as the fat source, but our recipe keeps it simple and easy with butter.
The main differences between puff pastry and phyllo dough are their fat content and preparation. Puff pastry is a laminated dough that gets its signature airy puff from layers of butter, while phyllo dough is comparatively low-fat. Phyllo dough is mostly flour and water and can dry out easily.
Cut thirty-two 11.5cm discs from pastry8 sheets frozen brand shortcrust pastry. Drop 2 tablespoons of beef mixture in the centre of each disc. Fold in half to enclose filling, pinching the edges to seal. Place empanadas, seam-side up, on the prepared trays.
The technique to making empanada dough is very similar to that of making pie dough. It conveniently uses pantry staples and ingredients you probably already have on hand. Butter is cut into flour and salt, then mixed with olive oil and a bit of cold water to bind.
Introduction: My name is Fr. Dewey Fisher, I am a powerful, open, faithful, combative, spotless, faithful, fair person who loves writing and wants to share my knowledge and understanding with you.
We notice you're using an ad blocker
Without advertising income, we can't keep making this site awesome for you.
