We had some leftover empanada filling that we wanted to use up so I made some dough and after it rested my daughter filled and baked them for the freezer.
Making empanadas has been on my list for a few years now and I just never pulled the trigger on them, they always seemed out of my grasp. Several years ago I ripped a 3 page recipe out of a magazine and that sounds pretty daunting even to me, I am usually not shy about long recipes but 3 pages is a bit much, I’m sure if it wasn’t in a magazine it wouldn’t technically be as long but it is definitely a turn off.
Confession time, I really still haven’t made empanadas. My daughter made the filling, dough and empanadas for our #worldwidewednesday meal from Chile the other night. I literally only made the dough for the leftovers. So I guess I have to keep them on my list.
A Chilean friend of ours came for dinner and was very surprised at how good they were. He buys them from a place he knows down in Massachusetts and has brought them to us before. I and he will admit that Abbi’s were quite a bit better. The ones from the restaurant have a small piece of egg a couple of raisins and an olive in each of them. Abbi slices up several eggs and mixes in a handful of raisins and dices up some olives so each empanada gets a little bit of everything mixed throughout. they were quite delicious. So here’s hoping you don’t find the recipe too much and maybe make your own.
Chilean Empanada de pino
Ingredients
Dough
- 4 cups all-purpose flour
- 1½ teaspoon salt
- 3 tablespoon sugar
- 12 tablespoons vegetable shortening chilled
- 2 tablespoons unsalted butter chilled
- 2 large egg yolks
- 1 cup water
Beef filling
- 2 tablespoon vegetable oil
- 2 tablespoon unsalted butter
- 2 large onions diced
- 2 cloves garlic minced
- 1 pound ground beef
- 2 teaspoon cumin
- 1 teaspoon chili powder
- 1 tablespoon paprika
- 1 tablespoon beef base or 1 cube beef bouillon
- ¼ cup hot water
- Kosher salt and black pepper to taste
- 2 tablespoons flour
- ½ cup raisins chopped
- ½ cup black olives chopped
- 2-3 hardboiled eggs
- 1 large egg yolk
- 2 tablespoons milk
Instructions
dough
- sift the flour into a large bowl, stir in the salt and sugar. Mix in the butter and shortening breaking up all the pieces. Use a pastry cutter or your hands until incorporated.
- Whisk the egg yolks with the water and stir half of it into the flour and then a little at a time until the dough starts to come together smoothly. Keep kneading the dough, adding more of the egg water mixture as needed. If you need more liquid a tablespoon of water at a time. The dough will become smooth, although somewhat wet, it will come together once it has been chilled.
- Cover the dough with plastic wrap and refrigerate for about an hour. You can also make this up a day or two ahead of time. When ready to use, the dough should be soft and smooth. It is not an elastic dough.
beef filling
- heat the oil and butter in a skillet over medium-low heat. Add the diced onions and cook, stirring frequently, until the onions are softened. Add the garlic and cook for another minute.
- Add the ground beef, cumin, chili powder, paprika. If using a bouillon cube dissolve it in hot water, Add the salt and pepper to taste. Cook the beef, stirring and crumbling the meat with a spatula, until well browned. Add the flour and continue to cook for 2-3 minutes.
- Remove the skillet from the heat and stir in the raisins, olives and eggs, Let the filling cool completely. The filling can also be stored for a day or two if you wanted to make these in stages.
assembly
- pre-heat the oven to 350°F and a baking sheet
- divide the dough into golf ball sized pieces and roll into smooth balls. Let them rest for 5 minutes
- roll each ball of dough on a floured surface into a 6-inch circle about ¼ inch thick. Add a tablespoon of the beef filling into the middle of the circle. Brush the edges with water and fold the pastry in half, over the filling to make a semi-circle. Seal the edges by pressing down with your fingers.
- brush the sealed edge lightly with water, then turn the edge toward the middle and press with your finger to seal.
- mix the egg yolk with 2 tablespoons of milk and brush the empanadas with the mixture. Bake for 25-30 minutes or until they are golden brown.
- you can freeze them individually either before baking or after. Just place them on a sheet tray to freeze them and them place them in a freezer bag. Should be fine for about 3 months in the freezer. Let them thaw for about 30 minutes on the counter before re-heating or baking.