Recipe: Empanadas from Argentina
An empanada is a savoury snack that you can buy in many countries in Latin America, with or without another name. I first became acquainted with the empanada in Argentina. An empanada is a pastry roll with a filling of your choice in it. Best known is the filling with spiced minced meat, but you can actually do it with anything you like.
Does it sound good? Here's how to make an empanada. I've chosen three different fillings, so there's something for everyone. Or, of course, you can make all three.
The dough for 10-12 empanadas
Ingredients for the dough:
If you don't have much time, choose a packet of ready-made puff pastry.
Make your own dough? You'll need this:
- 300 grams of flour
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 175 grams of butter
- 3-4 tbsp cold water
- 0.5 tsp salt
Preparing the dough:
- Put the flour, baking powder, salt and butter in a bowl and knead it into a dough.
- Slowly add the cold water and knead the dough further until you have a smooth even ball.
- Wrap the dough in foil or put a clean tea towel over it and put the dough in the fridge for an hour.
- Meanwhile you can make the filling, the preparation is shown below
- After an hour, remove the dough from the fridge and roll it out until it is about 1 centimetre thick.
- Cut circles of about 10-12 centimetres thick out of the dough and repeat this until the dough runs out.
- The dough is ready, read below the preparation of the filling and the preparation of the empanada
The filling for an empanada, for 10-12 empanadas
An empanada can be made with different fillings. Below I have made three different fillings:
Spiced ground beef
Ingredients:
- 250 grams ground beef
- 1 onion
- 2 garlic cloves
- 1 hard-boiled egg
- 40 grams of olives
- 1 tsp paprika powder
- 1 tsp ground cumin
- 1 tsp dried oregano
- 1 tbsp olive oil
- Pepper and salt
Preparing spiced minced meat stuffing:
- Heat the oil in a pan on medium heat
- Fry the onion and garlic 2-3 minutes
- Add the paprika, cumin, oregano and minced meat and fry until the minced meat is cooked.
- Finally, add the egg and the olives and pepper and salt and the stuffing is ready.
Tuna
Ingredients:
- 2 cans of tuna
- 1 onion
- 1 red pepper
- 1 hard-boiled egg
- 1 tsp dried oregano
- Olive oil
- Pepper and salt
Preparation tuna stuffing:
- Cut the onion and bell pepper into small pieces
- Heat the olive oil in a frying pan on medium heat
- Fry the onion and paprika for 2-3 minutes.
- Then add the tuna, oregano, egg and pepper and salt. Heat up the stuffing for a while and the stuffing is ready.
Cheese
Ingredients:
- 50 grams grated mozzarella
- 50 grams of grated parmesan cheese
- 1 onion
- 1 tsp paprika powder
- 1 tsp dried oregano
- Salt and pepper
Preparation cheese stuffing:
- Chop the onion and put it in a bowl
- Add the two types of cheese, paprika and oregano
- Mix well and add salt and pepper to taste. The filling is ready.