Empanadas


 Ingredients:

  • Little bit of veg oil
  • Little bit of all purpose flour
  • Pie dough
  • 2 medium potatoes
  • 1 pound beef or alternative ground meat
  • 1 onion
  • 1 bell pepper
  • Garlic to taste
  • 2 tbsp chili powder
  • 2 tbsp cumin
  • 1 tbsp paprika
  • Green olives
  • 1 egg
Directions
  1. Cut 2 medium potatoes into small cubes
  2. Bring salted pot of water to boil, add cubed potatoes
  3. While potatoes are boiling, dice 1 onion and 1 bell pepper, mince garlic
  4. Add little bit of veg oil to frying pan and bring to medium heat
  5. Once heated, add diced onion, bell pepper, and garlic to pan
  6. Cook until onions begin to look translucent and add 1 pound ground beef or alternative meat
  7. When meat is cooked thoroughly, add boiled, cubed potatoes
  8. Add 2 tbsp chili powder, 2 tbsp cumin and 1 tbsp paprika, and stir until integrated
  9. Remove from heat and let chill in refrigerator until cool
  10. Once chilled, take out (also chilled) pie dough (we're not doing the pie dough recipe on this entry, get it pre-made if you like)
  11. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F and grease/prepare a baking sheet
  12. Flatten dough with a rolling pin. Add some flour to the surface it's on, and to the rolling pin to avoid sticking
  13. Punch holes into pie dough with something circular, I used a large mug
  14. Place about a spoonful of empanada filling and a few green olives (if you like) to the centre of each circle of dough. Make sure not to overstuff
  15.  Fold them over so the edges of the dough are touching and seal them by crimping the edge with a fork
  16. Place empanadas on prepared baking sheet and in a separate bowl, beat an egg
  17. Use a brush to apply egg wash to empanadas
  18. Bake for 30 min
Yield: I was able to fit 12 empanadas onto the baking sheet and I had leftover filling

Source: I couldn't find one recipe that had everything I wanted, but a couple ones I took inspiration from were Argentinian Beef Empanadas Recipe | Bon Appétit (bonappetit.com)  Homemade Empanadas Recipe | The Recipe Critic and (597) Empanadas with Chef Frank - YouTube

Description:

My love of empanadas stems from Katimavik. I was in Chisasibi, which is a Cree reserve in North Quebec. We were helping out with a powwow, and the group left without me at the end of the day, which meant I had to walk back to the Katimahouse in the rain and missed dinner. I stormed into the house and shouted at the group for leaving me behind. The person who made dinner said "Sorry Gryph, you can have an extra empanada."

"What the f*** is an empanada?!"

I took one bite and I wasn't angry anymore. So warm, comforting, and satisfying.

To be honest, I've been chasing that experience ever since. I've had several people give me their takes on it, including a friend of my old roommates, who was from Chile. Always good, but not to the level of my first experience.

That's when it hit me, the person who made the first empanadas was a vegetarian. I remembered the potato filling. So then I felt like what I was chasing was some hyper-specific vegetarian recipe that I would never find.

So I was happy that, after some searching, I found several authentic recipes that use potato.  Yes, the relevant ingredient that I had been missing was the potato. I am not a vegetarian, so I used it alongside beef.

I enjoy the green olives a lot as well. I'm not sure if it's because the flavour is compatible, or if it's just because I have such a strong bias in favour of green olives. Lee-Anne didn't think they added much. They are authentic though. You can also add raisins and pieces of hard boiled egg. My Chilean friend used olives and hard boiled egg, but I didn't include the egg because I personally didn't think they added much. You can also add cheese and I'm sure that would be good, but it didn't feel necessary.

You can either bake or deep fry empanadas. I opted to bake, just because I really don't think I need to develop my deep frying skills. Everyone I know whose started a house fire has done so because they were deep frying something, and even if I learned to do it safely, it wouldn't help my waistline.

I should acknowledge that there are both savory and sweet empanadas. I've only ever had savory, but I can imagine some delicious dessert ones. Empanadas are basically hand pies, so it's the difference between a meat pie and a fruit one.

I don't know if straight pie dough is the most authentic but it did the trick. Different recipes had vastly different takes on how to do the dough. What I used for this batch was made by me and Lee-Anne's mom as she tried to teach me how to make it. I don't know if I can do it on my own yet, but if I succeed, it will be it's own post.

Make sure to chill both the dough and filling. I had an unsuccessful first attempt where I tried to make the pockets while it was still warm and I had the pie dough at room temp. Warmth makes the dough less pliable and it becomes vulnerable to tearing. Obviously it heats up as it bakes, but you don't want to be folding it while it's warm.

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