MAKING

THE

DOUGH

• 4 cups of All-Purpose Flour (harina)

• 1/8 Tsp Salt (sal)

• 2 sticks of (softened) butter (mantequilla)

• 250 ml (8.5 oz) Heavy whipping cream (Crema Dulce)

• Put all the ingredients into a mixing bowl and mix well.

• Knead the dough until all the ingredients are mixed and the dough DOES NOT stick to your fingers.  If the mixture is still sticky, slowly add more flour, continuing to knead the dough until it no longer sticks to your fingers.

• Using a rolling pin or something similar, begin rolling out the dough on a floured surface till the dough is about 1/8" thick.

• Cut the dough into circles approximately 3" in diameter.

IT'S ALL

ABOUT

THE STUFFING

The great thing about empanadas is that pretty much anything that can be stuffed into the shell will make a good empanada.  We make two types, a sweet empanada consisting of a local fruit called Chiverre and a meat and vegetable empanada. 

• For the meat and veggie empanada we use leftovers from a previous dinner of chicken or beef fajitas. 

• If you don't have any leftovers, just sauté up onions, garlic, green peppers, chicken or beef and add lots of appropriate spices.  When done cooking, put it all into a food processor and pulverize the living daylights out of the mixture.

• There are other sweet fillings you can use but you will need to be careful.  Those with a high water content (e.g. strawberry preserves etc) will leak out of your crust and make a bloody mess.  If you are into making preserves, I suggest cooking them long enough so as to cook away most of it's liquid.

BRINGING

IT ALL

TOGETHER

• Place approximately 1 teaspoon (mas o menos) of your mixture onto one half of the dough circle.

• Fold over the other half of the dough so as to form a crescent shape and seal by crimping the edge.

• Bake in a 350 degree oven using a non-stick cookie sheet for 15 minutes.  Then flip the empanada and cook for an additional 10 minutes.

• The finished product will have a nice golden brown look