Sandra’s Empanadas

Valeria’s friend Sandra came to visit for a couple days…she’s from Argentina so lucky for us she taught us how to make empanadas one afternoon. This is a rough recipe, as I was just observing and she was speaking Italian, so give or take some of this. It could probably be cut in half because the filling for these made about 20 empanadas and there was still a ton left over that we ended up using to make basically an argentinian version of Shepards Pie. And that was a whole another other dish that we couldn’t finish at lunch the next day.

Sandra’s Empanadas (makes 50-60)

• 2 bags of empanada wrappers
• 4-5 small white onions (chopped)
• 3 eggs (hard boiled)
• 2 pounds of ground pork/beef
• 1 large jar of green olives (drained)
• Chilli Powder
• Cumin
• half a stick of butter
• 1 tablespoon of olive oil (or any cooking oil)
• Sprinkle of Salt
• 1 teaspoon of red chili pepper flakes
• 1 egg beaten (for basting

So the recipe is simple enough, considering we didn’t make the wrapper dough from scratch.

1. Saute the onions in 3 table spoons of butter/salt/red chili pepper flakes and cook on low heat until just tender. Do not let it carmelize (although personally I think carmelizing the onions would be tasty)
2. While the onions are cooking, slice the green olives and hard boiled eggs to mix together.
3. When the onions are almost ready, saute the meat in the rest of the butter and olive oil in a large pan. Be sure to separate the meat so it doesn’t clump together.
4. When the onions are cooked, combine it with the meat. Then add the green olive/egg mixture.
5. Once everything is combined, add chilli powder and cumin to taste. If I had to guess she probably put about 1.5 table spoons of chilli powder and 2 tablespoons of cumin. Essential it comes out tasting like taco seasoning so you could use that too.
6. It’s important to let the filling cool before you begin the wrapping process so that it doesn’t ruin the wrapper. You can preheat the oven to 400 degrees at this time.
7. Place the wrappers on a flat surface, and spoon a couple spoons of filling on top. Dip your finger into a cup of warm water to seal the edges of the wrapper and fold over so it’s a semi circle.
8. Use your fingers to tuck the edges in (similar to a pie crust) and place on a cookie sheet. Repeat until everything is done.
9. Baste the top of the empanadas with the beaten egg mixture and place in the oven for about 10-15 minutes, just until the pastry has puffed and the top is golden.
10. Eat and enjoy!