Description
Delicious Brazilian-style Beef Empanadas featuring a homemade shortcrust pastry filled with a flavorful mixture of ground beef, chorizo, potatoes, and aromatic spices. These empanadas are perfectly crispy and golden baked, ideal for appetizers or main dishes, served hot with your choice of dipping sauces.
Ingredients
Scale
Empanada Shortcrust Pastry:
- 2 1/2 cups plain/all-purpose flour
- 175 g cold unsalted butter, cut into 1 cm cubes
- 1 tsp cooking/kosher salt
- 1 egg yolk
- 1/2 cup warm full fat milk
Empanada Filling:
- 1 1/2 tbsp olive oil
- 1/2 onion, finely chopped
- 1 garlic clove, minced
- 300 g beef mince (ground beef)
- 120 g chorizo
- 2 tsp tomato paste
- 1 tsp fresh thyme, finely chopped
- 1/2 tsp dried oregano
- 1/2 tsp cumin
- 1/2 tsp paprika
- 1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
- 1/4 tsp cooking/kosher salt
- 3/4 cup low sodium chicken stock/broth
- 1/2 cup tomato passata (or tomato sauce/crushed tomato)
- 150 g potato, peeled and cut into 8 mm cubes (~1 cup)
- 1/3 cup green onion, finely sliced
Other Ingredients:
- 2 hard boiled eggs (boiled for 9 minutes)
- 1/4 cup green olives, roughly chopped
- 2 eggs, separated (yolks whisked) for sealing and brushing pastry
Dipping Sauces:
- Empanada sauce
- Optional: ketchup, ketchup with sriracha, pink sauce, taco sauce, salsa dip
Instructions
- Prepare Filling: Roughly chop chorizo into 1.5 cm pieces and blitz with a stick blender until it forms a paste. Heat olive oil in a large non-stick pan over high heat, sauté onion and garlic for 2 minutes until softened. Add chorizo paste and cook for 2 minutes. Add beef mince and cook until no longer pink. Stir in tomato paste and cook for 1 minute. Add fresh thyme, oregano, cumin, paprika, cayenne, salt, chicken stock, tomato passata, and diced potatoes. Bring to a simmer, then reduce heat and cook gently for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally, until potatoes are cooked and filling is juicy but not watery. Turn off heat, stir in green onions, then transfer to a bowl and let cool completely (about 2 hours).
- Make Dough: Whisk together warm milk and egg yolk in a small jug. Pulse flour, salt, and cold butter cubes in a food processor until mixture resembles fine crumbs with pea-sized lumps. Add milk and egg mixture and pulse briefly until dough forms a ball (about 10 seconds). Turn dough onto a floured surface and form into two 2 cm thick rounds approximately 20 cm long. Wrap each in cling film and refrigerate for 30 minutes (or up to overnight).
- Roll and Cut Dough: Remove one dough disc from fridge, roll out on lightly floured surface to 3 mm thickness. Cut into 15 cm rounds using a bowl or cutter. Keep rounds covered on paper in fridge while you work through the dough. Expect to yield 10 to 11 rounds total.
- Assemble Empanadas: Preheat oven to 220°C (425°F) or 200°C (fan). Ensure filling is cold but spreadable. Place 3 tablespoons (approx. 55 g) of filling on one half of each pastry round, flatten into a half-moon shape leaving a 1.5 cm border. Sprinkle with chopped green olives and slices of hard boiled egg. Brush border with egg white, fold pastry over filling, pressing to seal and expel air. Optionally pleat edges for decoration, or crimp with fork.
- Bake: Place empanadas on two baking trays lined with parchment paper. Brush tops with beaten egg yolks, bake for 20 minutes until golden brown and crispy on base.
- Serve: Serve hot with your preferred dipping sauce such as homemade empanada sauce, ketchup, or salsa.
Notes
- Blitzing chorizo into a paste integrates its flavor better than chopping.
- If making dough by hand, rub butter into flour with fingers, stir in egg-milk mix, and knead until smooth.
- Dough can be refrigerated up to 2 days; allow it to soften at room temperature for 30 minutes before rolling.
- Empanadas are traditionally large in South America; smaller sizes work too but may alter baking time.
- Filling should be cold but pliable to prevent melting the butter in the pastry during assembly.
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 1 empanada
- Calories: 320 kcal
- Sugar: 2 g
- Sodium: 340 mg
- Fat: 18 g
- Saturated Fat: 7 g
- Unsaturated Fat: 9 g
- Trans Fat: 0 g
- Carbohydrates: 25 g
- Fiber: 2 g
- Protein: 15 g
- Cholesterol: 85 mg
