Easy Empanadas!

It seems to be rather conflicting about the origin of Empanadas when you Google them but they are definitely eaten in Spain, Portugal and Mexico to name just a few places. I first had them in a cafe in Leytonstone and I adored the sweetness to both the crumbly pastry (I’m not usually a pastry fan) and the filling despite the dish very definitely being savoury.

They are little filled pastry pockets to eat as a light or as party food and today I decided to make them with our leftover pulled pork from the weekend. I fried the pork with some diced pepper and red onion, added a teaspoon each of cumin, smoked paprika and mixed spice (for the sweetness) and then folded them up into the pastry circles I had made from scratch.

Somehow, despite never having made pastry before and not following a proper recipe or instuctions (there were too many ingredients and too much chilling and faffing in all I read) the pastry was short and crumbly and totally yum – even for a non pastry lover like me! The filling went with them beautifully and it made for a lovely family lunch (I only had a bite because… Diet) for the kiddos and Jonny.

They may not be terribly authentic but they were extremely tasty, used up leftovers, cost very little and took no time at all. A way to add some real colour and texture is to sprinkle over a drizzle of honey with some Pistachios Roasted and Salted at the end – I will be making again!

To make my flukey pastry I used 125g of plain flour which I mixed with a good grind of sea salt, a big pinch of sugar (one tablespoon probably), 25g of salted chilled butter and 25g of salted soft butter and I chop into small pieces then used my hand held mixer (totally not recommended on ANY recipes I have ever read about pastry but it worked for me) until it resembled bread crumbs which happened pretty quickly. I then mixed one egg yolk with about 20ml of water and added half that mixture to the pastry again using my hand held mixture. As soon as it was combined I balled it up and wrapped it in clingfilm before placing in the freezer for half an hour to chill.

On a dusted board I rolled out the dough to about 3 mm thick and cut out 8 circles using my largest cookie cutter. I had to fold up the dough twice and re roll but remembered you aren’t supposed to overwork pastry so tried not to handle it much.

Folding the empanadas invloved placing a spoonful of the mixture in the middle and then folding over to make a half moon and sealing the edges together with a fork before brushing with the other half of the egg and water mixture. I baked them on a preheated oven at 180 for 15 minutes.