You asked and I’m finally delivering. During quarantine I’ll admit I’ve been eating exceptionally well because Adrian has been cooking everything that I or he could dream up. The biggest daunting factor was I am not a photographer and I also don’t have a ton of spaces that are good for photographing the process of cooking food. Fortunately, we figured out a solution (more on that later) so now I’m officially bringing you the good stuff! The recipes!
I’m not going to launch into the awul back story of our lives like you see in most food blog recipes so we can get to it! Just know that Adrian is from Galicia, Spain where this is a specialty! Also, keep in mind you can use any protein you like! We used beef but the traditional uses canned tuna (great for all that apocalypse-prep canned food you stocked up on back in March). You can also used pork, shredded chicken or whatever weird stuff you have lurking in your fridge.
Here we go!
Step Uno - Gather all your stuff, julienne the onions and red pepper (you can also dice but it doesn’t matter too much since it’s all getting cooked down into a beautiful mash of flavorful goodness). Put a dough hook on a stand mixer and dump all of your flour and 1 tbsp of salt into the mixer.
Add your water/yeast combo and 2 eggs. Knead this on medium and add your 3/4 of your stick of butter 1 tbsp at a time until it is fully incorporated. Let your mixer work the dough for about 12 minutes or until the surface is smooth and it looks like a dough ball!
Once the dough looks like dough, oil a large bowl, take it out of the mixer and set it aside in the bowl on your countertop. Next onto the filling!
Heat a large pot on medium and add 1 tbsp of oil and your last tbsp of butter. Let it start to melt down and when it just so ever slightly gives off that beautiful sizzle sound that could and should be the best wake up alarm ever, add your ground beef and cook on medium until browned.
Now for what is for some reason my favorite part, dump all your onions…
Then all your peppers…
Then mix it all up, lower the heat and let it simmer until the veggies have released their water, about 5 minutes. See below:
My favorite part about this is that you let this cook down for about 20-30 minutes, the veggies and ground beef melding together as they cook into a beautiful golden brown filling full of flavor. Also the fact that you can leave this for a while to let your dough rise and filling cook. It’s like a set it and forget meal.
After your brief hiatus from the kitchen, turn off the stove, remove from the heat and add your saffron some salt and pepper to taste. Stir and set aside to cool. Whip out your dough ball and divide that bad boy into 2 even halves. You’re going to roll out each half to the size and shape of a jellyroll pan/cookie sheet. The dough will be about 1/4 inch thick.
Preheat your oven to 370 and place a piece of parchment paper on your pan. Lay your first half of dough out on this and spoon the filling evenly across the surface. If your filling is super dry or dense, you can take a small spatula or the back of a spoon and spread it out until it reaches all the edges.
Take your other dough sheet and cover the bottom half. You can crimp your edges however you like, get creative with it, this is your empanada and there is no wrong way to design your edges!
After you’ve crimped all your edges, stab or pinch a little hole in the top center of the empanada so it vents while cooking. Also brush some egg wash all over the top of it.
Place in your preheated oven and let cook for about 15-20 minutes until it’s golden brown and your house smells happy and all the hungry people are magnetically pulled from their rooms to ask when the food is ready.
When you pull it out of the oven, it will be very tempting to dive in right away but don’t do this! Let it cool for about 5-10 minutes and then slice it up into pieces and serve !
It’s a hearty meal that seems complex but really is so easy and delicious! Bonus points, this makes enough to feed several people for a few meals so you can wrap up half of this after cutting and save in the fridge or freezer for the next time you don’t feel like cooking, which will probably be like tomorrow.
Ingredients
2 1/2 cups of flour
1 cup of warmish hot tap water
1 packet of yeast (in water)
2 eggs
1 stick of butter (room temperature)
2 yellow onions
2 red peppers
2 packs of saffron (or a pinch of the real deal if you can get it!)
1 tbsp of salt
Recipe
Gather all your sh*t, julienne the onions and red pepper (you can also dice but it doesn’t matter too much since it’s all getting cooked down into a beautiful mash of flavorful goodness)
attach a dough hook to your stand mixer and plug it in (very important)
Put all the flour & salt in the bowl of the stand mixer
add 2 eggs & water with yeast
Mix! Turn on medium speed and start to mix, once it starts to incorporate, add your 3/4 o fa stick of your butter (or 3 oz) 1 tbsp at a time. Then you’ll let it mix for about 12 minutes or until the surface is smooth and there isn’t a any flour not incorporated.
Take the dough out and put it in an oiled bowl and set aside, covered and as long as your house isn’t 50 degrees just set it to the side on your counter.
Take a large stockpot and heat up 1 tbsp of oil and your remaining tbsp of butter. Heat it up to medium and then add your ground beef. Cook the ground beef until it’s browned
Toss in all of your onion & red pepper, mix it up with a wooden spoon you got in Bali and didn’t want to use for cooking, only salads, but it became the cooking spoon anyway and cover it and let it cook down for about 5-10 minutes until the veggies have released their water (see picture above) then turn the heat down to low, go play a fifa game, answer some emails, or have a drink and let it simmer for about 20-30 minutes. *If you don’t cook a lot and aren’t familiar with your oven, be sure to check back every 5-10 minutes to make sure the bottom isn’t burning in case your burners are more intense than you thought!
Once it’s cooked down, turn the heat off and add your saffron and mix it up again with your beloved wooden spoon. Set aside (or leave it on a burner on your oven that isn’t turned on).
Take your lovely dough ball that has risen, punch it down if you’re still really angry about the state of the world, then divide into 2 balls.
Roll out both dough balls into 2 rectangles about 1/4 inch thick.
Take a cookie sheet or jellyroll pan, line it with parchment paper or grease it up with some oil if you don’t have any parchment paper.
Preheat your oven to 370 degrees fahrenheit, contemplate the celsius scale, ensure no sheet pans or dutch ovens that live in the oven are currently in their residence.
Take one of your dough rectangles and place it on the pan allowing it to hang over the edge a smidge (you’ll use the extra on the sides to crimp this baby shut
Spoon that beautiful filling evenly across the top, don’t push it against the sides of the pan, just spread it out like one of those nutella ads where the white mom is putting in on a piece of bread for her kid)
Preheat your oven to 370 degrees fahrenheit, contemplate the celsius scale, ensure no sheet pans or dutch ovens that live in the oven are currently in their residence.
Take your other dough rectangle and place it on top. This is where any pie-baking experience comes in! If you are Snow White and have only ever had forest birds crimp & cut your pie crusts, I suggest googling a video or looking at the photos above which you should have done already anyway and should also use to follow along because this took a long time to edit and post. Crimp closed those edges with any method of crimping & closing that you prefer.
Brush the whole empanada with egg-wash and slice a little hole in the top so it vents and doesn’t go BOOM in your oven.
Bake for about 18 minutes (again check your oven temp!) Check on it after 10 to see if it’s baking unevenly and needs to be rotated or if it’s too hot and you might need to lower it 10 degrees.
Take it out, let it cool, slice it up and serve it to your family who is now responsible for dishes and cleaning the kitchen.
Que Aproveche!
