Photography by Samantha Demangate
Come escape with me into one of the world’s best comfort foods: the empanada. Portable pockets of goodness, either baked or fried, empanadas are ubiquitous in the South American diet. Imagine Crispy folds of roasted dough encasing savory fillings of minced meats, seafood, olives, and spices. These beautiful little envelopes of flavor fuel people of all classes and backgrounds and can cause heated contention; almost to the level of football.
The Journey From Spain
The Empanada’s origin story is complicated and multifaceted. Meat pies have long been a staple in Middle Eastern cooking, a style that at one time influenced most of Spain and Portugal. When the Burdor leader Tariq Ibn Ziyad and his vast armies conquered the Iberian peninsula in the 8th century, they brought their humble meat pie recipes with them. These portable pies took root in the cooking of the Northern Iberian kingdom of Galicia. These delicious relics of the Muslim rulers would survive the conquest and unification of Spain by the Christian kingdoms.
After the destructive colonization of the Americas that followed, settlers from Europe began immigrating to South America. Galician immigrants brought their culinary comforts with them to Argentina, including their recipes for empanadas. As people spread out into the vast plains, forests, and mountains of Argentina, the empanada evolved, taking on characteristics based on the availability and seasonality of ingredients and local tastes.
During the late 19th and early 20th centuries, empanadas sold from street vendors fueled workers during Argentina’s rise to becoming one of the world’s economic powerhouses. The empanada criolla, a staple variety of Buenos Aires, is so important that the Argentine Ministry of Culture declared it a Cultural Heritage of Food and Gastronomy.
Variations
The empanada is a staple food in Argentina and much of South America. Many places have adapted their versions according to the local palates. Depending on where you go in the continent, the recipe can change dramatically.
On the coast of Chile, fried empanadas with stewed shellfish (mariscos) and cheese reign supreme. In Bolivia, empanadas are known as salteñas and comprise a thick baked crust with a filling of sweetened meat stew and potatoes. Salteñas get their name from their recipe developer, a writer from Salta, Argentina.
Although almost every Latin American country has empanadas, Argentina and its vast countryside get the nod for being their true homeland. Empanadas are woven into the fabric of Argentine culinary identity and their variations are limitless.
The Folds and the Fillings
In the north of Argentina, they use flour from the tropical cassava root instead of wheat flour for the crust. The filling often consists of catfish. In the Northern provinces of Salta, thick cuts of steak, potatoes, and green onions make up the savory fillings. Nearby Jujay adds a healthy dose of peas and dried chilis to make them spicier. In southern coastal Patagonia, shellfish, crab, and lamb are stewed in white wine and baked inside a thick dough crust.
In Buenos Aires, all these styles are represented in the thousands of neighborhood bakeries specializing in empanadas. Aside from the usual criolla, fillings include ham and cheese, corn chowder (humita), sweet squash, and many more.
Sometimes there’s a language in folding empanadas. Some bakeries use different folds to represent the fillings while in others it depends on the person making them.
Crafting Them at Home
After living in Argentina for almost five months, I felt it was time to try my luck making empanadas from scratch. I settled on creating a simple version of the criolla empanada. In the end, my filling came out incredible and my crust, not so much. What I got right in the filling: lots of olives and garlic. What I got wrong in the crust: I forgot to coat them with egg white before baking. They still came out tasting great and, for a first try, I consider it a success!
Recipe for Empanada Criolla
Ingredients for the Filling
- 1 pound of ground or diced beef
- 1 large white or yellow onion
- Six large cloves of garlic
- 1 large red bell pepper
- 65 grams of lard or ½ stick of unsalted butter
- 1 – 2 tablespoons of paprika
- ½ tablespoon of dried chili flakes
- 1 tablespoon of oregano
- ½ tablespoon of cumin
- Green olives
- Cooked eggs
- Raisins (optional)
- 1 tablespoon of olive oil
- Salt
Ingredients for the pastry dough
- 4 cups of sifted flour
- 1 egg
- 1.5 sticks of unsalted butter
- ½ water or milk
- 1 Teaspoon of salt
- 1 Teaspoon of sugar
Cooking Steps
Make the filling a day ahead of time so the flavors have time to set.
In a large pot, heat 1 tablespoon of olive oil and 1/2 stick of butter on high
Add onions and saute until soft
Next, toss in the garlic and the finely chopped red bell pepper and saute for five minutes
Slowly add the meat and cook for five minutes
Stir in the raisins (optional)
Evenly pour in the spices, stir, and let cook on medium heat for ten minutes.
After ten minutes, turn off the heat
Add generous amounts of chopped green olives and chopped boiled egg to the mixture
Stir well and let the mixture cool for thirty minutes
Store in the refrigerator overnight
Make the dough by blending the flour, butter, egg, and salt in a bowl
Slowly add the water and milk to the mix while slowly forming the dough
Once the dough is at the consistency of Playdough, separate into two to three balls and refrigerate for at least one hour
Remove the dough and roll it thinly
Use a cookie cutter or a knife to cut out circular sections
Add small amounts of filling to the center of the empanada dough, make sure not to overfill
Moisten edges with water
Fold the dough over the filling and seal the edges with a fork
Let sit in the refrigerator for an hour before baking
Brush on egg white
Bake at 400° until the crust is golden and you hear the inside sizzling