Looking for a super simple and economical recipe to delight your guests?
Go for the empanadas!!
Empanadas, for me, are the symbol of Argentina.
No matter where you are or what time it is, you'll find these little pancakes just around the corner.
Street vendors and restaurants sell them for around 4 pesos each (60 cents), and you can find them with billions of toppings...
But today I decided to teach you how to make my favorite empanada:the ham and cheese empanada!
For 4 people and 3 empanadas per person (i.e. 12 empanadas, if my calculations are correct), here is the list of ingredients:
- 230 g of flour
- 180 g of butter
- 1 teaspoon of salt
- 20 g of flour
These first 4 ingredients are intended for the preparation of the puff pastry. Now for the empanada content:
- 400 g of ham
- 150g grated cheese
- 1 egg yolk
- a pinch of pepper
Do you feel it coming, the delight? Well, instead of making your mouth water unnecessarily, let's get to the preparation.
First of all, let's prepare the puff pastry, the main element of the empanada, the one that gives it all its flavor and crispiness:
1. We cut the butter into small pieces.
2. In a dome, mix the flour and salt, and add the butter. Then, stirring with a spatula, pour a little water so that the mixture is quite soft.
3. The dough thus obtained, we spread it on a floured work surface and we work it by hand, without forgetting to give it a rectangular shape (come on, courage). Then the strip is thinned by pressing on it with a roller until it no longer exceeds 2 centimeters in thickness.
4. We fold the rectangle in 3 in the direction of the length, then we fold the edges so that there are no more holes at the ends. Are you ok, do you get it?
5. We press the dough again to reduce it again, this time to 12 millimeters thick. We let it rest in the fridge for 20 minutes, then we start again, and this 4 times in a row.
6. Leave to rest for 10 minutes.
Here, the dough is ready. We can now get to the main topic:the content of the empanada! So, for the preparation:
1. We chop the ham into fairly large pieces, then mix it with the grated cheese.
2. We pepper a little. Not too much, huh, you know how it is, pepper:it's treacherous.
3. We cut the puff pastry into circles about 10 centimeters in diameter. No need to take out your ruler, cooking is not about geometry. And then your guests aren't going to quibble anyway.
4. We put a tablespoon of ham and cheese mixture in half of each circle.
5. We beat the egg yolk in a bowl, then brush the edges of the circles with it.
6. We close the circles, trying to seal the edges well.
7. Brush the empanadas with egg yolk, then bake in the oven at 150°C. . Too hot, they are too crispy, so not good.
8. We're in for a treat.
Here, your empanadas are ready to be served. I'll leave you, today I'm too lazy to cook, I'm going to buy 2-3 from the seller downstairs from my house.
But before leaving a question:what do you think of my recipe? Do you have questions about the preparation? Do you have other recipes to share with us? I await your comments.
Despite its apparent length, this recipe does not contain a lot of ingredients . In any case, much less than other elaborate dishes.
So, quick calculation:flour costs 70 cents, butter 50 cents, grated cheese 1€, ham 1.50€, egg 50 cents.
There you go, for less than €4.50, you can treat 4 people with 12 super delicious empanadas. Namely that empanadas can be used either as an aperitif, as a starter or as a hot dish because casually, these little things there, it stalls a man.
