dining

OK, I admit it. Empanadas trace their history back to Spain, and their versions may have been adaptations of Mediterranean precursors. In the Americas an amazing variety of turned over pie crusts with meat, poultry, cheese, seafood, egg, fruit, vegetable and/or tuber fillings came to be known as “empanadas” --- even those horrid Chilean things filled with prunes and hard-boiled eggs.

But of course, “real” empanadas --- which are hard to come by in Panama these days --- are made with a mixture of ground beef and ground pork, plus pickled cherry peppers. If you don’t understand, it’s because it’s a Zonian thing. If you protest that you’re a Zonian and still don’t understand, it may be that you acquired your false consciousness from the Diablo Clubhouse, whose good empanada recipe you will find somewhere on the CZ Brats website. But on the Atlantic side, way back when, we had REAL empanadas.

I won’t get into the crust and baking part. Understand that you can make little empanaditas for finger food, or standard sized empanadas for breakfast or lunch. Your favorite pie crust, whether from scratch of a mix or pre-made, will probably do. (If your preference is for graham cracker crusts and you seek to use them for your empanadas, you may need to seek professional help, but offhand I can’t think of any shrinks who treat that particular perversion.)

Anyway, when this mix is ready, you will want to use it to fill little circles of pie crust to be turned over into little semicircles, then crimped shut along the edges, placed on a greased cookie sheet, brushed on top with beaten egg yolk and baked in a 350° F oven for about half an hour or until golden brown. You will need about four double-crust pies’ worth of dough to handle this amount of filling.

Ingredients:
• 2 Tablespoons of olive oil
• 1 large Spanish onion, chopped
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 1/2 pounds ground beef
• 1 1/2 pounds ground pork
• 10 pickled cherry peppers (take your pick, hot or mild), chopped
• 2 Tablespoons of the brine from the cherry pepper jar
• 2 Tablespoons of tomato paste
• 1/2 cup mashed potatoes
• Salt and cayenne pepper to taste

Directions:
• Heat a large skillet to medium high, cover the bottom of the skillet with the olive oil, add the onion and garlic, and fry until the onions and garlic are transparent and starting to brown
• Add the beef and pork, stirring and mixing with the onion/garlic mix until they are fairly well done
• Drain the grease from the pan, then turn the heat to low
• Stir in the cherry peppers, pickling brine, tomato paste and mashed potatoes, and mix it well enough so that you have this gloppy concoction that sticks together
• Turn off the heat, taste your filling, and adjust with salt and cayenne pepper to your taste, stirring things up so that the salt and pepper are evenly distributed throughout the mixture

Now you will be ready to fill your pastries.

As alluded to above, there are almost infinite variations. A lot of people spice with cumin or chili powder. Other recipes go lighter on the peppers, or use different kinds of peppers. Some wild and crazy Peruvians will substitute seafood for the meat, and sweet potatoes for the potatoes. But the real thing is as above.

Back to top