Empanadas: Easy recipe for dumplings from Latin America

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Dumplings from Latin America: How to bake hearty empanadas

Empanadas are filled dumplings that are baked (or fried) in the oven

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They are warm and crispy, hearty and flavorful: empanadas. In Argentina, the filled dumplings are usually filled with minced meat. You can find out here which ingredients are required for the original recipe.

Empanadas originally come from Galicia, in north-west Spain. There they are mostly filled with seafood, in other countries not only the ingredients vary, but also the appearance: In Latin America, for example, the crescent-shaped dumplings are eaten with beef or chicken, ham and cheese or vegetables. And the original recipe from Argentina is also very popular in Germany – which is mainly due to one main ingredient: minced meat. Here you can find out what else you need for the coveted party snack in order to conjure up delicious empanadas.

These are the ingredients for the dough

  • 250 grams of cornmeal
  • 250 grams of wheat flour
  • 150 milliliters of water
  • 100 grams of margarine
  • 20 milliliters of olive oil
  • 20 milliliters of milk
  • a tablespoon of salt
  • half a tablespoon of sugar
  • two eggs

These are the ingredients for the filling

  • 250 grams of ground beef
  • 30 to 40 raisins
  • 20 to 30 olives
  • 20 milliliters of olive oil
  • three hard-boiled eggs
  • five tomatoes
  • an onion
  • a red pepper
  • a chili pepper
  • salt and pepper
  • cumin
  • paprika powder
This is what raw empanadas look like

Before baking, the dumplings get their typical shape

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This is how the dumplings are prepared correctly

Step 1: Weigh the types of flour and pour both together into a bowl. Make a well in the middle and put the rest of the ingredients (apart from the water and an egg) for the dough. Then mix all the ingredients – preferably with your hands – and keep adding a little water until you have a flexible dough that no longer sticks to your fingers. Before you process it further, it should rest in a cool place for a few hours.

Step 2: Finely dice the onion, pepper and chili pepper and fry them together with the minced meat and oil in one pan non-stick pan sharp on. Now taste the mass with the spices (salt, pepper, cumin, paprika powder) according to your own taste. Only then cut the tomatoes into small pieces and stir into the minced meat – this way the filling stays nice and juicy and doesn’t dry out. Let the filling cool down a bit, in the meantime you can chop the olives (whether black or green is up to you), raisins and eggs and then stir them into the cooled minced meat mixture.

Step 3: Now it’s the turn of the dough. Roll it out flat on a floured work surface and cut out circular shapes – you can these molds help. The diameter is usually 10 to 15 centimetres, but you can also vary the sizes according to your mood. Then the circles of dough are either placed in a suitable Dumpling maker and half filled before the empanadas get their typical shape. Alternatively, you can fold the dough over by hand and press the edges together with a fork to create a fine pattern, or twist the edges finely (as shown in the photo). To make the edges stick together better, you can brush them with some egg white in advance. Finally, the dumplings are brushed with egg yolk so that they get a nice color when baking.

Step 4: Now you can put the finished dumplings on a with baking paper Place on a lined baking sheet and bake in the oven at 200 degrees for about 15 to 20 minutes. Depending on how thick your batter has turned out, baking time can vary—for this reason, watch the empanadas and remove them from the oven when they’re golden brown. Then let the bags cool down a bit before you enjoy them while they are still warm. A tomato salsa goes best with this.

Many dips go well with empanadas

A fruity tomato salsa is the ideal dip for empanadas with minced meat

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Tomato salsa – the perfect dip for empanadas

To prepare the salsa you will need 500 grams of tomatoes, two red onions, two cloves of garlic, one chili pepper, some salt and pepper, the juice of one lime, five tablespoons, five tablespoons of olive oil and a bunch of parsley. Proceed as follows:

  1. First, place the tomatoes in a large bowl and pour boiling water over them. Drain off the water as soon as the skin of the tomatoes bursts – and peel off the skin of the tomatoes. Then cut the flesh into small cubes and remove the seeds or stalks.
  2. Peel the garlic and onions, remove the seeds from the chili and chop all three ingredients into fine pieces. Then mix them with the tomatoes and taste the salsa with salt and pepper, a little lime juice and the olive oil.
  3. Finely chop half a bunch of parsley, stir this into the tomatoes and then let the salsa rest in the fridge for at least two hours so that the marinade can soak in nicely. Before you serve the dip at the end, roughly chop the remaining parsley and sprinkle it over the salsa to finish.
Argentinian chimichurri sauce

The Argentinian chimichurri sauce also goes very well with empanadas

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Chimichurri – alternative dip with garlic

For this slightly spicier dip, you will need half a bunch of spring onions and half a bunch of flat-leaf parsley, four cloves of garlic, one tablespoon of oregano (dried), one teaspoon of herb vinegar, one teaspoon of lemon juice, 125 milliliters of olive oil, and half a teaspoon of salt and pepper. Proceed as follows:

Cut the spring onions as small as possible, the same applies to the garlic and parsley. Only mix the fresh ingredients with the remaining ingredients until the empanadas are ready and taste the chimichurri again before serving. Alternatively, you can also use a ready-made spice mix use, which – without additives, preservatives and flavor enhancers – from natural ingredients (including onion, tomato flakes (tomato paste, corn starch), parsley, chili, garlic, paprika, pepper, oregano, basil) is made. This saves you work, you can also use the chimichurri spices for grilling and marinating.

We wish you a good appetite!

One final tip: And now, if you’ve gotten even more cravings for empanadas, check out this book by the food blogger Nileen Marie Schaldach many more recipes for savory and sweet dumplings from Latin America – including numerous dip suggestions. How about a chili cheese, spinach feta or chicken fajita filling, for example? Alternatively, you can also try sweet empanadas with a cherry nougat or apple filling.

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