Traditional Argentinian Homemade Empanadas! RECIPE (Vegetarian Ones)

Today I wanna share a traditional recipe from Argentina. EMPANADAS!!!

This is something every argentinian eats but my recipe is vegetarian. Most people in Argentina would say the traditional food is ASADO, what means barbecue.

So, first the list of ingredients:

for the dough:

      - 2 cups of flour
      - 1 cup of water
      - 1/4 cup of Olive oil
      - 1 teaspoon of salt

for the stuffing you can use your own creativity, anything that's not too liquid is ok. My choice this time was:

      - 3 eggs
      - 1 big leek
      - 1 broccoli
      - little bit of celery
      - 1 sweet pepper
      - 1 carrot
      - lot of garlic (I love it)
      - some olives
      - cheese (this time I used manchego and some local mexican cheese)
      - 1/2 cup of lentils
      - 1 zucchini

Preparation:

The dough:

In a bowl put the 2 cups of flour, make a hole in the middle and add some water, maybe a third of the cup you're gonna use. Add the salt, if you want you can add the salt to the water before so you make sure it gets mixed even though all the dough.
Add the oil and slowly start mixing everything with your hands...

You need to make an even dough, keep adding the water and kneading until is not too sticky, it has to be elastic but not too sticky, it's not space science just try and if you miss and add too much water you can add a little more flour and again water if you go again too much to the dry side. Don't be scared ;)

This dough doesn't need time to grow, once you get the consistency you need you can start making smaller balls and with a rolling pin stretch them until they are a flat rounded disc about 1,5 or 2 millimeters thin. If you don't have a rolling pin you can use an empty bottle of wine or anything that has a cylinder shape.

It's important to have the stuffing ready before this last step because the dough once stretched start getting dry and that makes it brittle. You can leave the dough in the fridge for a while or just leave it in one big ball until you have the stuffing ready.
Truth is that is better to have the stuffing ready and cold before you make the dough but I kind of do everything at the same time, while the veggies are cooking i'm preparing the dough.
Anyway, let's keep moving and see whats the mix I used as stuffing this time.

First thing you need to think what is the part that takes more time so you can make everything simultaneously and in the shorter time. In this case that was the lentils so, I started setting the lentils to boil with a little salt and the celery leaves.
While the lentils boil, cut the broccoli in small or medium pieces and also put it to boil just with a little salt. You can also boil the eggs at the same time.

While the other things are boling cut the carrots, the leek,celery, sweet pepper, zucchini and garlic. With some salt and olive oil fry all of these until the everything is cooked.

You can even save more time cutting the cheese in cubes, taking the bone out of the olives and if the eggs are done cut them also in small cubes.

At this point if something like maybe the lentils still cooking you can use the time to wash what you're not gonna use anymore.

So... Everything is ready, now the interesting part. As I explained before you broke the dough in smaller balls (ideally the size should be something in between a golf and a tennis ball) and stretched them to make discs. If you have a partner is good to have one of you stretching the balls and the other making the empanadas.

To make the empanadas you imagine the disc in two halves and put the stuffing along one of the halfs leaving the other empty, also you need to leave about a centimeter around without stuffing. Mix the ingredients in the way you like the most, I did two kinds, one with lentils, broccoli, olives, cheese and egg. The other with the veggies I fried and cheese.
Once you have the stuffing places over half off the disc wet your fingers and put a thin layer of water on the 1 centimeter edge you left empty around the half of the disc with the stuffing. This is so when you fold it it sticks together.
Grabb the edge of the empty side and bring it over the stuffing all the way to the other side, close it and you can use a fork to press all around and then fold it... The Idea is to close it so nothing from inside ca get out and all the flavour stays inside.

I forgot to take a photo on this important step so I did instead this graphic I hope it helps understand :)

Set your oven in medium high and on a tray with an invisible layer of oil put them for about 30 minutes. This time can change depending on the oven. you can open and check if the dough looks done. Remember the stuffing was already cooked ;)

I hope you enjoy trying this, sounds difficult but it's not. And as I said you can use your creativity to fill them with the things you love the most.

Text and Photos are all Originals