4 Levels of Empanadas: Amateur to Food Scientist | Epicurious

[Applause] i'm stephen and i'm a level one chef i'm alicia and i'm a level two chef i'm already norvina and i've been a professional chef for 11 years a good empanada with the right amount of filling that's going to be a good snack to get you to the next meal i like empanadas because they fall into my favorite category of food which is party food so my empanadas are inspired in venezuelan traditional empanadas are going to be fried super crunchy and delicious [Applause] [Music] [Applause] first i'm going to start with the filling and today i'm making breakfast empanadas i'm making a chicken tinga filling and chicken tinga is basically a smoky tomatoey sauce that the chicken is sort of stewed in my feeling today it's gonna be a sweet spicy pork shoulder the reason why i like plant-based meat it's been a decade since i had meat but i sometimes i have that urge to taste meat this scratches that edge first i'm going to crack my eggs grab a pinch of salt and add some black pepper throw them in the pan and cook them low and slow just so they don't overcook and put these eggs aside so i'm going to get started with my aromatics i'm just going to crush my garlic first bay leaf just adds a nice sort of savory flavor to the water i'm gonna add my black peppercorn and last but certainly not least the salt and now i'm gonna throw my chicken in there and let it poach for about 25 minutes poaching your meat is totally fine but i rather use the soy technique because you can get way more flavor out of this the sous-vide technique is basically a water bath that maintains the temperature of the water and that way the meat cooks very evenly i'm going to start making the spice rub first i'm going to use a spice grinder smoked paprika dry oregano peppercorn chili flakes garlic powder salt brown sugar and finally mustard seeds so i'm gonna grind this and i want a very fine powder that will evenly cover all my pork i'm gonna add my onions and garlic let those cook a little bit add some of the sausage then the mushrooms finally add the spinach season it a little bit make sure it's very flavorful add the cayenne and then i'm going to add the cheese on top what i would like to see is the cheese start to melt intertwined with the vegetables hold hands and like okay we're together in this on this journey of empanadas so i'm going to use half of my spice wrap to cook the pork in the swede and the other half i'm going to use it when i cook the pork in the oven i'm rolling the pork with my hands because i want to get that rub in the pork so now that my chicken is fully cooked through i'm going to go ahead and remove it from the liquid set it aside let it cool and i'm going to reserve about a cup of this cooking liquid for my chicken ting sauce so now what i'm going to be doing is to put my pork in the soupy bag seal it and take all the air out to start cooking it in the water the reason why i'm doing the sous-vide is because i want a perfectly cooked pork i don't have a ton of space in my new york city cabinet so a sous-vide machine just isn't worth the real estate for me it's going to be so juicy and tender i'm going to leave my pork here cooking for 24 hours at 165 degrees i do not want to cook anything for 24 hours but i appreciate those who do now that my pork has been in this weed machine for 24 hours it's perfectly cooked super juicy i'm going to take it out of the bag now i'm gonna go ahead and do the second rub and i'm going to bake this at 300 for about an hour and a half just to get a very crispy and golden brown crust so now that my chicken has cooled down a bit i'm gonna go ahead and start shredding up the chicken wow glows feeling real lunch lady right now i love to use two forks just like this it's faster so as i'm shredding apart this chicken it's almost like string cheese i mean you can also do it with your hands so i'm done shredding my chicken and next i'm gonna work on my tingle sauce first i'm gonna combine some cored roma tomatoes then i'm gonna add my oil i'm gonna drop in my ground cumin my four garlic cloves chipotle peppers in adobo sauce is basically like a smoked jalapeno that's just marinating in this sauce i'm gonna drop in three or four of these as well as some of the reserved marinade in this can just adding some salt so now i'm basically just going to blend all these raw ingredients together and make a nice smooth sauce and i'm going to add that to a pan of sauteed onions and just kind of combine all of that together so i'm going to let this simmer for about 10 minutes until it really starts to thicken and reduce a bit and then i'm going to add my shredded chicken now that this is cooked i'm going to put it in the bowl with my eggs that i set aside and that's my filling i'm using a store-bought empanada dough i've never made dough from scratch i don't think i'm at a place in my life where i can make dough properly i'm going to be using a puff pastry dough i did not make this dough from scratch there's already enough going on with this dish and pre-made dough works just fine i'm going to start making the dough and i'm going to be using hamoni how many is a dry corn which is white and i'm going to soak it overnight in water and with a little bit of salt to get it nice and tender then i'm going to boil it to cook it through the process of preparing my dough is strenuous good for you so now that my harmony it's fully cooked it's a little bit chewy it's ready and i'm going to mix it with milk ghee garlic powder and a little bit of togarashi a traditional japanese spice it's not the traditional way but i love to add a little bit of spiciness to the dough and more flavor wow that was easy okay i can tell that my dough is ready because it's not sticking to my hands next i'm gonna put all the dough in a bowl and i'm gonna let it sit in the fridge for around 20 minutes so it dries out i prefer to use puff pastry because i think it's buttery and creates a nice flaky crust using puff pastry to make empanadas it's totally fine but i prefer to use how many because that's the way we do it in venezuela now that my dough is ready it's a little bit dry exactly how i wanted it i'm going to start forming the bowls to make the empanadas i'm going to roll up my puff pastry because i want it a little bit thinner than the thickness that comes pre-packaged so puff pastry is a laminated dough that's basically dough and butter layered on top of each other so that way when it bakes that butter helps the dough separate and create those nice flaky layers in the pastry i'm gonna cut it in equal pieces i like to roll them all first so i'm i know that they're all the same size and then i'm gonna start pressing them so i'm not fancy i'm gonna use a bowl to serve as my perimeter for my empanada i'm gonna use a knife to cut around that i like to use a tortilla press to form my empanadas because the dough is going to be super even the plastic bag is going to make sure that your dough doesn't stick to the surface of the tortilla press so this gets a very even empanada dough and that's my dough so now i'm gonna start to form the empanadas now i'm gonna grab the dough place it on the plate grab some filling place it inside make sure i'm getting enough egg i'm using monterey jack cheese because i really like the flavor and how that balances against the smokiness of the tinga sauce i'm going to wet the edge of the dough so that the edges stick together and they don't open up now i'm going to try to close it make a pocket press on the outsides with the fork this is so that it sticks together not for looks it also looks good i'm going to go ahead and kind of pinch and tuck the edges so that way as it's baking nothing starts to leak out sometimes when it heats up it starts to form bubbles so i'm gonna poke some holes just to add some ventilation you could totally use a fork to enclose your empanadas if you're a newbie but braiding it just looks prettier and personally i like doing things by hand so i'm making an egg wash to brush over my empanada dough so that way when it bakes we get a nice golden crusty situation and now i'm going to cut it perfect open it make that perfect circle and that's it who wants some bananas i love making empanadas now that the empanadas are ready let's put them in the airfryer before i put these in the airfryer i'm going to add a little egg wash just so it doesn't dry out you don't want to add too much of an egg wash because then it just starts cooking the egg and you just have egg forming like moss on the side of a tree so i'm going to bake my empanadas at 375 for about 15 minutes but i'm just looking for them to get nice and golden brown and that's when i know they'll be done i'm frying my empanadas because it's the tradition in venezuela to fry them who doesn't love anything deep fried i just think it's a bit intimidating to set up a whole deep fry situation i'm frying my empanadas because the texture it really is totally different if you bake them with this dough especially you have to fry them so you get that crispiness that i'm looking for i'm ear friend instead of deep frying because my doctor said so pretty much so i'm gonna put them in the airfryer it's a healthy alternative i've not worked with an airfryer people seem very excited about them the airfry is the way to go you don't have to work on preheating the oven we're busy people we've got other things to do besides watching pinatas grow now i'm gonna turn the airfryer on 350 15 minutes so i have my oil set up at 350 degrees and i don't want to overcrowd the pot because that way they're not gonna cook evenly so i'm scooping a little bit of the oil on the top of the empanadas so while i'm frying them the empanadas are floating and there are some parts that are not getting oil i'm just cooking the dough because the filling is already cooked so my empanadas have baked for about 15 minutes they're nice and golden brown and the dough is puffed up they're nice and golden they didn't crack because we added the egg wash so it looks good once i see that the empanadas are golden brown and they're fully cooked they're ready to take them out so now i'm getting started on the sauce and i'm making guacamole guacamole always it's a good pairing you don't want just empanadas by itself it needs something and it's always guacamole so i'm making like a lime herby crema and i think that that herbiness is going to help balance the smokiness of the chicken tinga i'm going to be making a smoky timaturi a timituri is basically a sauce made with herbs citrus and a little bit of spiciness so first i'm going to cut open the avocados mash them up in a bowl then i'm going to work on the onions dice them up then i'm going to grab the tomatoes cut those up i like my guac spicy so i'm going to take the whole jalapeno i just feel so terrified to cut off my thumb i need my thumb use this lime squeezer i'm going to grab some of the cilantro so now i'm going to mix it up and then it's going to be ready so first i'll start with my sour cream some mayonnaise just to kind of help balance some of the tanginess from the sour cream and my cilantro and i'm using both the leaves and the stems because why not so now i'm going to go ahead and grate my garlic into the food processor every time i grate i am worried that i'm going to grade off my fingertips i'm going to zest the lime and i'm going to juice the lime the lime zest will add a nice pop of color to the sauce i'm just going to sprinkle in some salt to help bring out some of these flavors i love to use a mortar and pester because it really releases all the flavors of the herbs and the shallots and the garlic so i'm going to start smashing this mixture of herbs i have parsley shallots and garlic i'm gonna add all my spices the vinegar and the olive oil the smoked paprika chili flakes dry oregano virgin olive oil and red wine vinegar and so i'm going to let this sit for 10 minutes so all the ingredients can really combine and boost the flavor so now i'm going to blend up all these ingredients until it's a nice smooth cohesive sauce and that's my lime herb crema all the juices are out the flavor it's concentrated and it's delicious so i'm going to change it to another bowl and in this case for me it's very important to add different levels of acidity so i'm going to finish it with lime and lemon zest and juice and this is my smoky chimichurri so now that the empanadas are out of the airfryer i'm ready to plate i'm going to get my empanadas down on the plate and i'm gonna add my sauce and these are my breakfast empanadas with guacamole and these are my chicken tinga empanadas with my herby lime crema and these are my pulled pork empanadas with a smoky chimichurri i see a crispy outside so i'm going to haircut as i eat nailed it i mean everything about it says bite me eat me i'm going to be yummy oh my god worth the pain that's some really good guac juicy in the inside crunchy in the outside and the tomatoey it's the perfect sauce that balance up all the flavors the herby creamy sauce really is complementing the smokiness of the chicken tinga and the sauce really slaps empanadas are a spanish and latin american treat let's see how each of our three chefs made theirs steven made a vegetarian filling using beyond meat plant-based sausage it contains a proprietary blend of pea and rice proteins with coconut oil pieces to replicate animal fat it's a tasty and good approximation of real sausage adriana used a sous-vide technique the meat is seasoned and then vacuum sealed in a pouch which is submerged in water held at a constant temperature by an immersion circulator the idea is that the meat will never exceed the temperature of the water so it's a slow cooking method which allows proteins to hydrolyze fat to melt and some of the connective tissue to convert to the softer gelatin there are no browning reactions with this method so she baked it so that the radiant heat of the oven aided in browning the outside of her pork shoulder also known as a picnic roast that comes from the shoulder area of the hog above the four legs alicia used pre-packaged laminated puff pastry laminated doughs are flaky because solid cold fat is covered with flour and rolled to flatten the layers forming sheets of fat and flour for a traditional puff pastry butter is used butter has enough water in it to form steam when baked in a hot oven thereby raising the laminated sheets giving puff pastry its characteristic flakiness adriana made a dough from hominy hominy is corn with the hulls removed by soaking it in an alkaline solution it's very high in starch she soaked it to soften it before cooking it to a paste through the process of gelatinization starch molecules start to vibrate when heated hydrogen bonds break and allow water to combine with starch fractions making the mixture swell and thicken corn doesn't contain gluten so the starches are responsible for the cohesive structure of adriana's empanada dough there are so many options for dough filling cooking and sauces when it comes to delicious empanadas next time you're in the mood to make them we hope you'll take some of the tips from our three fabulous chefs

Channel: Epicurious

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Keywords: 4 levels, 4 levels of empanadas, beef empanadas, best empanada, best empanadas recipe, chicken empanadas, como hacer empanadas, easy empanadas, empanada, empanada recipe, empanadas, empanadas dough, empanadas receta, empanadas recipe, empanadas recipes, epi, epi 4 levels, epicurious, epicurious 4 levels, epicurious empanadas, flaky empanada dough, ground beef empanadas, homemade empanadas, how empanadas are made, how to make empanadas, make empanadas, making empanadas

Id: wAg-2o7vyGc

Length: 16min 17sec (977 seconds)

Published: Tue Sep 06 2022