Dominican Beef Empanadas | Pastelitos de Carne | Homemade Empanadas | Chef Zee Cooks

what's for dinner hey everyone i'm chef zee and welcome back to my channel chef z cooks today i'm going to be showing you how to make beef empanadas and i am seriously so excited for this dish because the holidays are around the corner and as you know empanadas are perfect for potlucks family gatherings and of course the holidays now if you are new to the chef z family then welcome and just know that i do have a chicken open alice here on my channel as well as a video on how to make empanada dough from scratch two different ways so go ahead and check that out if you're interested now there's a variety of different ways on how to make some beef empanadas and i'm going to show you the regular way and the chef z way so that's going to be a little bit of a bonus and like always stay tuned until the very end of the video because you know why i'm gonna be sharing some tips and tricks to helping you make the perfect beef empanadas each and every single time let's go ahead and get started making empanadas is fairly easy but i do recommend that you give yourself some time just to make all of the different components so first things first we're going to season our ground beef with some onions some peppers and this is a great way to add some color into this dish some fresh cilantro garlic chicken bouillon cube dominican oregano some sausage a touch of cumin and of course some fresh black pepper now we definitely can't forget to add some fresh lime which is definitely going to bring all of these flavors together now you can season your ground beef a variety of different ways that will come out delicious this is simply my favorite way of seasoning some carne molida or picadillo as a standalone dish or when i'm making it as a filling for some lasagna pasta long or in this case some empanadas so once you've added all of your seasonings you want to go ahead and mix it all together and just let it sit for about an hour just so that those flavors really have a chance to settle and now we're going to heat up our skillet we're going to add some oil and we're going to go ahead and start cooking our ground beef now as you guys know i am very particular when it comes to making some kanemolida and i hate it when it's super chewy so i like to make sure to go in and break up all those chunks that will naturally form as the meat starts to cook and i'm constantly going in and breaking it up with the back of my wooden spoon now garni molida is very tricky to make and i know that some people actually like to season it in the skillet and they like to cook it one two three but i personally like to slow cook it because i love it when my ground beef comes out really nice and tender so this means that i like to add some water and let it just cook away for about 30 minutes now depending on the type of ground beef that you're using and if you got a stubborn badge your carne molida might come out really nice and tender after just one round of water but because i'm using some ground beef that's pretty lean it was actually a little bit on the tougher side so i had to go in and add a little bit more water and that's totally fine you may have to do one round of water or two round of water like i did in today's video and this is definitely why you want to give yourself enough time to make all of the different components whenever you are making some empanadas so once the water has dried away we're gonna go ahead and we're going to add some tomato paste and we're going to work it into the ground beef until it is well combined now the next step is totally optional you can add some green olives if you like and you can even add some raisins if you're going to be making the filling as a super old school traditional way which is how my grandmother used to actually make it so once the meat has finished cooking we're going to go ahead and we're actually going to start making the empanadas which is my favorite part now first things first we're gonna flour our cutting board and then we're going to place our empanada dough disc on it and then flour it some more just to make sure that our empanada disc isn't going to stick to our workstation we're now going to roll it out and this step is optional i just hate it when my empanada dough is a little bit too thick and doughy i went ahead and i dusted away any excess flour and now we're going to add that yummy filling that we just made and you want to make sure to be generous but not too generous because you also want your empanada dough to actually close we're now going to add some water to the edges and this is optional but it's a great insurance policy to make sure that your empanada isn't going to open when it's frying we're now going to fold it over and then we're going to gently seal it with our fingers and of course we can't make empanadas without adding the classic fork marks now because i'm a perfectionist i'm actually going to go in with a pizza cutter and i'm going to trim the edges which is further going to seal it and it's going to make the perfect half moon shape as you see right here now as you can see making empanada is super easy and you can either use some homemade dough or some ready-made dough now this is a classic way of making some empanadas and now i'm going to show you the chef z way now amongst my family and friends i'm actually known for my mini empanadas so whenever you see mini empanadas then you know that i'm the person who made them and don't ask me why but i have been doing this for as long as i could remember and when my grandmother was alive she actually used to make fun of me and say that of course i wanted to go the extra mile and make it all cutesy and you make them just like you make the bigger empanadas and again because i'm a perfectionist i also like to go in and trim those edges with a pizza cutter now as you can see here these mini empanadas are super cute and i like making the mini style because you can have a ton and still keep coming back for more we're going to place our made empanadas onto a baking dish and now we're going to get ready to fry them so you want to set your flame to medium high and once that oil has become nice and hot we're going to go ahead and start frying them and you want to fry them three and four at a time you don't want to overcrowd the pot because you don't want the oil to get too cold while it's frying because then your empanadas are going to get too oily so i find that three or four at a time is the perfect amount and every so often you're going to want to flip over the empanadas and i like to fry them until they're this nice light golden color like you see right here and once they reach that perfect color then you know it's time to take them out and you want to drain the excess oil onto a paper towel just like you see here so there you guys have it that's my recipe for making some beef empanadas i hope you enjoy the two different ways and make sure to share them with your friends and family if you have any questions visit my website or comment down below and until next week i'm chef z all right guys here are my quick tips and tricks to help you make the perfect beef empanadas each and every single time for my first tip make sure that you're using grass-fed lean ground beef now if you can't find grass-fed ground beef that's totally fine it's not the end of the world but you definitely want to use ground beef that's lean and i'm talking about an 85 15 blend or even a 90 10 blend now let's say that you can't find lean ground beef guess what it's also not the end of the world if you can only find like an 80 20 blend which news flash is a little bit oily that's totally fine you're just going to want to make your ganemalida as you would and at the very end just drain the excess oil now you always want to drain the excess oil whenever you're making a filling for empanadas lasagna or pasta long just so that when you fry it or bake it it doesn't become a hot oily mess and speaking of oil for my second tip you definitely want to use fresh oil whenever you're making beef empanadas because any time you use old stagnant oil it's definitely going to alter the taste and it's not going to be so good and we definitely want to make some yummy empanadas for my third tip if you're like me then you probably grew up eating pasta littles and for me pasta littles are empanadas except round now in my chicken empanadas video i show you exactly how to do it and it's really easy you just want to take a round disc add your filling take another round disc place it on top seal the edges and if you're perfectionist like me you'll take a biscuit cutter or a large cookie cutter that's round and you're just gonna cut it trim the excess dough and seal those edges and that's just like an easy way of how to make some beef pastelitos now for my fourth and final tip you can definitely make some beef empanadas ahead of time all you want to do is make it so you're going to make the dough or use ready-made dough fill it but don't fry it and then we're going to place it onto a baking dish with some parchment paper or even some saran wrap the trick is that you want something that's not going to stick and then you're going to place that in the freezer and then just use it whenever you're ready to make some beef empanadas but you want to make sure that when it comes time to fry it that you let it come up to room temperature before doing so so there you guys have it my tips and tricks on how to make the perfect beef empanadas thank you guys so much for watching today's video don't forget to join the chef z family and click that bell so that you're notified each and every single time i post an all new video and if you need some inspiration on what to cook next or what to make for the holidays go ahead and click right here

Channel: Chef Zee Cooks

Views: 100,001

Keywords: Dominican empanadas, authentic empanadas, authentic pastelitos, beef patties, beef patty, carne molida, chef zee, cuban food, dominican food, dominican recipes, easy appetizers, easy empanadas, empanada dough from scratch, empanada filling recipe, empanadas de carne, how to make dominican food, how to make empanadas, latin recipes, pastelitos, pastelitos de carne, pastelitos dominicano, picadillo, traditional empanadas, empanadas, dominican food cooking, homemade empanadas

Id: g1aKyZSnSlI

Length: 10min 18sec (618 seconds)

Published: Sun Nov 15 2020