Pre-pandemic, when we’re grocery shopping and needed some snacks, we often looked for this popular puff pastry beef patties. Besides being reasonably priced, the brand offers variety. The taste is good and the size is right to give a quick hunger fix.
Lately, the hubby seemed to miss it and requested me to bake. Since it’s my first time making puff pastry, I had to watch videos and compare several recipes. And because the kiddo couldn’t eat chilies, adjusting the filling recipe was a prerequisite.
While preparing the filling only follows simple sautéing and addition of chosen spices, making the dough takes some time as it requires several chilling and folding. I wasn’t able to achieve the flaky pastry but, I guess, the family enjoyed it as they had it thrice in a month’s time! 😀
On my first try, I used pork for the filling. The taste was okay but the dough didn’t stretch. I also had an issue with sealing because the filling was oozing from the patty dough.
On my second try, I had better patty dough and was able to seal the chicken patties well.
Since I neither used turmeric nor curry powder on the dough in both instances, the patties turned out pale, unlike the commercial ones that are yellowish or buttery.
Thus, on my third try, I added annatto to give color to the dough. The beef patties looked much better but not quite appealing still. 😀
After three tries, I learned that color is a key factor to appetizing empanadas. I promised to do better next time.
I still want to achieve that ideal flaky pastry. But for now, knowing that my ‘customers’ were satisfied already made me happy. Until the next batch of empanadas, buddies! 😀