Empanadas Paisas (Columbia)

World-Bites (96) / Empanadas Paisas

Colombian is blessed with a rich natural space, a variety of the fauna and flora and a high agricultural potential. The most significant agricultural possessions are the coffee plantations (Colombia is the second exporter in the world, but Colombian coffee is recognized as the best one), banana trees, cocoa, beans and sugar cane. Combining the Spanish cuisine with that of the Africans and the Native Americans, the Colombian cuisine is known for its exoticness and spicy taste. There are many fried dishes, as frying seems to be the most frequent preparation method of the Colombian cooking: fried puff squares (hojuelas), fried plantains, fried cheese puffs (bunuelos) and various kinds of fried meat. Empanadas Paisas (meat-filled turnovers with cumin seed and brown sugar) is a popular snack throughout Columbia.

Ingredients:

1 lb of lean meat
two large red potatoes
* two eggs
* small onion
* 2 cloves cut up garlic

* bay leaf

* salt

Directions:

Place meat , potatoes and eggs in enough water to cover them. Add the small cut up onion, garlic, bay leafand salt. Bring to boil, then lower to simmer. In about 1/2 hour when the potatoes are tender and the eggs are hard boiled, remove them. Simmer the meat for at least another hour.

Remove meat and cool completely.

Preparation of the meat filling:

Grind the cooked meat in a food grinder, or in a food processor. Chop the potatoes and the eggs finely. Add the eggs and potatoes to the ground meat. Now you must prepare a spicy “hogao” sauce to add to the meat mixture.

Hogao

Ingredients:

* 2 large tomatoes, finely chopped
* 4 green onions, finely chopped
* 3 cloves garlic, minced
* 1 tblsp of cilantro, minced
* salt to taste
* 3 tblsp of olive oil

Directions:

Heat oil in a saucepan and add all of the ingredients. Cook over medium heat until everything is mushy. Add this “hogao” sauce to the meat mixture. You will need to add some broth left over from cooking the meat, in order to get the meat filling moist. You don’t want the filling to be dry.

Preparation of the corn dough:

Salt to taste 3 cups of boiling water, plus a tablespoon of brown sugar. Pour the boiling hot water in a heat proof container, stirring constantly, slowly pour in the 2 cups of yellow corn meal, this will get pretty thick and hard to stir towards the end. Try to knead it as much as you can with the spoon, but eventually, as the dough cools, you can knead it with your hands. When the dough looks pretty smooth, about 5 minutes of kneading, cover it with a plastic or moist towel to keep it from drying out.

In a heavy deep frying pan, pour about 3 inches of oil. Start heating the oil over medium/high heat.
Shape dough into the size of small golf balls. You can do this golf ball shaping ahead of time as long as you keep them covered. Flatten a ball with a flat object such a a plate sprayed with Pam, also spray the surface underneath. Place a heaping tablespoon of meat filling on one hemisphere of the flattened dough. Fold the other half over and pinch together so that there is NO opening showing any filling. Place carefully in the hot oil and fry until golden brown. Drain on papers towels and serve immediately with lime quarters or sauce of your choice.