I have been wanting to try my hand at two things that I generally avoid in the kitchen: dough and the fryer. I have had too many instances where I tried to make pie crust, bread or really dough of any kind, which have resulted in disaster. I've resorted to buying pie crusts ready-made for fear of repeating past mistakes. The other is the deep fryer. I'm convinced that I will either burn myself, dinner or the entire house. So, when my neighbor told me that she'd found a fool-proof fryer, easy to use and clean and that I could borrow it if I wanted to see for myself, I decided to be brave and try it.
My friend was having a birthday party with a Spanish theme. Lots of small plates. She said that we were welcomed to bring a little something, if we were interested. I decided to try making empanadas. This would force me to face two of my fears in the kitchen and it wasn't so bad after all. In fact, it was fun and the results were really yummy!
I got the recipe from allrecipes.com. Here is the link. As far as I can tell, the recipe is Argentinian, but I'm not sure. I left out the hard-boiled eggs because I don't really like them..with beef. This recipe makes a lot. I think that I made 45 empanadas! You should definitely try it!
Tips:
Use a lot of flour on your rolling pin and surface so the dough doesn't stick.
Get a pair of metal tongs to use to flip your empanadas after 1-2 minutes in the fryer.
I don't think that the recipe mentions it but you may want to close your empanadas by pressing the edges with a fork.
My neighbor's deep fryer is a GE Deep Fryer Model # 169168. Very easy to use and clean!
