isithalal.food · Recipes

Beef empanadas without chorizo

Baked beef empanadas with a butter pastry instead of lard, Halal beef mince, and Halal beef chorizo or extra mince in place of pork chorizo.

Spanish · Snack · Moderate · 16 empanadas · 95 min

Each method follows published technique for the dish, and every Halal substitution is checked against the ingredient pages we cite. Photographs come from our ingredient library rather than the finished dish.

Print Back to recipe

Why Halal checks matter here

Empanada dough is often made with lard, a popular filling mixes in pork chorizo, and the beef is only Halal if it was slaughtered the Halal way.

Halal-critical ingredients

• Chorizo: Ordinary chorizo is pork sausage, and the original filling mixes 100 g of it into the beef. Use more Halal beef mince, or a beef chorizo with a Halal certifier's mark. See Chorizo.
• Lard in the pastry: Many empanada doughs are made with lard, which is pork fat. This pastry uses butter. When buying empanadas, ask which fat is in the dough. See Lard and Empanadas.
• Beef mince: Beef is Halal only from Halal slaughter. Buy from a Halal butcher or a certified pack. See Beef.

Ingredients

Pastry

• 375 g (3 cups) plain flour
• 6 g (1 tsp) salt
• 220 g (1 cup) chilled unsalted butter, chopped (not lard)
• 100 g (2 large) eggs, beaten (keep a little for brushing)
• 100 ml (⅓ cup + 1 tbsp) cold water

Filling

• 400 g (14 oz) Halal beef mince, plus 100 g more in place of the chorizo
• 150 g (1 large) onion, chopped
• 15 g (½ small pack) coriander, finely chopped
• 15 g (½ small pack) parsley, finely chopped
• 5 g (2 tsp) smoked paprika
• 4 g (2 tsp) ground cumin
• 2 g (1 tsp) chilli flakes
• 32 g (2 tbsp) tomato purée
• 100 g (3½ oz) optional Halal-certified beef chorizo, skinned, in place of 100 g of the mince

Method

1. Make the pastry. Tip the flour into a bowl with the salt and rub in the butter with your fingertips until crumbly. Add most of the beaten egg and the cold water, bring it together into a dough and knead briefly on a floured surface until smooth. Wrap and chill for 20 minutes.
2. Cook the filling. Mix the mince (with the Halal beef chorizo, if using) with the onion, coriander, parsley, paprika, cumin and chilli flakes. Cook in a frying pan over a medium heat for 2 minutes, add the tomato purée and cook for 7 to 10 minutes more until cooked through. Leave to cool.
3. Fill and seal. Heat the oven to 180°C (160°C fan). Divide the dough into four, roll each piece out thinly and cut 10 cm discs. Put a spoonful of filling in the middle of each disc, wet the edges, fold in half and crimp with a fork.
4. Bake. Lay the empanadas on a lined baking tray, brush with the rest of the egg and bake for about 20 minutes until golden. Cool for 5 minutes before serving.

Allergens

gluten (flour), milk (butter), egg

How this recipe was researched

Method adapted from BBC Good Food's 'Beef & chorizo empanadas' (butter pastry with egg, a spiced beef and chorizo filling with herbs and tomato purée, 10 cm discs folded and crimped, brushed with egg and baked for 20 minutes). We replaced its 100 g of cooking chorizo with Halal beef mince (or a Halal-certified beef chorizo) and specified Halal beef; its pastry already uses butter, not lard. Timings follow the published technique rather than a kitchen test.

Photograph from our ingredient library: an empanada, not the finished dish.