I love alfajores (who wouldn't?). The delicious combination of dulce de leche, toasted coconut, and cornmeal-style shortbread is almost too much to handle. So why not turn this delectable cookie into a larger dessert empanada? My thoughts, exactly.
These empanadas couldn't get much easier. Make your empanada dough, roll it out, fill it with dulce de leche, and top with a toasted coconut sugar.
It has nothing to do with South America or empanadas, but one of my superfluous summer goals for 2014 was to listen to more early Black Sabbath. I found their self-titled debut album on vinyl yesterday in Richmond at Steady Sounds, so here's "N.I.B.", live from Paris in 1970.
Ingredients:
For the dough:
--3/4 c. all-purpose flour
--1/2 c. yellow corn flour (not to be confused with cornstarch!)
--2 tbsp. granulated sugar
--1/2 c. butter, chopped and chilled
--1/4 c. ice water
--1 egg yolk
For the rest:
--1/4 c. turbinado sugar
--1/4 c. sweetened coconut
--1 egg, beaten
--1 jar dulce de leche
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
In a food processor (or in a bowl using a pastry blender), combine the dough ingredients. Immediately roll out onto a floured surface until the dough is about 1/8" thick. Cut the dough into circles with a diameter of approximately 6-8" (you can use a small plate or saucer to do this). Place the circles between parchment and chill in the fridge until you're ready to use them.
Now for the topping. In your food processor, combine 1/4 c. turbinado sugar and 1/4 c. sweetened coconut. Pulse the sugar and coconut mixture until it's very finely ground. Set aside.
Remove your empanada dough circles from the fridge and fill each with about 2 tbsp. dulce de leche on one side of the circle. Fold the dough over the dulce de leche filling, creating half moons. Now you need to seal the empanadas. To make a braided seal, or repulge, take a look at this short video. (*Note: if you're having trouble making the braided seal, you can pinch the edges firmly.)
Brush your egg wash over the tops of the empanadas and generously sprinkle your sugar and coconut mixture. On a parchment-lined baking sheet, place 6 empanadas at a time. Bake for approximately 25 minutes. If the crusts are turning golden, they're overdone. You only want the coconut to begin to toast before you take them out of the oven. When they're done, remove from oven and allow to cool before serving (the filling will be *extremely* hot!). Store in an airtight container.
Have you eaten alfajores de maizena in Argentina? They're delicious cornflour shortbread cookies, filled (in some cases, sky high) with dulce de leche and rolled in toasted coconut flakes. Until I had encountered the pastelerias in Buenos Aires, I thought I had already sampled the best sweets the world had to offer (baklava in Istanbul, of course). And just when I thought Argentinian sweets couldn't get any better, I tried the most amazingly delightful alfajores de maizena at the Mataderos Sunday market. Crumbly, melt-in-your mouth, dulce de leche delights.
These cookies are a labor of love: first you have to make the shortbread cookies, then you'll have to fill them with dulce de leche before rolling them in coconut. But it's worth every extra minute. They're not easy to come by in the U.S., and they're really good. We brought some delicious and fresh dulce de leche home from Green Eat on Buenos Aires' Reconquista for some authentic alfajores at home in Virginia. But don't worry: you can buy dulce de leche at almost any specialty foods store.
When I think of "paradise," I rarely see beaches or impossibly sunny days. Instead, with more than one hundred used bookstores (I visited fifty-eight of them!) and dulce de leche-infused sweets on every corner, Buenos Aires was for me, in many ways, a paradise. Here's the Atlantics' "Adventures in Paradise" from this Australian band's 1963 album, Bombora.
Ingredients:
--1/2 c. corn flour (no, not cornstarch--this is a specialty corn flour I bought at Whole Foods)
--1/2 c. all-purpose flour, + extra for rolling
--3 1/3 c. cornstarch
--1/2 tsp. baking powder
--3/4 c. unsalted butter, softened
--1 1/3 c. granulated sugar
--3 egg yolks
--1 tsp. vanilla
--2 tsp. dark rum
--16 oz. dulce de leche
--1 c. very finely shredded toasted coconut (you can grind already shredded coconut even further in a food processor)
Preheat oven to 300 degrees F.
In a large bowl, combine wet ingredients. Mix until fully combined and a fluffy light yellow color. In a separate bowl, sift the dry ingredients. Slowly add them to the wet ingredients, about 1/4 of the dry mixture at a time. Don't overmix! Once the dry mixture is incorporated (and it should be very dry and crumbly at this point), separate the dough into quarters.
On a floured surface, roll one of the dough quarters until it's about 1/2" thick. Using a 3" biscuit cutter, cut dough circles. Place about 1/2" apart on a parchment-lined baking sheet. Bake for 7-8 minutes. Do not let these cookies turn golden-colored on top--if they have any golden tone, they're overcooked. Allow the cookies to cool on a cooling rack and repeat instructions until you have about 75 shortbread cookies.
Once the cookies have all cooled, liberally apply dulce de leche to the flat side (bottom side) of one of the cookies. Be very careful--the cookies are very fragile and will crumble easily with too much pressure. Once you've smothered the bottom of the cookie in what most Argentinian menus translate as "milk caramel," add another cookie on top, flat side down (bottom side), making a cookie sandwich. Repeat until all cookies have become cookie sandwiches. Each sandwich should have about 1/4" of dulce de leche in the middle (of course, if you like a lot of dulce de leche, add more).
Place your shredded coconut in a shallow bowl. Roll each cookie like a wheel until the exposed dulce de leche has been coated with coconut. Repeat until you've finished all cookies. Makes about 3 dozen alfajores de maizena. You won't regret it.
At a small Buenos Aires restaurant called Na Serapia, I ordered a dish I had never seen on a menu before: humita. My plate arrived with a small square package of folded cornhusks, filled with creamed corn and tied together with a string of husk. Naturally, I knew I'd be making a version back at home. Humitas are South American steamed corn cakes, created with fresh corn, cheese, and spices.
*Just as a side note, the owner of Na Serapia is one quirky and cool dude. This portrait of him hangs on the wall behind one of the tables, and in fact, the MALBA now keeps it in their permanent collection. He's a hole-in-the-wall, pun intended, Buenos Aires celebrity of sorts.
Aside from the blanching and folding of the cornhusks, the corn cakes themselves are pretty easy to make. I added a few ingredients of my own and steamed them in a roasting pan. They're delicious for dinner on their own, as an appetizer, or to accompany a juicy steak. They're also the perfect addition to any autumn menu.
In South America, these are often made with choclo, a large-kerneled corn from the Andes. While I can't provide you with ears of corn that are out of the current reach of my American hands, I can give you an Andean song. Here is Violeta Parra's extraordinary "Gracias a la vida."
Ingredients:
--6 ears of corn
--1/3 c. half and half
--1 c. cornmeal
--2 red peppers, chopped
--2 cloves garlic, slices thinly
--1 medium-sized yellow onion, chopped
--2 tbsp. olive oil
--2 eggs
--2 c. shredded cheese (I used mozzarella, but if you have a crumbly queso, I think that'd be delicious)
--1 tsp. coriander
--a few pinches of salt and pepper
In a medium-sized saucepan, saute the garlic and onions for about 3-4 minutes in the olive oil until they're getting soft. Add the red peppers and saute until everything is soft and aromatic. Set aside and allow to cool just a bit.
Husk the ears of corn, being very careful to preserve the husks--you're going to be using them as casings for the corn cakes. Set the husks aside. Using a large knife, cut the kernels from the corn and place them in a large food processor. Don't pulse yet!
To the kernels in the food processor, add the garlic/onion/pepper mixture, the half and half, cornmeal shredded cheese, eggs, coriander, and the salt and pepper (in other words, all remaining ingredients). Pulse for about a minute, or until all ingredients are finely ground and combined. Set aside.
Now, the next part gets a little tricky. Fill a large pot with water and bring to a boil. Add the corn husks and boil for about 5-7 minutes, or until they're soft and pliable. Drain the pot and place the husks in a bowl of ice water.
Using 3 or 4 husks as a base, line them up on a workspace, and then add 3 or 4 more in a cross pattern on top. In short, you're creating a liner/pocket to fill with the corn cake mixture. This picture should help:
Next, fill the layer of cornhusks with about 1/2 c. of the corn mixture.
Then, fold up the edges so you've got a small packet, and tie a piece of a cornhusk around the packet to keep its shape.
Repeat with all remaining husks and remaining corn mixture. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F, and fill the bottom of a roasting pan with about 1/2" water. Place the roasting rack in the dish, and place the corn packets on top of the roasting rack (you want to steam them in the oven).
Place the roasting dish in the oven and steam/bake for approximately 40 minutes, or just until the edges of the husks begin to turn a golden color. Remove from oven and allow to cool.
Serve in a dish. When you unwrap them, you'll find a delicious and perfectly steamed corn cake.
And as with everything else from South America, it seems, humitas go very nicely with a glass of Torrontes.
The torta de mil hojas is a classic South American dessert. I tried my first slice at Liguria, an amazing and quirky restaurant in Santiago. I bought another in Buenos Aires at our neighborhood panaderia, Del Carmen on Viamonte. In Chile, the cake featured a lighter caramel in between the layers, and naturally, the Argentinean version had spoonfuls (and more spoonfuls) of dulce de leche.
While I was in the Southern Cone, I continued to dream about all of the sweet things to pair with dulce de leche when I returned to America. Banana has been at the top of my list since I had a banana split and dulce de leche sundae at Freddo, the best heladeria in the world. (I'm not kidding: I don't think I'll ever taste ice cream that's as rich, velvety, and creamy until I return to Argentina.)
I thought a torta de mil hojas featuring some fresh bananas would be out of this world, and it turns out I was right. As with any layer cake, this one is a labor of love, but it's definitely worth the work. I topped mine with a decorative Argentinean sun.
I have the most perfect song to accompany the banana torta de mil hojas. Los Beat 4, a Chilean band formed in Santiago in the late 1960s, has a song that's absolutely made for this dessert. Here's "Dame un Bananino" ("Give me a banana!").
Ingredients:
--1 1/4 c. flour, + extra for rolling
--1/2 c. chilled butter, chopped
--1/4 c. ice water
--pinch of salt
--pinch of granulated sugar
--2 c. dulce de leche (we brought some back from Argentina, but you can also buy it at any specialty foods store, or in many cases, the lovely World Market)
--2 ripe bananas, slice very thinly
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
In a food processor, make a pastry crust by pulsing the flour, butter, ice water, salt, and sugar until the mixture begins to form a ball of dough. On a large flat surface, add some flour and roll out the dough until it's quite thin. Using a dish or other perfect circle, cut out eight (8) dough circles that are approximately 6" in diameter.
On a parchment lined baking dish, bake the pastry dough for about 12 minutes, or until it becomes lightly golden around the edges. Remove and allow to cool completely. **If you want to make a design on top like I did, cut out whatever design you'd like from your remaining dough and bake for 10-12 minutes, or just until golden around the edges--just like the pastry layers.
Once the pastries have cooled, place a dollop of dulce de leche on the bottom of a plate and stick the first pastry circle on top. This will prevent the torta de mil hojas from moving around. Coat the top of the first pastry circle with a heaping of dulce de leche (about 3-4 tablespoons), and then add another pastry circle on top. This time, coat the circle with a very thin layer of dulce de leche (less than one tablespoon) and add a thin layer of bananas. Repeat, alternating between layers of dulce de leche and bananas, until you've placed the final pastry circle on top. If you're adding some pastry decor, attach it with any remaining dulce de leche.
Serve!
In South America during the winter months of July and August, calabaza is king! Panaderías all over Santiago and Buenos Aires sell pumpkin empanadas, pumpkin torts, and so on. I also had some amazing calabaza creations at Cumana, a delicious restaurant in Buenos Aires' Recoleta neighborhood. Naturally, given my love of winter squashes, I tried my hand at some pumpkin and cheese empanadas in our Buenos Aires kitchen! And they're a fabulous savory pastry to have for dinner on a chilly night.
They're also pretty easy to make. Once you've made the flaky empanada dough (basically a pie crust with some salt and pepper), all you need to do is fill your savory pastries with a pumpkin mash. I bought and roasted a pumpkin, added some delicious raw honey fresh from the Pampas, and topped off the filling with some delicious Argentinian queso de campo and a little bit of salt and pepper.
After going to a New Order show just before leaving for South America, I've been listening to a lot of Joy Division and New Order (in fact, I listened to "Unknown Pleasures" almost exclusively as I rode buses to Isla Negra and Valparaiso in Chile). Given the way these empanadas conjure my visit, here's Joy Division's haunting and beautiful "Atmosphere" (and, might I add, one of my favorite music videos of all time).
Ingredients:
The Empanada Crust:
--2 1/2 c. flour
--1 c. cold butter
--1/2 c. ice water
--1 tsp. salt
--1/2 tsp. pepper
--1 egg yolk
--extra flour for rolling
Pour flour into a large bowl and cut in the butter (you can also pulse the ingredients in a food processor). Add the ice water, salt, pepper, and egg yolk. Mix together until all the dry flour has absorbed into the dough.
Roll on a flat surface and cut into approx. 6" diameter circles. Set aside until ready to use.
The Filling:
--1/2 c. shredded queso de campo (if you can't find this cheese in the states, you can substitute a Spanish manchego)
--3 c. pumpkin puree (about one medium-sized pumpkin, roasted)
--3 heaping tablespoons of raw honey
--1 large yellow onion, chopped
--2 cloves garlic, minced.
--2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
--salt and pepper to taste
Preheat oven to 425 degrees F.
If you're roasting your own pumpkin, slice in half lengthwise and scoop out the seeds with a spoon. Coat the squash with olive oil. Place both halves on a baking sheet and roast for approximately 1 hour, or until soft. Remove from oven and allow to cool. (If you're using canned pumpkin, go on to the next set of steps.)
Decrease oven heat to 350 degrees F.
In a large saucepan, saute the garlic and onions until soft and golden. Set aside until ready to use.
In the saucepan with the onions and garlic, mash in the pumpkin puree, raw honey, queso, and the salt and pepper. (If you've roasted your own pumpkin, it should be soft enough to just scoop right out of its skin and into the bowl.) I like mine with some texture, so I do a rustic mash with chunks of the squash still intact.
Fill each empanada shell with about 1 tablespoon of the mash, fold the shell over to create a half-moon shape, and press the edges together with a fork. Poke a couple of fork hole in the top to allow the empanada to breathe in the oven. Continue until you've filled all empanadas. (That's me, in our Argentinean kitchen.)
Place empanadas on a parchment-lined baking sheet and bake for about 25 minutes, or until the edges become golden and crispy. Remove from oven, allow to cool, and serve.
Eat heartily and happily!
*Wine hint: these go very, very well with a bottle of Torrontes, a delicious Argentinean white wine.
