Making food from scratch is often times more time consuming. There are plenty of reasons to do it, however. The first, and my personal favorite, is that making your own food allows you to control the ingredients used. You can also make it exactly how you like it, and personalize it for others that you cook for. This mushroom pecan empanadas recipe is time consuming, but totally worth the effort!
Eating whole foods is a personal goal of mine. I often times try using whole wheat flour in recipes that don’t call for it because eating whole foods is important to me. The dough recipe for mushroom pecan empanadas uses about 1/3 whole wheat flour. The whole wheat flour makes the dough a bit more difficult to work with because it gets crumbly as you work with it. However you couldn’t tell in the finished product, the flavor was amazing and paired well with the pecans.
Variations on the Mushroom Pecan Empanadas recipe:
- If you can’t find white whole wheat flour, use all purpose flour. Regular whole wheat flour has a tough grain that will make this dough recipe very difficult to work with.
- If you aren’t into pecans, try walnuts or almonds. The nuts pair really well with the whole wheat dough!
- If you have extra time, try making your own tomatillo sauce instead of using green salsa.
- In place of mexican cheese blend, you could use queso fresco or cheddar.
Mushroom Pecan Empanadas
- Prep Time: 1 hour 30 mins
- Cook Time: 24 mins
- Total Time: 1 hour 54 mins
- Yield: 8 servings
- Category: Main
- Cuisine: Cuban
Ingredients
Dough
- 1 ½ cups white whole wheat flour
- 2 ¼ cups all purpose flour
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 2/3 cup olive oil
- 2/3 cup cold water
Filling
- Splash olive oil
- 1 ½ cups yellow onion, diced
- 4 garlic cloves, minced
- 8 oz mushrooms, chopped
- ½ tsp salt
- ½ tsp black pepper
- 6 oz package pecan pieces – 1 ½ cups
- ¾ cup tomatillo salsa
- ¾ cup mexican shredded cheese blend
- 1 egg, beaten
- 1-2 tsp water
- 16 oz tomatillo salsa, for serving
Instructions
Dough
- In a 9 cup food processor, mix together the flours, salt, and baking powder by pulsing a few times.
- Mix together the olive oil and cold water until an emulsion forms. With the food processor running, poor the emulsion through the chute. Stop the food processor, scrape down the sides, and run again until well combined. The dough will be the texture of fine crumbles.
- Transfer the dough to a working surface and knead it by pressing into the surface until the dough comes together into a ball. Split the dough into two sections and flatten into a 5 inch disk. Place disks into a zip top bag for 30 minutes to rest.
Filling
- Heat olive oil in a skillet. Add onion and cook covered until it starts to turn translucent, about 5 minutes. Mix in garlic through black pepper and cook uncovered until the liquid from the mushrooms starts to form. Mix in pecans and cook until the liquid is absorbed. Remove from heat and mix in tomatillo salsa and cheese. Set aside until ready to fill the pockets.
Pockets
- Preheat the oven to 400ºF.
- Whisk together beaten egg and water. Set aside.
- Working with one disk at a time, cut it into 8 pieces. I find it is easiest to cut it into wedges like a pie. Work with one portion at a time, keeping all the other portions covered so they won’t dry out.
- Roll out a single portion into a 6 inch circle. The circle does not have to be perfect, but it will be helpful if it halves mirror one another so they will come together when you fill it.
- Brush the edges of the circle with the egg wash. Place about 3 TBS filling on one side of the circle. Flip the other side over the filling and pinch the edges together. If they don’t meet perfectly, try folding the dough up from the bottom to reach the dough on the top and pinch together so there will be a ½ inch edge. On the edge, press with a fork to seal and make a pretty border on the empanada. Repeat with remaining dough portions, and the next dough disk.
- Place empanadas on a parchment lined baking sheet. Brush the tops with remaining egg wash. If you run out of egg wash, crack antoher egg and continue until all the empanadas are covered.
- Bake in the preheated oven for 24 minutes, or until golden brown. Serve with extra salsa. Makes 16 empanadas, or 8 main dish servings.
Notes
Leftover empanadas can be frozen and reheated in the oven at 350°F for 15 minutes.
Recipe adapted from Cooking Light.
I know Alison and I know what she can do with a camera. I had to chuckle and enjoy the above photo. It is heart warming to see that the empanadas are not perfectly shaped. They look like if you were to make them at home. So many food pictures everything is made to look just so perfect that when you make it is does not looking anything like the picture you saw in the recipe. Not with Alison’s recipes. Not picture perfect but mouth perfect.
Home cooked food by a home cook is what you will find here! And they were very tasty. Thanks Lee!