How To Make Perfect Empanadas In The Air Fryer

Empanadas are a culinary tradition claimed by countries from Europe to north Africa to Latin America. Usually, empanadas fall under two categories: Deep fried and oven-baked. In a recent interview with Tasting Table, Lorena Cantarovici, owner of Maria Empanada, affirms that air frying is the easy and quick method you should try on your next batch of empanadas.

"Making empanadas in the air fryer is great because it's ideal to cook them at a high temperature for a short period of time," she says. "In the countryside, empanadas are cooked in brick or clay ovens at high heat which can produce darker blisters like on the crust of delicious pizzas from Naples, Italy. Because of this, you need to watch them carefully and take them out before they over cook. Set the air fryer at 425 degrees Fahrenheit and watch like a hawk after about four minutes if cooking fresh. Reduce to 400 degrees Fahrenheit if cooking from frozen for about eight minutes. Oh, and please, never flip an empanada."

Air fryers function like a powerful convection oven, blasting food from all sides with hot air much more efficiently than your typical home oven. As its name implies, air fryers are famous for instilling the crispy crunch associated with deep frying. So, whether you're making these deep fried chicken empanadas with green chile or these crispy baked beef and sweet potato empanadas, you can convert them both to air fryer recipes and save yourself time and a mess.

Lorena Cantarovici compares a hot air fryer to a fiery Italian pizza oven, creating charred bubbles that you'd see in Neapolitan pizzas. The same can be said for calzones, which are essentially giant empanadas. That said, empanadas use a different type of dough with butter that creates more of a flakey, delicate texture when cooked. Whether you're making the dough from scratch or forming store-bought pastry dough like these Pepperidge Farm puff pastry sheets, you'll still need to brush the dough with egg wash to get that crackly, crispy, buttery shell.

A bubbly crispy empanada shell needs a tender and texturally complex filling. An earlier interview conducted by Tasting Table staff gives three key factors to pay attention to for perfect empanada fillings that include a juicy but not overly wet filling, a chunky consistency, and well-executed seasoning. You may not be able to correct an underseasoned empanada filling, but you can pair it with flavorful sauces to compensate. For an Argentinian empanada fan, this easy chimichurri sauce is a bright, tangy, and herbal pairing. These classic Spanish empanadas stuffed with tuna will pair well with a smoky and rich romesco sauce. Even if you stray from the conventional savory fillings, a sweet empanada can still follow the three-factor guidelines. You could pair a creamy nutella filling with a chunky fruit compote or diced raw fruit like cherries or bananas.