Pulled Pork Empanadas with Peach-Chipotle Barbecue Sauce

in Appetizers, Chipotle peppers, Pastry, Peaches and apricots, Pies and Tarts, Pork, Tailgating Favorites

Pulled Pork Empanadas with Peach-Chipotle Barbecue Sauce

Some of the greatest things about food blogging have very little to do with food. I’ve had a chance to meet some absolutely fun and wonderful people over the last several years, and one of those fun and wonderful people is about to have a brand new baby!

My friend Josie, the sweet tea and southern food lover behind Pink Parsley, will soon be welcoming a new baby boy to her family! Since we all couldn’t get together in one place at the same time to celebrate, our friend Annie of Annie’s Eats is hosting a virtual baby shower – lots of food, lots of love, spread out over the country.

I chose to make Pulled Pork Empanadas with Peach-Chipotle Barbecue Sauce. Josie’s love of peaches rivals few and you’ll never come up short of suggestions if you search the word “chipotle” on her blog. We combined the two and ended up with one heck of an appetizer and one completely addicting dipping sauce!

Empanadas are one of our favorite ways to “deal with” leftover pulled pork. (I say it like it’s a chore. It’s most definitely not!) And the sauce? It’s almost a barbecue-sweet & sour hybrid with the expected tanginess from the tomatoes and cider vinegar, smokiness from the chipotles, and sweetness from the molasses and a big helping of your favorite peach preserves.

So head on over to Annie’s Eats and Pink Parsley – run, do not walk – to share some love and see a round-up of the full shower menu. It’s full of amazing food from some very talented (and equally fun and wonderful) bloggers.

And, seriously. We’re really going to have to figure out a way to do this in person next time.

Pulled Pork Empanadas with Peach-Chipotle Barbecue Sauce

Leftover pulled pork gets a makeover with empanadas and a sweet-smokey-spicy barbecue dipping sauce. Take a short cut and simmer peach preserves with your favorite brand of barbecue sauce or make the sauce from scratch.

Ingredients

  • For the empanadas:
  • 1 stick of butter, chilled
  • 1 1/4 cup whole wheat flour
  • 1 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
  • 1 1/2 tsp salt
  • 1/2 tsp paprika
  • 1/4 tsp fresh ground black pepper
  • 1 egg
  • 1/3 cup ice water
  • 1 Tbsp white vinegar
  • ~2 1/2 cups leftover pulled pork
  • For the sauce:
  • 2 Tbsp olive oil
  • 1/4 cup chopped onion
  • 1 clove garlic, minced
  • 1/4 cup peppers and sauce from canned chipotles in adobo, minced
  • 2/3 cup ketchup
  • 1/4-1/2 cup water
  • 1 Tbsp cider vinegar
  • 1 Tbsp spicy brown (or creole) mustard
  • 1 Tbsp molasses
  • 1/2 cup peach preserves
  • Black pepper
  • Pinch of salt
  • For the egg wash:
  • 1 egg
  • 1 Tbsp water

Instructions

  1. To make the empanada dough, cut the butter into the flours, salt, pepper, and paprika in a large bowl until the butter chunks are pea-sized (I do this in a food processor).
  2. Whisk together the egg, water, and vinegar and add to the flour mixture, mixing with a fork until just incorporated.
  3. Turn out onto a lightly floured surface and knead a few times before patting into a circle.
  4. Wrap the dough in plastic and chill for an hour.
  5. To make the sauce, heat oil over medium heat in a medium sauce pan.
  6. Saute onions until soft and translucent. Add garlic, stir, and cook for 1 minute more.
  7. Add the minced chipotles and sauce to the pan.
  8. Stir in the ketchup, vinegar, water, mustard, molasses, and peach preserves.
  9. Simmer for 10 minutes.
  10. Season with salt & pepper to taste.
  11. Transfer to a jar or airtight bowl and store in the fridge (will keep for ~2 weeks).
  12. To form the empanadas, cut the dough into 4 pieces and roll to ~1/8 inch thick.
  13. Cut ~4-inch round circles from the dough, rolling and cutting scraps (you should get 4 rounds from each quarter).
  14. Whisk egg and water together and brush the edges of a dough round.
  15. Preheat oven to 400.
  16. Toss 1/4-1/3 cup sauce with pulled pork (just enough moisten the pork).
  17. Place a large spoonful of pork in the center of the round, folding the top half to the bottom, and lightly pressing to seal.
  18. Use a floured fork to press the tines around the edges.
  19. Repeat for all remaining dough rounds.
  20. Brush the empanadas with the remaining egg wash.
  21. Bake 20-25 minutes, until golden brown.
  22. Serve warm or at room temp with additional sauce for dipping.

Notes

Yields: ~16 empanadas

Source: Confections of a Foodie Bride, dough adapted from Gourmet

Estimated time: 2 hours

33 comments… add one
  • You’re right, we do need to do this in person next time! 🙂 I love when we have these because some really great food ideas come out to serve at parties. I have a feeling this is going to be the first dish Josie tries!

  • I never thought to use empanadas for left over pulled pork! I guess its the dough rolling that would scare me off. These sound so good though, I have some left over pulled pork from last nights carnitas, I think I could attempt something like this!

  • Such a thoughtful idea!

    And what a great recipe!

  • These are pretty much little bites of my favorite things – pie crust, pulled pork, chipotles, peaches, and BBQ sauce. Joey is actually smoking a pork shoulder this weekend, so now I know what to do with the leftovers. And now I have a BBQ sauce recipe to serve with the pork. You are awesome, Shawnda!!

  • I cannot wait to try this with our next batch of pulled pork. With only two of us for most dinners, we enjoy making and eating the pulled pork but always have a lot left over. Once the weather cools off and the days shorten, I will be trying this. Thanks for sharing! And great job in the virtual shower. I’m loving seeing all these recipes this morning.

  • These look sooooo good!

  • Jennifer

    I see these being made in my near future! YUM!

  • We have gobs of leftover pork when my husband gets in the mood to use the smoker plus I have lots of peach preserves canned and can only take so many breakfasts of jam-on-toast. Definitely making these soon.

  • Empanadas? Peach? Pork? Barbeque? Ahhhhh…. Shawnda..I have always been a fan of your blog.. but now you may have a crazed stalker on your hands! Seriously.. what a great combination… ::drool:: It was great contributing with you!!!

  • These look wooonderful! Lucky JoJo!

  • I normally am not the biggest fan of pulled pork or BBQ sauce, but you are making me want both badly. Thanks for being part of Josie’s shower! We will definitely have to do this in person someday.

  • Wow! These look great! You’ve creatively combined all these ingredients to make an amazing dish. I absolutely love the idea! I want to make these soon.

  • I sometimes think about what it would be like if all of my favorite bloggers and i got together to go on vacation somewhere…maybe paris or Italy…how awesome would that be?

    Peach-chipotle bbq sauce? I feel inspired.

  • I feel like the second luckiest girl in the world right now (Josie being the first, of course) because I happen to have leftover pulled pork in my freezer right now. These are so on the menu…and soon!

  • These look incredible!! Peach chipotle bbq sauce?! Yes, please! 🙂

  • Beautiful photo and delicious sound recipe!

  • You had me at pulled pork! Once again, you’ve outdone yourself, Shawnda. These empanadas look amazing and paired with the peach-chipotle bbq sauce, I can’t imagine how they could get any better…except if you were able to mail me some. 🙂 And I totally agree – we all SO need to get together in real life!

  • I don’t know how you do it, Shawnda. You always come up with such fantastic flavor combinations and leave me wanting to lick my screen. Sometimes I wish I still lived in Texas so that we could cook and make wine and beer together.

  • I am drooling over this peach chipotle BBQ sauce. I am heading to a BBQ this weekend, and since I don’t do meat, I am thinking about trying this out on some grilled tofu. Sweet and spicy? I’m in!

  • These empanadas look beautiful and so delicious!

  • Beautiful picture and delicious sounding recipe! This is definitely something I want to try.

  • Tres Delicious

    Sounds good and looks healthy. The sweetness of peach seemed to blend with the flavor of pork

  • When I saw the photo I thought they looked identical to my fake ‘pierogi’ I made for a cooking comp a couple of weeks ago ( http://expatgourmet.wordpress.com/2011/07/23/24-going-on-74/ ), but they were filled with saurkraut and ham. I’m experimenting with different fillings and I’ll have to give yours a bash too. They just look so beautiful!

  • GastroStu

    Thanks a lot for posting, sounds great. There’s not enough good leftover recipes floating around online.

  • What a great combination of flavors! I’ve got to find an excuse to make these.

  • Mmmmmmmmmmm. yummy. Pulled pork is a favorite, and the peach chipotle sounds unbeatable!

  • As soon as I read what you were making for this shower, I thought, “well, no one is ever going to top THAT.” Hah. These look delicious. I mean, you really can’t go wrong with empanadas, but with pulled pork, chipotle, and peach? Amazing.

  • Jaye

    I just used the dough of this recipe to make some empanadas stuffed with left over shredded buffalo chicken and some blue cheese. It was a amazing!!! This is my new go to recipe. Totally going to use this again and again. Just this morning I stuffed 10 of them with leftover mash potatoes and diced sausage links.

    They freeze really well. I prepare up to the point I would put them in the oven – and I flash freeze them and later transfer to a large freezer bag. When I am really to eat I place them frozen in the oven at 350 for 30 minutes! Perfect. Thank you so much for the yummy recipe.

  • Cathy R. Braun

    Saved as a favorite, I really like your blog!

  • Rosey

    Yum! I’m making these this weekend! I’ve got peaches galore and oh, so many recipes to try out! Now I’m wondering if I should can up a bunch of the peach-chipotle barbeque sauce….!

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