Empanadas are one of my favorite types of hand pies, and these Ground Beef Empanadas are a unique take on a traditional meal. Use puff pastry as a shortcut. and get cooking!

Ground Beef Empanadas

Easy dinners are my jam these days. With a full work schedule and a really full house – I just don’t have time to do anything else.

5pm also seems to be the time of the day that the toddlers decide it is “stand at the gate and scream for mom” hour, so the faster I can get dinner done, the better.

My kids, surprisingly enough, all fall on the slightly picky side.

Shocking, right?

It is easy to get discouraged about dinner because no matter what, someone is faced with a plate of food that they don’t like – and I don’t do separate dinners around here. Nope.

So I try and be accommodating, while also letting them experience other flavors. This is a great way to do that. Great big flavors like olives and feta are featured here but packaged in a flaky pastry crust and a familiar ground beef flavor and texture that they all already know and love.

Can I Make My Own Crust?

You can, but you don’t have to. Puff Pastry does really well here, as would pie crust. The Puff Pastry was my favorite, but either of those are really fabulous options.

If you want to make your own, check out this awesome empanada dough recipe on Smitten Kitchen. This is not a thing I’ve made homemade from scratch. One of the few!