Sweet Dessert Empanadas

Course: Dessert

Prep Time: 15

Cook Time: 15

Total Time: 30

Servings: people

Calories: 328kcal

Author: Aleka Shunk

Cost: $8

These Sweet Dessert Empanadas are a fun treat that uses canned biscuit dough. The dough is stuffed with sweet cherry cream cheese and then baked until light and puffy. An easy and fun bite sized party dessert!

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Ingredients

1 8 ct 16.3 oz Can Pillsbury Grands! Flaky Layers Original Biscuits

Cherry Cheesecake Filling

⅔ Cup Canned Cherry Pie Filling
8 oz. Cream Cheese
½ Cup Powdered Sugar
1 Tsp. Vanilla Extract

Egg Wash

1 Egg + 1 tbsp. milk

Instructions

Preheat oven to 350°F.
Pop open your can of biscuits and separate each of the 8 biscuits. Next, take each biscuit and separate them in half by pulling apart the layers down the middle. You should have 16 biscuits now. Take each separated biscuit round and lay each onto a baking sheet. (Greasing your baking sheet is not needed).
*If you did not use Pillbury's FLAKEY LAYERS biscuits, see note below.
Cream together your cream cheese, sugar and vanilla in a bowl or mixer.
Add your cheesecake filling and your cherry pie filling to two separate Ziploc sandwich bags. (small bags) Snip off the corners of each so you have a hole about the size of a dime. We will use these to neatly pipe our filling.
*Adding your filling to bags is not necessary but helps makes thing MUCH easier and quicker.
Squeeze, or spoon, about a tablespoon of cheesecake filling in the center of each biscuit round. Then squeeze the same amount of the cherry filling over top of the cheesecake filling. You want to fill your rounds up as MUCH as possible without spilling out! (And if filling spills out, it's okay!)
Carefully close your empanadas by folding them in half and either pinch the ends together using either your fingers or a fork to seal the edges together. (See photos above.) Make sure to seal them well!
TIP* The dough stretches easily so to help close them, pick the filled dough up by both sides and let the weight of the filling sink down in the middle to help stretch the dough a bit before folding.
Using a pastry brush, lightly brush your scrambled egg wash over top of each sealed empanada. Then sprinkle the top of each with sugar crystals if you have them for a pretty look AND an added crunchy bite. (This is optional)
Bake them on the middle rack for 12-15 minutes or until your dough becomes golden brown. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Notes

*For this recipe, I used Pillsbury’s canned flaky layers biscuit dough. They already come in perfectly shaped rounds so you don’t have to worry about shaping them out.

If you did not get this type of biscuit dough, you will need to CUT each biscuit in half lengthwise and then roll them out or pat them down until they are rounded. (They don't need to be perfect rounds.)

Store any leftover empanadas in a sealed Tupperware container. They have the shelf-life of a danish so will last just 1-2 days at room temperature. If you refrigerate them, they can last up to a week. Freeze them and they will last up to 2 months.

Nutrition