I was hungry for a homemade empanada. If you have never had one empanadas are a stuffed pastry that is filled with a savory or sweet filling and deep fried. I had asked some friends where they recommended I go when I was visiting Tampa. They all suggested Mr. Empanada.
Tucked away in the corner of a shopping center sits Mr. Empanada. If I did not have the address of where to go I would never have seen this place from the street. However, based on the line of people inside, no one else had any problems finding this place.
They have a large selection of empanadas to choose from.
It was a hard choice but I narrowed it down to three:
- Beef & Cheese
- Italian Sausage & Cheese
- Buffalo Chicken & Blue Cheese
I was really excited to dig into these. They had just come out of the fryer so they needed to cool down a little.
I started with the beef and cheese. The tender ground beef was mixed with a ton of cheese. It was extremely creamy because of all the cheese. The beef was full of great spicy flavor. The empanada pastry was sweet and crispy. It held in the meat and cheese as I took a bite so I luckily did not make a mess.
Up next was the Italian sausage and cheese. I was not sure what the sausage would be like inside the empanada shell. They actually took the sausage out of the casing ad cooked it up in crumbles. They then covered it in melted cheese. The sausage had amazing robust flavor. It was even more flavorful than the ground beef and was very tender.
The last empanada was the Buffalo chicken and blue cheese. They took fresh chicken breast meat and shredded it till it was very fine in texture. It was tossed with blue cheese that melted once it was fried up. The cheese and chicken were covered in a tangy Buffalo wing sauce. When I took a bite it was exactly like eating a chicken wing. The empanada shell added crunch to the soft chicken and the blue cheese toned down the tang from the sauce.
I had a great experience at Mr. Empanada. I want to go back to try one of their other varieties. They also made a fresh Cuban sandwich that looked pretty good. Another good thing about Mr. Empanada is they now can ship directly to your home across the country.
Visit their website to order your empanada or check out one of their local shops http://www.mrempanada.com/
Enjoy!
T
