Another Instagram jobby? I hear you ask. Yes, another Instagram jobby.
Caminito Empanadas piqued my interest right away. A small-ish business who pride themselves on authentic, hand made, high quality produce. The food looks great, and the reviews are overwhelmingly positive.
To add some context – an empanada is essentially a South-American spin on a pasty. And as a pasty lover, I was desperate to give these a try.
I built my own box, choosing one of each of the flavours that tickled my fancy. I had 6 empanadas in total, and I ordered 2 of their homemade dips, too. My total came to £27.19, including shipping.
They were shipped quickly and packaged nicely. They are sent frozen, with ice packs to make sure they stay that way. The package contained an information sheet, which allowed you to identify which empanada was which flavour, cooking instructions, ingredients, nutritional information, and so on. Not one stone was left unturned.
I started with the BBQ pulled pork empanada. I was super excited for this one in particular, but was left a little underwhelmed. The barbeque flavour was a bit muted, and I felt it was lacking in cheesiness. The pork itself was incredibly tender, but there wasn’t an awful lot of it.
The empanadas aren’t massive, so you really notice if there isn’t a great amount of filling.
Next, I went for the chicken and chorizo flavour – which was very pleasant. There was plenty of filling, although it was certainly a bit heavy on the onions. I was very surprised at how fresh it tasted, despite being kept frozen for a decent amount of time. The same goes for the tenderness of the chicken inside – which was pretty much perfect. I don’t think I could really taste any chorizo – but aside from that, it was lovely.
I tried the cheese and ham one next. Whilst being a pretty basic flavour, I had seen it raved about in a lot of the reviews- and rightly so, too. It was absolutely beautiful. The filling was beautifully creamy and cheesy, and the pieces of ham were large and flavoured nicely.
I opted for the plain chicken empanada next. It was definitely nice, but the flavour was largely dominated by bell pepper. Still, there was a great amount of filling – and you can’t escape the feeling that it’s really high quality produce that’s used in these.
I wasn’t sure about the caprese empanada, but ordered it anyway because I did like the way it sounded. I was really pleasantly surprised. This empanada was delightfully cheesy, and super tasty. The basil really took the flavour to another level, which, combined with the sun-dried tomatoes, gave it an almost pizza-like flavour. Typically, with something like this, I would’ve expected the tomatoes to be a bit nasty – just dry pieces of skin and such. But, once again, there was only high quality, good stuff in my empanada.
The cheese and onion came last – a classic pasty flavour. Similarly to the cheese and ham, the cheese was lovely, creamy, and rich (although not quite as rich.). Personally, I like an absurd amount of onions when I have something like this – so I wasn’t crazy impressed with that.
For the dips, I chose the garlic aioli and the chipotle mayo. They came in decently sized tubs (about the size you’d expect for £1 each). The garlic aioli was nice and thick, and fairly mild. Sometimes garlic flavour can be a bit too strong, but the taste of this aioli was very pleasant and nicely balanced.
The chipotle mayonnaise was something that I’d never tried before – but once again, very pleasantly surprised. It offered a perfect balance of sweetness and smokiness, with a slight hint of spice thrown in there for good measure. Overall, a lovely sauce.
I’m not entirely sure either of these dips really went with the empanadas, but that’s just a matter of opinion. Regardless, they were still really good.
In conclusion: Caminito Empanadas offer extremely high quality, tasty food. It is definitely evident that their produce is made with a lot of care – from the sourcing of ingredients, to the production process, to the packaging.
They don’t take too long to cook, as they are fully cooked before being frozen and shipped out – and, of course, will keep in the freezer for a long time. And amazingly, it seems that no matter how long you keep them in the freezer, they retain that freshness – which you almost never get with anything frozen. Especially if it’s been cooked and then frozen. Again, this really adds to the sense that they use top quality ingredients when making these.
To be totally transparent, I’m not completely convinced about the price. At £3.20 per empanada, I would like them to be a little bigger. They do have set deals and a loyalty program, too – but of course, I wanted to cherry pick the flavours.
So, despite my initial reservations about the portion size and price, I feel like they are worth the money. It’s a family owned business, and all of the products are hand-made by their small team.
If you order from Caminito, you are getting a little slice of Argentinian home-cooking delivered to your door. It’s good stuff, and I’d most definitely recommend.
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