Thin, crisp Brazilian pastries filled with seasoned ground beef, deep-fried until bubbly and shatteringly crunchy.
Pastel is one of Brazil's most beloved fried snacks, a paper-thin pastry (much thinner than an empanada wrapper) folded around a savory filling and deep-fried until it puffs into a blistered, bubbly, incredibly crisp shell. The beef version, pastel de carne, is the most classic, filled with well-seasoned ground beef, onion, and often olives or hard-boiled egg, and found at street fairs, market stalls, and dedicated pastelarias across Brazil. The technique that defines pastel is the dough thinness: the dough is rolled or run through a pasta machine until it's almost translucent, far thinner than most other fried dough snacks, which is what allows it to blister and bubble dramatically in hot oil rather than simply frying into a solid crust. The filling needs to be fully cooked and cooled before assembly, since the pastry cooks so quickly in the fryer that a raw filling wouldn't have time to cook through. Served hot straight from the fryer, often alongside a glass of fresh sugarcane juice (caldo de cana) at Brazilian street fairs, pastel is quick, crunchy, and endlessly satisfying -- one of Brazil's defining street food experiences.
Serves 6
Mix flour and salt. Add oil, vinegar, and warm water, kneading until a smooth, elastic dough forms, about 8 minutes. Rest covered 30 minutes.
Cook ground beef in a pan over medium heat until browned. Add onion and garlic, cook 5 minutes until soft.
Stir in tomato paste, paprika, and salt. Cook 3-4 minutes until well combined. Remove from heat and let cool completely.
Once cooled, stir in olives and chopped egg if using.
Divide dough into portions and roll each as thin as possible, ideally almost translucent, into rectangles.
Place a spoonful of cooled filling on one half of each rectangle. Fold the dough over and press the edges firmly to seal, crimping with a fork.
Heat oil to 180C/350F. Fry pastels in batches 2-3 minutes per side until deeply golden and blistered.
Drain on paper towels briefly and serve hot.
Roll the dough as thin as humanly possible without tearing -- this is the single most important factor in achieving the signature bubbly, blistered crust.
Let the filling cool completely before assembling; hot filling will make the thin dough difficult to work with and can cause tearing.
Seal the edges firmly and thoroughly; any gaps will let oil seep into the filling during frying.
Pastel de queijo: fill with just melted mozzarella cheese for the simplest and most classic variation.
Pastel de camarao: use seasoned shrimp instead of beef for a coastal variation.
Add a small amount of chopped cheese to the beef filling for a richer, meltier bite.
Best eaten immediately while hot and crisp. Refrigerate uncooked assembled pastels up to 1 day and fry fresh; already-fried pastels don't reheat well and lose their signature crispness.
Pastel is believed to have roots connecting to Chinese immigrant communities in Sao Paulo who introduced thin-dough fried pastries, which were then adapted with Brazilian fillings and became a beloved fixture of Brazilian street fairs (feiras) nationwide.
The dough was likely rolled too thick. Roll it as thin as you can manage without tearing -- almost see-through -- for the characteristic bubbly texture in hot oil.
Baking won't produce the same texture; pastel is defined by deep-frying, which is what creates its distinctive blistered, crackling shell.
Yes -- freeze the assembled, uncooked pastels on a tray until solid, then store in a bag; fry directly from frozen, adding an extra minute or two to the frying time.
Per serving (150g / 5.3 oz) · 6 servings total
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