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Karipap (Malay Curry Puff)

Malaysian

Intro:

Karipap is a common snack that you can find all throughout Malaysia. Essentially it is quite similar to an empanada. The dough for this recipe is very similar to a puff pastry, although this dough is far easier and much quicker to prepare. You can fill this snack with anything you like but for this recipe, I decided to keep it nice and simple and add a curry potato filling. Let’s cook!

Method:

Method:

1. Lets start this recipe by making the filling for the karipap. Start by sweating off 1 roughly chopped shallot, 3 crushed garlic cloves and 1 diced tomato in a pan with a drizzle of oil. When the onions become translucent and fragrant now add 2 tbsp of curry powder, 1 tsp turmeric, 1 tbsp palm sugar, 1 tsp crushed coriander seed, 1 tbsp chilli flakes and around 8 curry leaves. Turn the heat onto medium and continue to fry until all the spices become fragrant.
2. Now add 1 tsp of tomato puree and 3 peeled diced potatoes. Coat the potatoes in the dry curry then add just enough water so that all of the potatoes are covered and are able to cook. Reduce until all of the potatoes are cooked topping up with additional water if needed. When all the liquid has reduced and the potatoes are cooked season with salt, black pepper and additional sugar if needed. Now ready, remove from the heat and place into a bowl and allow to cool.
3. Whilst we are waiting on the curried potato mix to cool we can now move onto the making the two different types of dough. Start by making the water dough. In a large mixing bowl add 400g of sieved plain flour, 20g of diced soft butter and a pinch of salt. Now make a well in the centre of the flour then add 210ml of water and combine together until the dough starts to form. Now kneed the dough until a smooth ball of dough is formed then cover with cling film and allow to rest in the fridge for 30 minutes.
4. Now to make the oil dough, begin by adding 90ml of rapeseed oil into a small pan and place onto a medium heat. Whist the oil is heating up sieve 200g of plain flour into a bowl then add 1 tsp salt and 1 tbsp sugar. Mix well then create a well into the middle of the flour then when the oil reaches approximately 120° carefully pour the hot oil into the centre of the well. Using a spoon mix the flour into the hot oil until a sand like dough is formed. Now gradually add 20ml of cold water to the dough allowing the dough to slightly cool. When manageable form the dough into a ball and cover in clingfilm. (This dough is quite crumbly at this point). Allow the dough to rest for 15 minutes.
5. Now that both doughs are ready its time to incorporate them together. Start by placing the water dough onto a lightly dusted work surface, then roll the dough into a flat circle roughly 2cm thick. Now place the oil dough into the middle of the flat water dough and fold over the water dough so that the oil dough is incapsulated into the centre then seal by pinching the dough to form a ball.
6. Shape the dough into a smooth ball of dough then roll into a flat rectangular piece of dough roughly 1cm in thickness. Now the dough is flat, roll up tightly to form a large cylinder taking care to try and roll out any air pockets that may occur.
7. Now use the rolling pin to flatten out the cylinder of dough, then roll again going from the width ways upwards to create another long rectangular piece of dough roughly 1 cm thick. (You want the dough to be long in length yet roughly 15cm in width). When ready roll the dough tightly again into another neat cylinder.
8. Tap the edges of the dough to make the cylinder neat then cut the dough into 8-10 equal slices roughly 1 cm in thickness. When all the dough is cut dust lightly with flour and set to one side.

9. To make the karipap, take one piece of the dough and roll out flat until roughly the size of your hand. Now add approximately 1 tbsp of the chilled curry potato into the centre of the dough and fold over the edges to form a crescent with the filling sealed into the middle. Seal the edges by gently pinching the perimeter of the dough then crimp to tidy up. (Make sure you don’t over fill as they may burst open when frying.) Repeat this process until all the pastry is filled and shaped then set to one side.

10. Now to finally cook the karipap, there are two ways in which to do this, firstly you can either lightly brush the karipap with egg wash and bake in a hot oven set at 170°c for approx 20-25 minutes until golden brown. The alternative way to cook them would be to add to a pan of hot oil set at 160°c and fry until lightly golden brown. When all of the karipap are cooked allow them to cool and devour! Hope you all enjoy this amazing snack recipe!

Additional notes

If you really want to make things easier then you could simply use a ready-rolled puff pastry for the dough although the benefit of this slightly different dough is the crispy crumbly dough. Instead of using potatoes, you could also try various other root vegetables such as squash, sweet potato or pumpkin…This karipap also works great with a chicken or beef filling. Have fun making karipap!

Ingredients

To make 8-10 karipap
 
Water dough:
400g plain flour
210ml water
20g soft butter
1/2 tsp salt
 
Oil dough:
200g plain flour
90ml rapeseed oil
20ml cold water
1 tsp salt
1 tbsp sugar
 
Filling:
3 potatoes
1 shallot
3 garlic cloves
1 tomato
2 tbsp curry powder
1 tsp tomato puree
1 tsp turmeric
1 tbsp palm sugar or brown sugar
1 tsp coriander seed
1 tbsp chilli flakes
8 curry leaves (optional)
salt and black pepper
water