Defrost and drain pineapple chunks.

Roughly chop the pineapple chunks and add to a medium saucepan with sugar, lemon, and vanilla. Stir and bring to a low boil.

Cook pineapple, sugar, vanilla, and lemon juice. First bring to boil over medium-high heat, stirring often so nothing burns. Then lower heat to medium low, and let it bubble and blip for 45 minutes, stirring occasionally. In the last 5 minutes of cooking, stir in cornstarch.

Remove the filling from the heat, and let it cool to room temperature. Use a stick blender to blend the jam to your desired consistency.

At one point before the empanadas come out of the oven, make the cinnamon sugar coating. In a pasta plate or wide bowl, combine the cinnamon and sugar. Set aside until the empanadas come out of the oven. Alternatively, you can brush empanadas with egg wash before they go into the oven and leave them plain, or you can skip the cinnamon, and just use granulated sugar. It’s really a matter of personal taste.

To make the empanada dough, combine the dry ingredients in a large mixing bowl to make the flour mixture: 4 cups of all-purpose flour, ½ teaspoon salt, and 2 tablespoons sugar, and then using your hands or a pastry cutter, work in the 1 ¼ cups of shortening until the mixture resembles pea-sized crumbles. NOTE: If you’d like your dough to have a yellow hue the way it does in some bakeries, you can use a few flecks of yellow gel food coloring and whip it into a small bowl with the shortening before you work it into the rest of the dough.

Add the vanilla first, and then the water 1 tablespoon at a time until the mixture comes together in a large ball. Cover and let chill in the fridge while you preheat the oven to 375F.

Divide the dough into 12-14 chunks and roll into dough balls. Press the ball of dough down lightly onto a lightly floured surface, before rolling into a rough disc. (I’ve found this dough won’t give you a perfect circle.)

Place 2-3 tablespoons of the pineapple filling in the middle of the dough circle, leaving approximately 1 inch of dough around the outside and close into a half-moon shape, sealing it shut by gently pressing the edges together with your fingers.

Gently transfer the empanada to a parchment-lined baking sheet and crimp the edges down with the prongs of a fork. (Alternatively, you can fold these up as a triangle, see the video in the blog post to learn how!)

Bake for 25-30 minutes until the empanadas start to brown around the edges. Remove

While still warm, coat with the cinnamon sugar mixture.