Sausage Rolls Recipe

Sausage Rolls from Our Cookbook

We all love a sausage roll. It’s a staple lunchtime snack for us Brits. But as foodie innovators since 1707, we’ve given the humble sausage roll a flavourful update.

Taken from the pages of our Cookbook, this subtly spicy sausage roll recipe features the addition of port, prunes, brandy, fennel seed and cranberries. .

Ingredients

SERVES 8

1 tbs Sunflower Oil

1 small Red Onion, chopped

½ a stick of Celery, chopped

1 small Garlic clove, crushed

½ tsp chopped thyme

40ml Port

25g Prunes, pitted

2 tbs Brandy

2 tbs water

25g Cranberries

400g Sausage Meat

¼ tsp ground coriander

¼ tsp ground White Pepper

¼ tsp ground Fennel Seeds

¼ tsp ground Cinnamon

¼ ground Mace

¼ tsp salt

2 Sage leaves

1 x 320g sheet of ready-rolled Puff Pastry

Plain Flour, for dusting

1 Egg, light beaten to glaze.

The recipe

STEP 1

Heat the sunflower oil in a small pan, then add the onion and celery and cook gently until soft but not browned. Stir in the garlic and thyme and cook for 5 minutes longer. Pour in the port and simmer until it has completely evaporated. Remove from the heat and leave to cool.

STEP 2

Put the prunes into a separate pan, add the brandy and water, and simmer until all the liquid has evaporated. Put the cranberries into a third pan, add enough cold water just to cover and simmer until the cranberries are tender. Drain well. Transfer the prunes and cranberries to a board and chop roughly.

STEP 3

Put the sausage meat into a bowl, add the onion and celery mixture, prunes, cranberries, spices salt and sage and mix well. Cook a small spoonful of the mixture in a frying pan until golden brown, then taste to check the seasoning. If necessary, adjust the amount of seasoning in the rest of the mixture.

STEP 4

Take a disposable piping bag and snip off the end; we find cutting off 7cm in length gives a good size – you need the opening to be roughly 2.5cm in diameter. Unroll the pastry sheets on to a lightly floured surface and roll it out just a little across its width, so it is 1cm wider. Cut lengthways in half. Pipe half the sausage mixture down the centre of one piece of pastry. Brush all down one side with beaten egg, then fold the pastry over the sausage meat and press the edges together to seal. You should have a flat lip on one side, where the edges join. Press down all along the lip with a fork to mark it. Cut into 4 sausage rolls and place them on a baking sheet lined with baking parchment. Repeat with the remaining pastry and filling. Chill for 15 minutes.

STEP 4

Brush with beaten egg and place in an oven heated to 180°C/Gas Mark 4. Bake for 20-25 minutes, until the sausage rolls are golden brown and cooked right through. A good way to make sure they are cooked is to check the underneath; the pastry should be lightly golden.