Homemade jumbo sausage rolls

Relatively easy to make, and certainly worth the effort.  The apple sauce adds a touch of sweetness, which works well with herb-and-spice flavoured sausage meat.

Preparation time:  Around 30 minutes

Cooking time:  Around 30 minutes

Store-bought sausage rolls always feel more like snack food than a proper meal, but these homemade jumbo sausages are very satisfying.  Serve as a buffet option at a party, with a salad in the summer, or with chips for a full-on comfort food hit.

Ingredients (makes 4):

• Sausages – 6 pack (good quality, high meat content sausages ideally)
• Dried thyme – 1 tsp.
• Dried oregano – 1 tsp.
• Cumin seeds – 1 tsp.
• Fennel seeds – 1 tsp.
• Garlic salt – 1 tsp.
• Ready rolled puff pastry – 1 sheet
• Apple sauce – 2 tbsp.
• Egg – 1, beaten
• Sesame seeds – to decorate

Method:

1. Split the sausage skins carefully with a sharp knife, and empty the sausage meat into a bowl.  Add the thyme, oregano, cumin seeds, fennel seeds and garlic salt to the sausage meat, along with a grinding of fresh black pepper, then mix well. (Note: if you’d prefer not to use whole seeds of cumin or fennel, you could substitute for ready-ground spices, or you could crush the seeds in a pestle and mortar, to break them up a bit first);
2. Lay out the sheet of ready rolled puff pastry (the on-pack instructions may say to take the pastry out of the fridge to reach room temperature first).  Assuming the sheet comes in a rectangle, cut across the middle horizontally and vertically, to make four smaller rectangles;
3. Put ½ a tablespoon of apple sauce on each pastry rectangle, and spread around (but leave a small border around the edges of each rectangle);
4. Divide the sausage meat mixture into four, then shape each portion into a sausage-shape the same length as the long edge of the pastry rectangles.  Place the "sausage" to one side of the pastry, then wrap the other long edge of the pasty up and over the sausage.  When the two long-edge borders of the pastry meet, crimp the edges together with a fork;
5. When you’ve made all four sausage rolls, brush them all with the beaten egg, then put them in the fridge for 10 minutes while you heat the oven to 200C;
6. After 10 minutes in the fridge, transfer the sausage rolls to a baking sheet (you may want to line or grease the sheet to avoid the sausage rolls sticking).  With a sharp knife, make a series of little slashes along the top of each sausage roll, then sprinkle over some sesame seeds, before baking them in the over for around 30 minutes.

Homemade jumbo sausage rolls