Sausage rolls rough puff

This is a delicious, fun recipe based on this one by Gill Meller https://youtu.be/oKWNqzG0kko

A warning though - the amount of water in the ingredients for the YouTube video and the River Cottage website version (as noted by one among hundreds of positive comments) is way wrong. I’m guessing a zero got dropped off. Follow my recipe instead!

I know the recipe looks kind of long, but it’s really quick and simple once you get going. Pastry part 1 takes no more than 10 minutes and part 2 just five. And the filling is even simpler - stick everything in a bowl and mix it up.

Ingredients

Filling

• 1kg finely minced pork, fairly fatty
• A small bunch of chives, finely chopped
• 1 tsp each chopped thyme, lemon thyme, mint leaves
• 1 tsp chopped lemongrass stalk
• 1 long chilli, seeded and chopped
• 75g dried breadcrumbs
• 1 tsp salt
• Freshly ground black pepper

Pastry

• 175g unsalted butter, chilled and cut into small cubes
• 350g plain flour (about 2.5 cups)
• A good pinch of salt
• About .5 cup iced water, to mix

Assembly

• Egg wash (1 beaten egg mixed with a tbsp of milk) for the seal and to glaze
• 1 tsp each fennel, cumin, sesame seeds.
• Ground salt

Method

Pastry part 1

In a mixing bowl, combine the flour, salt and butter cubes.

Add water a little at a time until the dough comes together. I find the amount is between half and three quarters of a cup.

Roll out the dough on a floury work surface until its roughly a rectangle about 40cm by 20cm.

To get a layered and fluffy pastry, fold it longways into thirds by taking one end and folding it into the middle, then the other end folding on top of that. Make a quarter turn, and now you have a new long side, and you roll it out again.

Do this another three or four times, gradually making your rectangle shape more and more even.

Cover with cling wrap and pop it in the fridge to rest for 1 hour.

The filling

Combine the filling ingredients in a bowl and mix through evenly.

Cover and leave at room temperature for 30 minutes.

Pastry part 2

Take the pastry from the fridge and leave at room temperature for about 15 minutes until it starts to relax (you don’t want to be rolling it when it’s all stiff straight from the cold)

On a floured work surface, roll it out into a long rectangle about 2mm thick and about 20 cm by 80 cm.

Assembly

Grab about half the filling mixture and, starting at one end shape the mixture towards the middle, and about 2cm back from one of the long edges. It doesn’t have to be super even - just so long as there aren’t any gaps.

Now take the other half of the mixture and, starting from the middle, work it towards the other end.

Brush the egg wash along the long, narrow edge of the pastry.

Now fold the other edge over so that it holds the mixture snugly, tucking the pastry in towards the mixture where the two sides meet.

Trim at each end, and down along the side. I always retain the strips of pastry and any bits of filling that stick to the knife and give it to the kids to make into shapes. They’re 14 and 16 now - and they still like doing this.

Your great big sausage roll should be 80cm long, possibly a little more.

Glaze the length of it with the egg was, and sprinkle with the seeds and a little salt to finish.

To divide into 12 good size rolls, find the middle and cut right through. Then find the middle of those to pieces, and cut right through. Now you’ve got four pieces, and you divide each of those pieces into three.

Line a baking tray with baking paper (the tray I used was 40 cm by 27 cm and it all fitted perfectly). Gently place the rolls on the paper evenly, most likely three rows of four. Then place in a preheated oven at 180º C for 40 minutes, turning the tray about halfway through.

When they’re golden brown, remove the tray from the oven and use tongs to move the rolls to a wire rack to rest. This help the bottoms get crispy.

After about 10 minutes, they’re ready to serve.

Yields 12 rolls (serve two with veggies for dinner or one with salad for lunch)

Pepper beef pie

Pastry

3 sheets short crust pastry
2 sheets puff pastry
1 lightly beaten egg

Filling

4 tablespoons olive oil
2 onions, diced
1 kg chuck steak, cut into 1cm cubes
1 tablespoon tomato paste
2 cups beef stock
1 portobello mushrooms, chopped - about 2 cups
1 30g can green peppercorns, including brine
1 cup Guinness
1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
3 tablespoons cornflour
¼ cup water
salt and pepper to taste
Yields - six pies

Method

As with just about all cooking, the key thing is to start well by having everything (including the Guinness - and especially the meat) at room temperature.

In a heavy-based saucepan, fry meat in the oil a handful at a time to brown. You want a little caramelisation to happen. Set cooked meat aside.

Reduce heat and sauté onion and garlic, and then mushrooms, until soft.

Raise heat and add Guinness, bringing it to a strong boil to cook off the alcohol.

Add stock, peppercorns, tomato paste, Worcestershire sauce, then return meat to pan and simmer uncovered for an hour and a half.

Mix the cornflour in the water, and stir through the pie filling until it thickens. Remove from heat.
Preheat oven to 180º C.

Smere the pie trays with butter, and sprinkle with flour. Line with the shortcrust pastry. Place in the oven for 5–10 minutes. You want them to firm up a little, and just begin to go gold.

Remove, and loosen from the tray using a spoon, or the back of a bread knife. Spoon in mixture. Cut the 2 sheets of puff pastry into four squares each, then place over the top of the pies. Beat the egg, and glaze the puff pastry. Slice up the remaining puff pastry and do something that tries to be creative but isn’t. Glaze that too - you might as well.

Pop them into the oven for 30 minutes, repositioning every 10 minutes so that your pies are evenly golden brown.

Stock management

On a dry winter weekend, with my mornings set aside for the boys’ soccer, and my arvos free - it was a good opportunity to stock up.

One of my local butchers is the Chop Shop at Hurlstone Park. I also like Mick’s Meats on New Canterbury Rd.

With local butchers you have the advantage of knowing a few things. You just ask. When does the meat come in? Where is it from? How was it fed? The chop shop saved me a lovely piece of point end brisket for a steak and mushroom pot pie, also used for pulled beef burritos.

For the pie, and for this week’s ragu, I also asked for bones for stock. Leg bones, rib, neck, all make good stock.

The equation is 1 kilo of bones for 2 litres of water, to yield .5 litres of stock.

So, the way I generally do it is 2k bones, 4l water, yielding 2 litres of brown stock.

Roast the bones with some olive oil, a couple of onions, a couple of mushrooms, carrots and celery sticks - 180º. 15 minutes, turn, then another 10.

While this is happening, bring 4 litres of water to the boil. My pots have handy litre measurements - but that’s not essential here.

What you do is take note of how far the water is up the pot - use a wooden spoon for instance. Then add the roasted bones and veggies. Then simmer back down to the level before you added the solids.

Remove most to the solids with tongs, the strain the rest into another saucepan, keeping just hot enough to make the mixture even, then ladle into containers for storage or freezing.

That’s about 5 family meals worth, right there.

A surprise pie!

I had some bacon and eggs in the fridge, but felt like doing something other than frying, and the result was very pleasing and provided a lovely bachelor meal and tasty work lunches to boot. I can hardly wait to run it by the boys!

I’m new to the pie game, but I’m getting better at it. And so far - the boy test has been ok.

Generally you use a short crust pastry for the bottom and puff for the top, but this time I used puff all around, and really enjoyed the result.

Recipe - Bacon and egg pie

Ingredients

• 2 sheets puff pastry
• 4 rashers bacon, rind removed
• 5 eggs
• 1 onion
• 1 red capsicum
• .5 cup grated mild cheese
• .25 cup crumbled stilton (or other blue or bighty cheese)
• 1 handful green beans
• 2 tablespoons chopped shallots
• 2 birds eye chilies, chopped
• ground pepper and cumin to taste
• Butter for greasing the pie tray

Method

Preheat oven to 180º. Grease a 25cm (or there abouts) pie dish with butter.

Take 2 sheets of puff pastry and allow to thaw (no, I’m not quite up to making my own pastry yet)

Chop bacon, onion, capsicum and beans. Place in a cold frying pan on medium to low heat on the cooktop. This allows the bacon fat to render out and the flavour to distribute nicely. Sauté for 10 minutes. (If you’re feeling lazy, you can just pile everything into the pie and cook, but the result isn’t as good)

Place a sheet of pastry into the pie tray and trim the edges with a sharp knife. Stretch the pastry out a little so that there is some extra over the sides (the puff pastry will shrink a little in the oven).

Place the pie tray and pastry base in the oven for 10 minutes. By this time, the pastry will have ballooned up, but that’s ok. Poke of few holes in and pat it back down flat, then add mixture from frying pan.

Sprinkle cheeses over the top.

Take one egg and whisk in a small bowl.

Crack the other 4 eggs over the top of the pie mixture. Sprinkle chilies and shallots. Season with pepper and cumin.

Top with the second sheet of puff pastry.

Trim with a sharp knife and brush the pastry with the egg mixture to that it glistens. This will help the pastry go golden and crispy. With a fork, poke holes in the pie lid to allow steam to come out.

Return to the pie to the oven and cook for 40 minutes.

Remove when golden!