Homemade Pork & Fennel Sausage Rolls

The sausage roll you wish the bakery sold.

Why you should cook this

The sausage roll the bakery ought to be selling but isn’t. Pork mince with proper fat, fennel seeds toasted in a dry pan, a bit of chopped sage, soft breadcrumbs that have soaked in milk for five minutes, an egg to bind, all packed into store-bought puff pastry, sliced into 24 rolls and baked until the bottoms are dark golden and the tops are flaky enough to shatter. Ten dollars of ingredients, twenty-four rolls, every man at the BBQ asks for the recipe.

Use proper Italian-style pork mince (the butcher at any decent suburb in Sydney or Melbourne will do you a 20%-fat mince with fennel already mixed in if you ask). Toast the fennel seeds until they smell of an Italian deli, then crush them with the back of a knife. Don’t overmix the filling. Gently combined, just until the protein binds, like the difference between bread dough that has been kneaded right and bread dough that has been kneaded angry. Egg-wash the rolls twice, once after rolling and once after slicing. Bake at 200 fan until the bottom is a deep amber. Tomato sauce on the side, no apologies.

What to drink with it

A cold pale ale, a Tom Collins (our recipe), or a Negroni Sbagliato. Tomato sauce or your home-made chutney.

Notes from the kitchen

Pork mince with 20% fat. Lean pork makes dry sausage rolls. Egg wash twice. Once after rolling, once after slicing. Glossy crust.

The recipe

Homemade Pork & Fennel Sausage Rolls

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Prep Time 25 minutes mins

Cook Time 30 minutes mins

Total Time 55 minutes mins

Servings: 24 rolls

Course: Appetizer, Snack

Cuisine: Australian

Ingredients Method

Ingredients

  

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• 750 g pork mince (20% fat)
• 1 brown onion, finely grated
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 tsp fennel seeds, toasted and crushed
• 1 tbsp fresh sage, chopped
• 1 tsp smoked paprika
• 1 cup fresh breadcrumbs
• 60 mL milk
• 1 egg
• 4 sheets puff pastry, thawed
• 1 egg, beaten, for washing
• 1 tbsp extra fennel seeds, for the top
• Salt and pepper

Method

 

1. Preheat oven to 200°C fan.
2. Soak breadcrumbs in milk for 5 minutes.
3. Combine pork, onion, garlic, fennel, sage, paprika, soaked breadcrumbs, egg, salt and pepper. Mix with one direction for 1 minute until tacky.
4. Cut each pastry sheet in half. Lay a log of filling along the long edge of each rectangle. Roll up. Press to seal.
5. Slice each roll into 6 pieces. Place on lined trays seam-side-down.
6. Brush with beaten egg. Sprinkle with extra fennel seeds.
7. Bake 25-30 minutes until deep golden and the filling is cooked through.
8. Cool 5 minutes before serving. Tomato sauce, mustard, or chutney.

Tried this recipe?Let us know how it was!

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