August 26, 2006: Non-sausage rolls

On this Saturday night Michael and I decided to create a comforting winter meal at home and watch ‘Love and Other Catastrophes’ (set at the University of Melbourne) on video. Sausage rolls have always been a comfort food for me, first because I love pastry in almost all its forms. Sausage rolls also remind me of the occasions after church when my family would stop at the bakery on the way home for pies and/or sausage rolls, and a sweet treat each for dessert. (I almost always chose a chocolate brownie: cakey, dotted with walnuts, and topped with sugary icing.)

I’d been using this recipe for meatless sausage rolls for a few years even before I went veg. It gives me whatever it is I love about sausage rolls without the threat of snouts and entrails (gross!). On this night we trialled sauce and side veg recipes from our Moosewood cookbook: the arrabbiatta sauce contains lots of tomatoes, capsicum, onions, garlic, basil and black pepper. On the side are baked turnip chips with onion, and garlic silverbeet. These proved to be perfect accompaniments to the non-sausage rolls, but next time I’ll reduce the amount of oil that the turnips are cooked in.

I’ve got leftover sausage mix, sauce and pastry in the freezer so we’ll be enjoying this a few more times before the weather warms up.

Liz O’Brien’s Non-Sausage Sausage Rolls
(This recipe was given to me by Anna Stewart, Michael’s boss from Griffith Uni. I have no idea who Liz is, but her recipe should be shared with the world.)

Combine:

• 3 eggs, lightly beaten
• 1 cup pecans, chopped finely
• 1 medium to large onion, finely chopped
• 1 vegetable stock cube
• 1 clove of garlic, minced
• 3 tablespoons soy sauce
• 250g cottage cheese
• 1 cup oats
• ½ cup breadcrumbs

It’ll look a bit like this:

Thaw out some ready-rolled puff pastry and cut it in half, into two rectangles. Spoon a line of the non-sausage mix down the centre third of each rectangle and gently roll up. Slice the rolls into halves, thirds or quarters and cut some diagonal slits along the top. You can repeat and assemble the lot now, or just do as many as you want to eat and freeze the remaining mix for later.

Glaze the sausage rolls with milk or a beaten egg, and sprinkle with sesame seeds. (I’m often too lazy to mess around with the sesame seeds.) Bake at 200 deg for 20-30 minutes, until golden brown.

Categories

• Savoury
• Cooking
• Recipes